Ratings & Reactions: Leeds v Villa

[Thug]

17 minutes ago, ozvillafan said:

My enduring image of Stevie G tonight was seeing him continually frustrated on the sideline by missed chance after missed chance....

... as if he couldn't do anything about it. You know..... like turn around 180 degrees, look at your bench and find 1 of 2 strikers wondering what it would take to get a guernsey

 

This is exactly it.

 

It’s very easy to point the finger at Watkins and say he needs to be tucking one of this chances away.

But the point is that he knows just like everyone else what Watkins is good at and what’s he’s not so good at.

He is sacrificing a finisher for a worker, because he needs that to make up for other inadequacies because of how the team is laid out.

[TheMightyVillans]

1 hour ago, ozvillafan said:

My enduring image of Stevie G tonight was seeing him continually frustrated on the sideline by missed chance after missed chance....

... as if he couldn't do anything about it. You know..... like turn around 180 degrees, look at your bench and find 1 of 2 strikers wondering what it would take to get a guernsey

 

Exactly. I said it in the match thread. He was throwing his arms around in disgust at watkins missing probably his 5th chance yet decided to leave him on the full 90 and bring Ings on with just 10mins to go. He only has himself to blame. Guy has no clue what he is doing.

[chappy]

7 hours ago, Indigo said:

It's probably been mentioned but for what it's worth I fully agree with Marsch criticising Villa for killing time in the first half. How on earth have we sunk to a level where we're wasting time against Leeds at every available opportunity in the first half of a game to maintain a 0-0 scoreline. Genuinely embarrassing. 

I thought it actually had the desired effect of winding up their fans and therefore their players to the extent that one got himself sent off. Unfortunately we didn’t capitalise on it.

[sidcow]

12 hours ago, R.Bear said:

You cant blame Gerrard for that one. It was just shocking quality and decision making in the final third. That wont stop everyone piling in though.

Yeah, I mean it's not as if it was within his power to take off Watkins and bring on Ings on say 60 minutes, or give Archer a run out against struggling opponents, or try half a dozen other things a competent manager would try against a poor 10 man opposition. 

Gerrard simply didn't have those options the poor guy. 

Edited October 3, 2022 by sidcow

[John]

We have tightened up at the back, despite our injuries, but we carry no threat up front whatsoever. A point was the minimum expectation last night, but that was before they went down to ten men and we should really have done better inside their box, given the possession we had in and around it. Had Coutinho's lovely effort gone in, rather than striking the post, we may well have gone on to a comfortable win and as SG said after the game it was two points lost.

Watkins can't buy a goal and if he's to start for the work he puts in, then it should be at Bailey's expense in my opinion (who frustratingly failed to show again), rather than that of Ings, who might actually score the odd goal. That would also make Archer along with Bailey our first attacking options off the bench. Still on the bright side it's a third game unbeaten, we're out of the bottom six and October has for a long time, not been a good month for us, so it could have been even worse.  

[Sulberto21]

4 hours ago, Thug said:

This is exactly it.

 

It’s very easy to point the finger at Watkins and say he needs to be tucking one of this chances away.

But the point is that he knows just like everyone else what Watkins is good at and what’s he’s not so good at.

He is sacrificing a finisher for a worker, because he needs that to make up for other inadequacies because of how the team is laid out.

The thing is Archer is also a worker it’s just that he works in better area’s than Watkins to score goals. 

Gerrard should have bought on Ings 5/10 minutes after the red card and then given Archer 20 instead of Watkins. 

[CVByrne]

We created the chances to win the game yesterday. Frustrating our attacking players - especially Watkins - can't finish the chances.

Need to go and win at Forest now. We need to get the results and move up the table. Home to Chelsea then we've Fulham and Brentford. We need to be 7 or 8 points from those.

I saw more attacking threat from JJ and McGinn yesterday a little beginning of a change in how we are going to use the 8s? I think the only way forward for us is attacking 8s

[limpid]

13 hours ago, fruitvilla said:

Ramsey, a quiet game except for the moments he was exciting, I think I prefer to see him on the left. @limpid please note it's Ramsey, that's two weeks in a row now.

Your turn to create the thread next match..

[Nigel]

10 hours ago, Indigo said:

It's probably been mentioned but for what it's worth I fully agree with Marsch criticising Villa for killing time in the first half. How on earth have we sunk to a level where we're wasting time against Leeds at every available opportunity in the first half of a game to maintain a 0-0 scoreline. Genuinely embarrassing. 

Tbf we only tried to kill the clock when Leeds were gathering a head of steam. We really are going through the full dark arts handbook.

[sidcow]

14 hours ago, Wainy316 said:

As bad as we are under Gerrard, this one is on Watkins

So why wasn't he withdrawn? That's 100% on Gerrard. Everyone could see it needed to happen except him 

[R.Bear]

2 hours ago, sidcow said:

Yeah, I mean it's not as if it was within his power to take off Watkins and bring on Ings on say 60 minutes, or give Archer a run out against struggling opponents, or try half a dozen other things a competent manager would try against a poor 10 man opposition. 

