Ratings & Reactions: Villa v Man City

[VillanousOne]

Poor first half, but magnificant second with plenty of really improved individual performances, hope Bailey isn't crocked again

[The_Rev]

Saw enough there for optimism.  Manchester City are one of the best teams on the planet right now, we hung in there and the second half performance was a good reaction.  Some big performances too, felt Cash, Young, Luiz and Ollie all played very well. Buendia looks increasingly confident and Carney & Sanson will be happy with their cameos.   
 

The Gerrard project is looking good. 

[Talldarkandransome]

1 minute ago, Phil Silvers said:

No disgrace in this, they are light years ahead of us, SG and co said the right things at half time which got a bit more out of us. Emi2 improvement but obv more to come. 

Nice to here a few boos, anyine with a problem with is from cloud cuckoo, you don't sell your soul to the devil and expect to have your arse kissed, **** him.

probably the best Mike Dean performance I've seen, barely hindered the game 

Exactly this, Villa Til I Die was excellent response to Grealish, a few boos and even some clapping. I was personally shouting f off at the telly, but that's just me. I'm glad I'm Villa

[osmark86]

Just now, VillanousOne said:

Poor first half, but magnificant second with plenty of really improved individual performances, hope Bailey isn't crocked again

he hasn't exactly set the world alight so I don't mind us rotating him. honestly though, he does seem very fragile which is a bit of a worry.

[AVTuco]

3 minutes ago, sheepyvillian said:

I thought that. Tbh, it feels like it isn't the first time that's happened. 

Unfortunately I agree. This hasn't been his season so far. He hasn't been bad... but we need him to fetch us some points by himself, and he hasn't done that.

[It's Your Round]

Much improved second half, bodes well for the future. Watkins much better, Douglas-Luiz with a top performance, Chukwuemeka so unlucky near the end. 

[mikeyjavfc]

Good performance in the end, showed a lot of fight and spirit but lacked a bit of quality and ball retention. You can feel that the new patterns and systems still haven’t completely sunk in yet but it’s very promising after only 2 weeks. I know it’s city but we need to have more possession than that against them in the future. The graphic showed 29% after about 70mins. But overall pleasantly surprised and it definitely wasn’t the usual capitulation against city.

[osmark86]

Just now, Talldarkandransome said:

Exactly this, Villa Til I Die was excellent response to Grealish, a few boos and even some clapping. I was personally shouting f off at the telly, but that's just me. I'm glad I'm Villa

I was sitting a little bit more quietly. I'm also glad I'm Villa

[tonyh29]

After 4 mins I feared the worst

After 43 mins I feared 5-0 would be a good result for us

so fair play to the manager and players for digging in and despite  the views of the commentators on Amazon , causing City a lot of problems in that second half.

Luiz looked good out there and I thought Sanson gave us a few glimpses of what he might be able to bring to the team. Mings seemed to be getting abuse in the match thread but I thought he put his body on the line all the way through that game 

and Mike Dean didn’t make the game all about him … big surprise there 

i get he’s young etc but I don’t think Chuck is going to fit the Gerrard system , he just seems way too laid back , didn’t press enough… I think  he needs a few years to develop I hope he does it with Villa and doesn’t get blinded by the talk about clubs eyeing him up.

Leicester look beatable at the moment , let’s hope we can turn them over on Sunday 

Edited December 1, 2021 by tonyh29

[BleedClaretAndBlue]

Luiz, Young, Marv, Ollie brilliant. Good second half, far too nervous first half.

They just have far too much even for the top sides. To have any chance they need an off day and you need to be at 100%.

Thought Jack was going to cry. He made plenty of young Villa fans cry, so good. All 4 sides screaming VTID was the perfect response to him coming on.

Onwards and upwards. Fancy us against Lesta

[WakefieldVillan]

We won the second half and probably deserved to as well, on another night we may have got a point. 

Proud of every one of them, lots of positives. Only real negative was Bailey, who had a mare. 

