Ratings & Reactions: Villa v Man City

[NeilS]

1 hour ago, Genie said:

It’s funny cos watching the Sky Sports coverage last night they agreed there was an offside before Coutinho scored.

Then on MOTD this morning they say he was certainly onside.

Sky have a product to protect, hence why they bring out Dermot Gallagher on a Monday to defend the weekend referee cock ups that keep the favoured status quo.

[TheStagMan]

10 hours ago, Peter Griffin said:

Surely, what u have just said suggests this is not his best? There are lots of managers that take some time to adapt. Just look at Arteta now, Gunners fans wanted him and Edu dragged out of Arsenal last season. There are not too many calling for their heads now

By that logic, why did we sack Smith then?

[CLARETANDBLUEFOXY]

Hoping Brighton knock the stuffing out of Leicester today so we can literally maul them next weekend! 

[Nigel]

Just now, Keyblade said:

I wonder how much of it was simply down to the fact that we weren't getting forward as often and spent a lot of time behind the ball due to the nature of our opposition. There really wasn't much opportunity for our midfield too get pulled apart at we've seen so often this season because there wasn't much transition play. We were camped in our own half for most of it.

I thought our transition game worked much better last, probably a lot to do with having another defensive minded player on the pitch not to leave ourselves short at the back.

I thought in the second half we were not pinned back that much either.

[DCJonah]

10 minutes ago, TheStagMan said:

By that logic, why did we sack Smith then?

People ignore this logic because they didn't want him here. 

 

[Herman22]

I know a game against Man City and Leicester city is a very different proposition but one thing that’s consistent in every game is hard work and application. That should be a minimum requirement. 

One other thing, we grew into the game last night and we became more brave on the ball. We have to do that against Leicester. Get on the ball and make forward passes. Look what happened when Young dispossessed KDB and passed positively into midfield. 

I think a solid base of Kamara and Luiz will help with that! 

[TRO]

The linesman, just bumped in to me..........in specsavers.

[TRO]

3 hours ago, Robtaylor200 said:

Great result and we could see the tactics but let's hope the tactics change for other games. I wouldn't want to see us camped in our own half under a deluge of attack every game 

He said after the game, in some games its necessary to go with these tactics, we want our cake and eat it, and we are not good enough, yet, to do that.....we can't keep going gungho, and having no respect for opposing teams. We have to tighten up.

It wasn't a spectacle, but it was effective.....points don't just jump out at us, we have to fight for them, and we did.

It was a massive, shift, in mentality....lead by the evergreen Ashley Young and Tyrone Mings.

I was proud of the boys yesterday.

Edited September 4, 2022 by TRO

[TRO]

2 hours ago, Shirtman said:

Hats off to Mings. He's been put under unnecessary pressure by his manager, but was immense throughout.

maybe the manager was right then.....He seems a different player to me.....Tyrone is playing the football that got him in the England team.

sometimes a shake up, works.

[pintpotvilla]

4 minutes ago, TRO said:

maybe the manager was right then.....He seems a different player to me.....Tyrone is playing the football that got him in the England team.

sometimes a shake up, works.

Maybe a word in the Media for Mings performance from Gerrard would have been appreciated.

[TRO]

12 hours ago, The Fun Factory said:

Much better. Often with Villa we look better against sides in which we are not expected to have much of the ball. In fairness to  Gerrard he got his tactics correct today. We actually had a shape unlike last week's shambles but then again is that easier when you are expect just to be deep and compact?

City on another day could have won the game with the chances they made, though we had a few with Ramsey and Coutinho's on-side goal. City are a good side and I expect them to win the league. I can't see Jack getting much of a run out for them this year but that's isn't my problem. Still doesn't stop me disliking them and what they are doing to the game. They are still just a nothing club.

Young made a difference when he replaced a struggling cash. His tackle on Haaland really got the crowd going. Rolled back the years. 

Hopefully we can take his point and move on but knowing Villa who knows.

It can't always be.....heads you lose, tails you lose.

But it wasn't another day, it was yesterday, and we played a game we had to play, and done it well.

One of the things you have to do when playing a better opponent, is put DOUBT in their mind and we did, we did at Arseanl too, until we succumbed to another piece of suicide defending....Arteta's face, after we scored.

City, didn't win because they wasn't good enough on the day to beat us.....and we could have done with some better touches and better officiating.

some of the things Villa Have been criticised for, we made a better fist of, yesterday.

Lets see, if we can build on it.

[TRO]

5 minutes ago, pintpotvilla said:

Maybe a word in the Media for Mings performance from Gerrard would have been appreciated.

Maybe, yeah.

I thought the boy was immense.

[onmeedson]

Ashley forever Young was the turning point yesterday, what a game for a 37 year old to come out and lead us as club captain with Martinez making a decent captains role when needed. Mings played well up against a big man and looked far more relaxed concentrating on his own game, add to that 30% more effort by most players when they started to believe and watkins forever running gave their defence a torrid time. Have to say it again Ashley Young was the best player on the park.