Gerrard simply didn't have those options the poor guy. 

Watkins was getting in good positions. Ings was anonymous when he came on. Bring on Archer for who? We had two strikers on the pitch already.

What "have a dozen" things could he have done? Don't use generalities like that and actually say something useful, seeing as you're clearly such an experienced tactician.

[Zatman]

9 hours ago, Podster said:

I can not understand how people are defending SG and blaming the players. Its Gerrards job to do the work off the pitch with the players, so when they are on the pitch they dont play like they did today. He simply is not doing his job, it is his fault we play the way we do. Yes players can have an off day, but the whole team is playing crap almost every week, and every one says this is the best squad we have had in a long time. It's about time the powers in charge hear the voice of the fans. If we had acted sooner (before Chelsea) then we could have possibly lured Potter, but that ship has sailed so we need to act now or we will be swapping SG for another left over manager that nobody else wanted.

Vs 10 men.you have to stretch the pitch and since we dont play width we relied on a 37 year old and a centre back as the attacking full back options

[wedge]

I must be either absolutely mental or witnessed a different game to most yesterday evening. Judging by the reaction you'd have thought we got hammered, admittedly there are bigger questions such as have we progressed under Gerrard (I'd argue we've gone backwards if anything) but commenting solely on the 90 minutes we saw yesterday I really don't think we were bad at all!? We didn't set the world alight but it's a tough old place to go and we stood up to them, battled well and if we could hit a barn door we'd have won comfortably. Despite what the over-dramatic football twitter jellyfish and wannabee vloggers/bloggers blue ticks post, we aren't going to win every game 5-0 playing a hybrid of 2010 Barcelona/1970s Brazil unfortunately.

[Zatman]

1 minute ago, wedge said:

I must be either absolutely mental or witnessed a different game to most yesterday evening. Judging by the reaction you'd have thought we got hammered, admittedly there are bigger questions such as have we progressed under Gerrard (I'd argue we've gone backwards if anything) but commenting solely on the 90 minutes we saw yesterday I really don't think we were bad at all!? We didn't set the world alight but it's a tough old place to go and we stood up to them, battled well and if we could hit a barn door we'd have won comfortably. Despite what the over-dramatic football twitter jellyfish and wannabee vloggers/bloggers blue ticks post, we aren't going to win every game 5-0 playing a hybrid of 2010 Barcelona/1970s Brazil unfortunately.

We played against 10 men for about 50 minutes yesterday if include the added time. Its a team that stayed up on the last game of last season and wont be near the top 8 this season

We also had 37% possession vs 11 men

[R.Bear]

5 minutes ago, wedge said:

I must be either absolutely mental or witnessed a different game to most yesterday evening. Judging by the reaction you'd have thought we got hammered, admittedly there are bigger questions such as have we progressed under Gerrard (I'd argue we've gone backwards if anything) but commenting solely on the 90 minutes we saw yesterday I really don't think we were bad at all!? We didn't set the world alight but it's a tough old place to go and we stood up to them, battled well and if we could hit a barn door we'd have won comfortably. Despite what the over-dramatic football twitter jellyfish and wannabee vloggers/bloggers blue ticks post, we aren't going to win every game 5-0 playing a hybrid of 2010 Barcelona/1970s Brazil unfortunately.

You're right, we werent bad yesterday and should have won.

But everyone hates Gerrard and any game we dont win gives everyone a chance to do what they love most with is froth at the mouth and complain. Just as they will with the next manager and the one after that.

[wedge]

1 minute ago, Zatman said:

We played against 10 men for about 50 minutes yesterday if include the added time. Its a team that stayed up on the last game of last season and wont be near the top 8 this season

We also had 37% possession vs 11 men

Show me a team apart from perhaps Man City that goes to Elland Road and dominates possession? Regardless of league position they're absolutely all over you with their pressing and give you next to no time on the ball, we matched them physically which is the bare minimum and we had 19 shots with 7 on target so there's the issue. If Watkins had finished his chances we'd all be gushing over it.

[AVFCDAN]

Just another result that you would expect from a team who will finish 14-16th.

Something needs to change or this season is already a write off.

[wedge]

Just now, R.Bear said:

You're right, we werent bad yesterday and should have won.

But everyone hates Gerrard and any game we dont win gives everyone a chance to do what they love most with is froth at the mouth and complain. Just as they will with the next manager and the one after that.

You're right, we'd employ Poch and within 6 months @AVFCTransWatchTweet1 etc would be starting the #PochOut trend after we draw away to Everton or something.

 

I have a strong suspicion a lot of these bed-wetters would have been posting the same about Deano 12 months ago...

 

To clarify, I never called for DS to be sacked, and still don't believe we've got any better under SG, if anything, I think we're worse.

[Demitri_C]

It literally feels like a defeat. I swear we played like we were with 10 men not against 10 men.

Why he didnt up the intensity and go for it ill never know. 

Watkins should have been removed after 50 minutes. He was just absolutely hopeless.

[Delphinho123]

Just a Monday morning reminder to all that Gerrard took the captaincy off Mings and gave it to McGinn. 

That actually happened.