[Brumstopdogs]

5 minutes ago, Mozzavfc said:

Disappointed with how much Mike Dean let them get away with. Constant fouls, and no cards

[Talldarkandransome]

That City team could win 7-0 next week, and that's the bare bones apparently.

[foreveryoung]

Think Foden would have made the difference for them, so glad he didn't get a game.

Great second half though, if we started like that, we may have got something.

Shout out to Luiz, Sanson, Buendia, they have all got some skills, need to see it a bit more consistent.

[TomC]

What can you say? We went against a better team, maybe the best in the world, and came up only a little short. We will win a lot of matches playing the way we played today.

I thought Gerrard got the tactics right. (It looked entirely different than anything I ever saw us do under Deano.) The first 25 minutes or so, as much possession as City had, we denied them space to threaten the goal. It seemed like Gerrard wanted to funnel the ball along the side, put up a wall of three parallel to the touchline, and then swarm another 2-3 players behind the wall to plug any gaps. It was effective. Plus, we tried to play out with confidence rather than hoofing long balls. The players were committed to the cause and put their best foot forward.

The first goal, City exploited the weakness to swarming one side of the pitch. Sterling played a diagonal ball to the opposite side. We had players within range to stop them, and you can argue that maybe Bailey could have challenged Dias better, maybe Targett should have gotten his head to the ball, maybe Martinez was a little out of position. But Dias’s finish was world class.

We had to push more players forward chasing the lead. For City’s second, Mings went a little too far forward, and City punished it ruthlessly. I knew as soon as the ball got near the centre line that we were screwed. Again, a world class finish. Plenty of players could have scored there; Silva had all the time in the world. But most players would have settled to play two touches and tap it in. Silva decided to do it with style, and he succeeded.

We were good going forward when we had possession. No mindless balls up the wings like we often saw with Deano. Dougie had more license to roam forward and seemed to enjoy it. He was excellent.

Watkins was excellent holding up the ball, not to mention the first goal; much better than against Palace.

Nakamba gave the best performance I’ve seen him give in a Villa shirt. If he keeps playing this way, maybe we won’t have to buy a DM. My MOM.

Buendia had a few good moments, but was frustrating at others. Par for the course, I guess. When Chuk came on, the two of them seemed to read each other well.

Speaking of Chuk: Gutsy of Gerrard to put him in when he did. Still green, but he didn’t look bad.

Cash’s defending really impressed me. He gave the ball away too easily going forward though. Konsa was excellent today too.

The flip side to Dougie going forward was that McGinn seemed more withdrawn. He did not influence the game like he did against Palace.

Young; How many other players can go from forward to fullback in the same match? And he looked good at both. His experience shows. What a signing.

We didn’t get to see too much of Sanson, but you know the phrase “head on a swivel?” I like the way he is always looking around.

Ref: Not often you can say it, but outstanding. No cards and the match was completely under control. He let some stuff go, but was consistent (sure, they got away with some stuff, but we got away with some stuff too).

Best of City: All of them? It’s easy to hate them because of the way the team was assembled, i.e. brute force spending of money that wasn’t earned in the game. But if you didn’t know how the team was assembled, they’d be pretty admirable. I do have to say that we made them look mortal in the second half, though.

 

[KillieVillain]

Brave 2nd half performance , almost nicked a point  but even in defeat you can see the improvements Gerrard and coaching team have made to the team .  

[The_Steve]

Jack looked rattled when he getting ready to come on - did he think the fans would also lay on the red carpet? He tried to pass it off with a wink but it clear as day.

[mikeyjavfc]

Also we lost to a deflected shot that found the bottom corner and an absolute worldie that 99% of players would have shanked row z. Hardly soft goals to concede and we could have been luckier with both.

[SuperTed]

 Villa till I die for 10 mins straight when that little shit same come:

we were brilliant. Deserved a point.

 

im drunk sk forgive me but, f*** that money grabbing whore 

[CLARETANDBLUEFOXY]

These sorts of games will expose the deadwood ready for a big January transfer window! We did ok. Lacked quality up front and that was the glaring difference. They had two world class goals and we were like bambi on ice up front. I’m confident we can push on but we need a bit more class.