Steven Gerrard

[Sulberto21]

8 minutes ago, NeilS said:

So 8 wins from 16, that's a decent return of 50% win rate and it could have easily been better but for a couple of duff results against Leeds 1st game, Newcastle and Watford. Hopefully given time and pre-season to really drill the squad, Gerrard and his team will be able to reduce the duff performances and we will be really pushing the top 6-8 positions next season.

For me it’s the Brentford loss and Leeds draw which rankle as we were cruising especially the Brentford one.

Newcastle and Watford we didn’t create much although Ollie’s goal was legitimate against the barcodes. 

[KentVillan]

Really starting to believe in him - he’s finally found a way of getting Ings and Watkins to look convincing together, and his signings Coutinho, Chambers and Digne look either world class (Coutinho) or at least very very good.

My only note of caution would be we’ve had *relatively* easy games, so be good to see how we handle our upcoming run of fixtures, which look nasty. But Gerrard will no doubt be treating these as 6 pointers - an opportunity to climb up the table.

Edited March 11, 2022 by KentVillan

[gwi1890]

14 minutes ago, Sulberto21 said:

For me it’s the Brentford loss and Leeds draw which rankle as we were cruising especially the Brentford one.

Newcastle and Watford we didn’t create much although Ollie’s goal was legitimate against the barcodes. 

I mean we had 20 shots on goal in both those games vs Newcastle and Watford I believe and dominated possession ,but only 1 shot on target, we’ve had 9 shots on target in our last 2 .

[NeilS]

6 minutes ago, Sulberto21 said:

For me it’s the Brentford loss and Leeds draw which rankle as we were cruising especially the Brentford one.

Newcastle and Watford we didn’t create much although Ollie’s goal was legitimate against the barcodes. 

I had forgotten the Brentford match to be honest. The Watford one was a game we should have won, but we didn't turn up that day which was frustrating. The Newcastle game I can understand, as Newcastle had just started to turn their season around and it was always going to be a tough one up there.

I hope the games we don't turn up to will become less and less common, and I hope that Gerrard will be demanding greater things from the squad and won't accept that. From his time at Rangers his results improved drastically as time went on, until he left to come here. I think his win rate in the championship winning year was ridiculous at something like 80%. I am not expecting that level of success, but anything over 50% win rate over the course of a season would be a big step up for us.

[Zatman]

9 minutes ago, gwi1890 said:

I mean we had 20 shots on goal in both those games vs Newcastle and Watford I believe and dominated possession ,but only 1 shot on target, we’ve had 9 shots on target in our last 2 .

We had 11 shots vs Newcastle and one on target which was a free kick

[YouUnastanFren]

When teams cottoned on to stopping our two 10s and our results turned sour I started to fear he was a one trick pony.

Changing to the 4-3-1-2 and getting some great performances and results has put that fear to bed.

His next big test will likely be using the depth of the squad to keep intensity levels high until the end of the season but I'm very hopeful he's up to the task.

[Rodders]

I'm beginning to think I might have jumped the gun in deciding he was no better than tactics tim 

[ender4]

4 minutes ago, Rodders said:

I'm beginning to think I might have jumped the gun in deciding he was no better than tactics tim 

What's impressed me the most is that he tried a certain way of playing.   It didn't work, so instead of just keep going and hoping it does eventually work, he tweaks things to cover the problems with his first way of playing. 

[CVByrne]

9 minutes ago, YouUnastanFren said:

When teams cottoned on to stopping our two 10s and our results turned sour I started to fear he was a one trick pony.

Changing to the 4-3-1-2 and getting some great performances and results has put that fear to bed.

His next big test will likely be using the depth of the squad to keep intensity levels high until the end of the season but I'm very hopeful he's up to the task.

It was more than just the formation change, he changed how the full backs played. Newcastle were the team to beat us tactically and Watford followed the same blueprint. Block the midfield and force the attack to come from wide (which is the full backs) then counter into the space vacated by them. 

In Gerrards system from later Rangers he wants positional rotation from his front three. So a 1 2 becomes a 2 1 depending on different phases of the game. But Buendia is more a player dropping deeper to pick up the ball and in this congested midfield we had against Newcastle and Watford it was hard to get the ball into the attacking areas. So it was like 4 4 1 1. 

