Ratings & Reactions: Forest v Villa

[CLARETANDBLUEFOXY]

Today will be spent staring at my phone waiting for the news to arrive that he is gone. I literally feel numb to Villa right now. Disconnected. And it’s because of him. 

Edited October 11, 2022 by CLARETANDBLUEFOXY

[VillaCas]

10 hours ago, MackHaakon said:

I think the Mings/McGinn captaincy swap has seriously damaged this season. Such a stupid error of judgement and completely unnecessary.  

Unbelievable error of judgement. He should go just for this. Mings is absolute captain material and McGinn is absolutely not. How can a football professional not see that

[Robtaylor200]

18 minutes ago, VillaCas said:

Unbelievable error of judgement. He should go just for this. Mings is absolute captain material and McGinn is absolutely not. How can a football professional not see that

Looking at the players response IMO they still listen to Mings, easy as I don't see or hear SJM saying much any way 

[MakemineVanilla]

Both teams were lousy.

Forest were lousy because they resorted to cynical brutalism which they and the referee excused because they are desperate.

Villa were lousy because they allowed themselves to be dragged down to Forest's level, as they joined in the tit-for-tat.

Villa were also lousy because they didn't do the basics well enough, and their attempts at crosses were either over-hit or more often, blasted into the nearest defender.

Mings was lousy because he allowed himself to be dragged into the niggle and spite which was Forest's game plan.

Watkins was lousy because his timing, touch, and balance, have deserted him.

The referee was lousy because he allowed Forest too much licence from the outset; no doubt out of sympathy.

Gerrard showed that he had reached the final destination of all failing managers - he started with passion, went through frustration and has finally arrived at resignation.

Thanks to a fine strike by Ashley Young, Villa just about have their heads above water, but are definitely in need of a buoyancy aid.

 

Edited October 11, 2022 by MakemineVanilla

[wict01]

There is no joy to be had here. Everything that was vibrant and entertaining about us as a club has been stripped away and all we are left with is John McGinn attempting a diving header with a ball that was falling perfectly onto his left foot in the box. 

As we've said so often, what are we? Aside from utterly turgid. There's no structure or pattern of play to allow us to try to hurt teams. I'm sure I heard somewhere it was the 6th or 7th time in 9 league games we've failed to haul ourselves above 1xG? That is not the players failing to step up, it's a damning indictment of a flawed system imposed by a shit manager who needs to go back to cutting his teeth coaching the Liverpool under 21s. 

[CLARETANDBLUEFOXY]

Anyone think Mcginn’s ridiculous header was on purpose to get rid of Gerrard? Only rational thought process to such a stupid move. 

[TRO]

6 hours ago, Shomin Geki said:

There doesn't really feel like there's any adequate response to football like this.  Circumstances like this.  We had Grealish and Smith not much longer than a year ago and the wind seemed in our sails.  The waters were choppy but there was something about us, whether it was the spirit of the crew or a fundamentally sound vessel.  We don't seem to have any of these things now.  The choice, it would seem to me, is to decide whether our present circumstance can be treated as an aberration or a culmination of everything that's lead here.  I dearly hope it's the former.  The former, however, necessitates the kind of boldness, intelligence and conviction that seem currently alien to the club.  Let's see if they've still got, eh?

And as vitriolic as I've been about Gerrard, and everyone has, all very much deserved, whilst taking a step back there's something quite sad about the whole situation.  I've always loved football, playing it and watching it, and whilst I was never the best player on the pitch I felt I had a decent understanding of its dynamics and requirements.  Eventually a chronic injury was discovered that, unbeknownst to me, has kept me from playing any kind of football at all.  But the time spent on the sidelines encouraged me to really watch the game carefully, read about it, colour in parts of my knowledge that were, in retrospect, quite spare.  There was a lot I, as a 'marauding left back with an engine', didn't even begin to appreciate about the game.  I find your knowledge of the game can be quite defined by the position you play in.  I was determined to come back stronger, armed with all this tactical and intellectual nous, and add it to my game.  I had a real hunger.  Now, I've never played at any real level at all, but like all of you I would imagine, there's a dignity, an art, to the game that's, for want of a less cliched phrase, good for the soul.  Every game is important.  I lasted one game back before it was obvious how terminal my injury was and I haven't played since and never properly will.  But that hunger, that desire to fuse my physical and intellectual understanding of the game, is something I still find quite striking.

It's how I imagine former players must feel when they find themselves in the dug-out.  There's unfinished business.  There's still a fire in the tummy.  You still kick, as they say, every ball.  Now, Steven Gerrard has had a playing career full of drama, if nothing else.  A dazzlingly exciting player, that, with the exception of one very odd night in Istanbul, didn't taste much bona fide success.  That's in spite of being the hero of his boyhood club, the cut and thrust of a 'golden generation' of a national side, and coming of age at a time when the English game was evolving massively in both proficiency and popularity.  Gerrard must have seen the imports that made that happen, that heralded the Premier League 'the greatest league in the world', out-achieve him.  Maybe it baffled him.  Nobody ran as much, nobody sprinted towards goal like him, nobody 'wanted' it more.  And yet there they were, better trained, better schooled, better coached, more sophisticated and measured, more intelligent and visionary, lifting trophies and getting their moves to giant clubs and lifting more trophies.  Now Stevie G isn't an idiot, and not for want of trying, he's still managed to retain a certain fondness among the general football-loving public.  There grew something more reflective about him, even maybe a little melancholic or sanguine, in his final years as a player.  As if he realised, somewhere, that his playing style, his gung-ho army of one approach wasn't 'The Answer'.  That there was more to this game.  That what he himself was doing wasn't... enough.  Business was unfinished.  He'd have to be shrewder, wiser, more cultured and reflective, like those clever foreign lads that seemed to be... better... than him.