[TRO]

1 minute ago, onmeedson said:

Ashley forever Young was the turning point yesterday, what a game for a 37 year old to come out and lead us as club captain with Martinez making a decent captains role when needed. Mings played well up against a big man and looked far more relaxed concentrating on his own game, add to that 30% more effort by most players when they started to believe and watkins forever running gave their defence a torrid time. Have to say it again Ashley Young was the best player on the park.

1000% right.

Ashley was that leader, they all gained belief from......He was the Roy Keane, the Patrick Viera.

What a tremendous performance, and it clearly rubbed off....best Game I've seen Dougie play.

It was dogged, it wasn't pretty, but this city team are the best around, what was we expecting to be like the old Barcelona.....It was a magnificient shift in belief, doggedness, commitment and a willingness to compete.

I was actually proud of them.

That was like watching, the old Ron Saunders teams.....for a sheer refusal to be mullered.

[BOF]

Kudos to the 42 people who voted Gerrard's performance on the day to be "average" or below, after a draw with Manchester City. The bias is strong with you

[sne]

3 minutes ago, BOF said:

Kudos to the 42 people who voted Gerrard's performance on the day to be "average" or below, after a draw with Manchester City. The bias is strong with you

I mean we set up defensively as all teams do against Man C. We played tight and stayed deep allowing them to have the ball the whole game. We had something like 70% passing accuracy and that was pretty much defenders passing other defenders. We had 1 shot on goal and that went in (offside that wasn't an offside not counted).  9 times out of 10 this approach doesn't work against City, but it's the only realistic way that will ever work for a team in our position.

He started but finally took off McGinn and we looked better for it. Young had a great game after coming in due to injury.

But yeah, by Gerrard standards this wasn't average. It was much better than the usual stuff as we didn't leave a massive hole in the middle or on the flanks for once.

[KangarooVillan]

15 hours ago, Jas10 said:

Dropping McGinn would really help us…

I wonder… would Ramsey be the right fit for LW?

Bailey RW…

Buendia/Coutinho ahead of the double pivot?

Luiz has to play…

This - by no means am I saying Ramsey is as good, but his strengths are quite comparable to Grealish who thrived off LW.

Surely has to be a 4-2-3-1 now - Luiz and Kamara seem capable enough in the 2 with those LW and RW roles pushing back hard defensively. The 4-2-1-2-1 Gerrard played yesterday basically seemed to be a 4-2-3-1 with extra steps.

[OutByEaster?]

i haven't read this thread yet, so apologies if I'm just repeating stuff that others have already said.

Firstly, it was wonderful to come away from Villa Park feeling positive again, even if it was only a draw. There have been a number of posts this week in various threads and on twitter of people denigrating the atmosphere at Villa Park and casting envious eyes at other grounds - I think yesterday reminded those people of just how special Villa Park can be when it gets going - the second half yesterday compares favourably with just about any ground in England. It's a wonderful arena for football.

In terms of the team, I think there are two or three positives that we can take for the manager - firstly, in the Arsenal game and in this game, it's pretty clear that these players are playing for him. Individually against Arsenal and yesterday, each and every player gave their all; in terms of application, effort, commitment, energy and heart, I don't think you can fault any of them.

His job is to make sure that effort is expended in positive ways that help us win - against Arsenal and for most of the season I thought he let the players down a little, they worked hard for him, but they were working really hard to do things that weren't having the right impact on games, working hard in the wrong areas of the pitch or working hard at the things they're individually weakest at - he made big strides in getting that right yesterday.

He did that largely by finally giving up on one of his key principles - that McGinn, Ramsey and Coutinho can all play together - by removing one of his three eight/tens he immediately made us look much more solid - Ramsey playing on the left of a slightly narrow front three wasn't ideal, but the shape was better - McGinn had more freedom to be himself, Watkins had more space to attack, Bailey had room to come inside and I thought Luiz and Kamara were excellent in ticking us over and starting off everything good we did.

And finally, what was good is that the crowd appreciated that, they could see that we were better formed, better organised and better positioned - he had his name sung and he was applauded at the end of the game - an outcome I'm not sure I expected going into the day.

I'm in the out camp, I'm not sure about him, but he has given himself a little bit of an opportunity, For Steven Gerrard, there are now things he needs to do - firstly he needs to recognise that we seem to play better when the other team attacks us; when we get to counter attack, he needs to set us up for that, rather than long bouts of awkward possession around the opposition box. He needs to see that the Luiz/Kamara partnership is absolutely crucial to keeping us solid in games and he needs to get over himself with Tyrone Mings who is our best centre back by a country mile. He needs to recognise that he can't play all of his favourites in one team and that we can only afford to start two of McGinn, Ramsey and Coutinho (or for that matter Buendia) and he needs to work on developing the relationship with a fanbase that can make a noise that will help a group of players that are working hard for him.

If he can manage all that, and he can beat Leicester, I may even consider letting him continue to manage our football club.