I think the switch to 4 3 1 2 was down to opposition. I can see a 4 3 2 1 returning for more difficult games. I also think if we had a top class CDM the 4 3 2 1 would work better as Buendia can drop deeper to pick up the ball but he needs Ramsey and McGinn getting past him forward. Which they can now do more of due to the change to how full backs play and even more so next season if we have the safety net of a quality CDM. 

The more I think about it the more I see big futures for Buendia & Bailey in the system. Bailey can operate in the 1 2 and 2 1 positional rotation. Buendia can become a key link player dropping deep, think how Kane does this for Spurs dropping into his own half to pick up the ball and 4/5 players are further up field. 

 

[gwi1890]

26 minutes ago, Zatman said:

We had 11 shots vs Newcastle and one on target which was a free kick

Thanks, and over 60% possession, we weren’t good enough but I agree but we should have come out of that game with a win.

[PaulC]

Listening to him after the match you know he really knows the game and adapts his tactics for each game 

[sheepyvillian]

14 hours ago, AV82 said:

I agree. Funny that, after the majority of fans ripped into his thick accent when he was announced.

Since when does a scouse accent preclude intelligence? You would think the majority of Villa fans being from Birmingham, they would be a bit more understanding about such negative stereotypes. 

 

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by sheepyvillian

[Dale]

1 hour ago, PaulC said:

Listening to him after the match you know he really knows the game and adapts his tactics for each game 

Hmmm... Took a while for him to adapt the old tactic to this one in relation to roles of FBs and CMs. That is a change that won't be reversed, the 2 up top isn't the change that helped us, it was the FB and CM roles - maintaining those you can play around with the front three in any which way, including more width etc. but the performance of the Central Midfield will always be better. Luiz has looked great since he hasn't been responsible for the entire Midfield with CMs covering the flanks. 

[TRO]

16 hours ago, R.Bear said:

Plenty of people will need to eat their words tonight 

Its just a few games and consistency is yet to be secured......but surely folk can see the control he has in interviews, the Nous he emits and the measured comments that make so much Sense...always consulting his people, involving them, praising players and ALWAYS taking responsibility when we lose, its always on him...that takes a strong manager to say that and mean it....for me, he is a William Wallace, maybe a Bill Shankly in the making......now wouldn't that be nice.

This guy has been a winner as a player and we can all see the winning mentality he exudes as a Manager......I was sure from the start, and the Newcastle and Watford games wer set backs.....there will be more, but the gaps between wins ( the losses) will get less and less.

I see next season a real drive for Europe.....and we have the people to lead that drive.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

Love Emis quotes about him, saying he is very calm, but when he talks, they listen. When it's game time though, he's aggressive, says he reminds him of Arsene Wenger.

Ringing endorsement there.

Then again, EMI also said Grealish was like Messi with a left foot, or something like that

[Demitri_C]

Wasnt we something like 2 points away from relegation zone before gearrd came in? Now sitting in top half. So as much as we liked deano shows was correct decision to make the change 

So far two appointments under nswe and both have been decent appointments.

Beats the days of lerner when we were appointing losers like mcleish and sherwood. Or under xia RDM and fistface 

 

[messi11]

Listen 

Gerrard is the worst manager we've had since Dean Smith

[Tom13]

He needs to learn how to use a squad and when to freshen things up.

[nepal_villan]

Most of us called him out on bombing the fullbacks forward and he corrected. Hopefully next he'll learn to rotate his squad and use his bench earlier.

[VillaChris]

Just now, nepal_villan said:

Most of us called him out on bombing the fullbacks forward and he corrected. Hopefully next he'll learn to rotate his squad and use his bench earlier.

He was doing it right at the start of his reign so I don't get why he's reluctant to do it now.

Can remember Leicester at home, we were winning 2-1 and he put I think Sanson and Carney on at exactly the right time to freshen things up and we comfortably saw out the game. Also played a good second half v Man. City making a double change.

I really hope he hasn't fallen back into the trap of thinking Watkins + Ings must start every single game between now and the end of the season due to them playing a couple of decent ones in a row. Ings did nothing today apart from hitting the post.

Much rather look at different options behind CF and in midfield starting with Arsenal at home.