For the game itself, I thought that a number of players played really well; Martinez, Mings, Young, Luiz and Watkins were excellent.

Haaland is a monster and I thought Mings dealt with him really well, he got into a little bit of a personal battle with him, which often works out badly for Mings, but here I thought he did it in a really controlled way and he got into Haaland's head a little bit - the most positive result of that being that Haaland decided to try and play against Mings rather than Konsa - it protected Konsa a lot and watching the two giants throw each other around was fun. I mean, he did still score, but frankly looking at him in this City side, keeping him to one goal in a game might be seen as a positive result.

Luiz didn't play like a man who had spent a lot of time thinking about Arsenal this week - I think it's probably in his nature that things don't bother him much, he seems mentally very balanced and like not much knocks his confidence, and I thought he was excellent both with and without the ball. He was busy all day and the ball he played for Watkins after Ashley Young's great work against De Bruyne was sublime - I don't think that pass got enough credit.

And how 'bout that Ashley Young? He physically out fought De Bruyne on a run, out paced and and out strengthed Phil Foden on a few occasions and played the game like his mind was running two steps ahead of everyone else. For a man that's 72 years old, it was an incredible performance and he thoroughly deserved the singing of his name that went on outside the Holte End and Under the Trinity Road way after the final whistle. He still looks like he's got as much energy as anyone - just fifteen years and seven months after his first game for us.

A final word of individual credit should go to Ollie Watkins though, his running throughout the game was exemplary - I'm not sure what he's fuelled on, but his ability to make lung bursting run after lung bursting run after long balls into the corners is extraordinary - from the first minute to the 95th he gave the rest of the team a simple out ball and an option - under pressure? Bang it into the corner for Ollie to chase. At the back with no options? Bang it into the corner for Ollie to chase. I thought he worked like an absolute trojan for the whole of the game. Impressive.

The referee was diabolical all day, managing to ensure that at every opportunity City were handed the advantage; ignoring shirt pulls, pushes and fouls and then committing his coup de grace by preventing the Coutinho goal. It has over the last few years become increasingly difficult to believe that the game is honest and that the need for the league to maintain simple narratives and consistency amongst the brand leaders doesn't play a part in the decision making of the officials that it employs. Given the way we operate it, it's hard to believe that VAR wasn't introduced to protect the TV show and ensure that advertisers and sponsors never again have to deal with the confusing emergence of a Leicester style aberration or a year where Man Utd aren't in Europe. I can take a bad referee, I can take inconsistency, I can take incompetence - but the level of consistency in decisions that are wrong and only favour certain teams is almost impossible to ignore.

That said, correct or not, I don't think a 2-1 win would have been a fair reflection of the game - City were the better side and with a bit more luck and better finishing could have finished with a comfortable win - that they didn't was down in no small part to the effort and endeavour of our players and a much improved showing by the manager. I'd like more of that.

In the bigger picture, I long for the days where we don't celebrate a draw at Villa Park against anyone. It'll take a lot of improvement and a lot of effort to achieve that dream, but I thought this performance was a reminder that we are still travelling in that direction, even though the journey isn't aways as smooth as we'd like.

Onwards and upwards.

 

 

 

 

[Villatillidie95]

Thought it was a really spirited performance by the boys and something which i definitely wasn't expecting. We were disciplined and although city dominated the ball we were able to maintain our shape for the most part and after the first 30 mins and first half, i thought we were able to compete well with them in midfield. our movement and passing was better than in previous games aswell. Obviously there is a huge gulf in class but we showed that we could get something out of the game.

I think the key thing now is we need to build on this and take another step forward, not go back like we do too often. The next 4 fixtures are a great opportunity and we simply have to seize it. I feel like Gerrard needs to get 2/4 wins as a minimum, there is no excuse not to get that with the squad we have. even that would be quite disappointing, and i hope the team can take some confidence from their performance yesterday going into the Leicester game. They are bottom of the league, our mentality has to be we are going there to win.

UTV

[ender4]

41 minutes ago, sne said:

I mean we set up defensively as all teams do against Man C. We played tight and stayed deep allowing them to have the ball the whole game. We had something like 70% passing accuracy and that was pretty much defenders passing other defenders. We had 1 shot on goal and that went in (offside that wasn't an offside not counted).  9 times out of 10 this approach doesn't work against City, but it's the only realistic way that will ever work for a team in our position.

He started but finally took off McGinn and we looked better for it. Young had a great game after coming in due to injury.

But yeah, by Gerrard standards this wasn't average. It was much better than the usual stuff as we didn't leave a massive hole in the middle or on the flanks for once.

Yeah I can see why average would be ok here. He did what any decent manager would have done against Man City and it worked. Did he do something better than the average Premier League manager?  

Of course he was miles better than his own average, but that’s not saying anything useful.

Oh and this is the first Villa match this season I didn’t watch, so I can only go off the match thread, MOTD and general comments on this forum.

Edited September 4, 2022 by ender4