And this is how it ends.  Before it really gets started.  Dogshit football barely motivated by the slightest of motivational cliches.  That better, greater football that Gerrard was too busy running through to ever properly notice, that you thought maybe he'd reflected upon as his legs stopped doing what they do, that seems to remain a mystery.  Maybe even an enemy?  He didn't learn.  He's either still running about in his head, thinking every player on the pitch can run like him, 'want it' like him.  Or maybe he's stopped running and he's tired and worn and resentful.  The chase never found itself anywhere substantial.  And Steven Gerrard finds himself lonely on the Aston Villa sidelines not noticing patterns, not working things out, not attuned to player's dynamics, but still oddly occupied, but occupied with creating this imaginary finishing line, with the cheers and the champagne and the hugs, that all his running deserved.  And all he can do is repeat mantras he might have imagined if he'd been managing himself back in the day.  Managing himself to this moment.  Where he seems not to accept the truth in front of him.  Nor want to see it.  I'm very disappointed, perhaps even angry at where Aston Villa are right now, but there's also something really sad about the whole thing.  Is this all there is?

TODAY'S PLAYER RATINGS FOR STEVEN GERRARD'S ASTON VILLA (season average afterwards)

MARTINEZ 6 (6.55) You wonder what he might be thinking, spectator that he is of late?  Enough of a professional you would hope that he can see these relatively easy matches are the calm before the storm of the harder ones and won't let himself drift away with the mundanity of it all.

MINGS 7 (7.14) Decent again, totally consistent, reassuring so, but... had a slightly nasty undercurrent to his game today.  Feel there might be a naughty challenge, borne maybe of frustration, or apathy, in the not too distant future.  That Mings is not your friend.

KONSA 6 (5.55) Kept the rampaging, dagger-toothed wolves of Nottingham at bay.  Still looking woolly and eminently bullyable.

CASH 6 (6.14) Back, and after a pleasing initial jolt when reminded of his energy and enthusiasm, settled into a familiar sweaty ineffectiveness.

YOUNG 7 (7) That old cliche about a team of James Milners?  What does it say about Steven Gerrard's Aston Villa that we'd probably be better off with a team of 37 year old Ashley Youngs?  Top lad though.

LUIZ 6 (6.43) You can't be a sophisticated gentleman on a sweaty, deafening club dancefloor and likewise a composed Brazilian CM ain't gonna get any classy ladies numbers in Steven Gerrard's oil-spattered engine room. 

MCGINN 3 (4.11) I remember every time I used to watch Gaetan Bong I was amazed, from my limited vantage, how he could be playing at elite level.  I wonder if for fans of Forest, Leeds, Bournemouth... McGinn is our Bong.  He's getting worse, you know...

COUTINHO 4 (5.22) After a promising, but unproductive, couple of weeks, he's back to... oh is that Phillipe Coutinho?  He used to be somebody.

BUENDIA 4 (5.37) The decline continues.  Buzzes around ineffectually, no doubt somewhat aware of places that links should be.  Quite possibly the player most in need of Gerrard's departure.

RAMSEY 6 (5.44) How I long for football's most potently dropped shoulder to be followed by a feint, a shimmy, a charge, into somewhere other than a cluttered no man's land.

WATKINS 4 (5.13) I seem to remember some speculation that Watkins first experience of fatherhood might be negatively effecting him.  Now, has it ever been confirmed just how many kids Watkins had, and if any of them were accidentally born Blose?  Might explain things, cos otherwise .

INGS 5 (5.8) Looks old.  Like really old.  Seems to age about 18 months between each match.

DENDONCKER 5 (5) Doesn't look very good huh?

ARCHER 6 (6) Showed something.  I doubt he'll thrive given the present circumstances.

Good rendition.....something to at least, think about.

[TRO]

That display was Rancid....it was Pedestrian, it was laboured and it was of doltish proportions.

There is no sharpness, quick thinking, urgency, intensity or intelligence in this team......This team is beginning to scare me.

Ashley Young, aside, no one showed any signs of professionalism, that should be representative of our club.

I have to be honest here.....I never expected to see, some of the things, I am witnessing, from our Manager.

I don't know where we go from here......but this team right now, is getting worse, not better.

my fear, was gaining ground, the longer the game went on......I have been here before, in my Villa supporting life and it dosen't end well.

I have fought hard to resist change, but I genuinely don't know what to think anymore.....We are bereft of any semblance of hope.

 

[El Segundo]

6 hours ago, Shomin Geki said:

Now Stevie G isn't an idiot

Nice summary but I think you were a lot closer with the crayons for brains analogy last time.

[El Segundo]

2 minutes ago, TRO said:

That display was Rancid....it was Pedestrian, it was laboured and it was of doltish proportions.

There is no sharpness, quick thinking, urgency, intensity or intelligence in this team......This team is beginning to scare me.

Ashley Young, aside, no one showed any signs of professionalism, that should be representative of our club.

I have to be honest here.....I never expected to see, some of the things, I am witnessing, from our Manager.

I don't know where we go from here......but this team right now, is getting worse, not better.

my fear, was gaining ground, the longer the game went on......I have been here before, in my Villa supporting life and it dosen't end well.

I have fought hard to resist change, but I genuinely don't know what to think anymore.....We are bereft of any semblance of hope.

 

We've been trying to tell you...

[fightoffyour]

1 minute ago, Genie said:

Villa would have gone 9th if a winner was scored. 

If my Aunty was called Dave, she'd have been my Uncle.

[roonst83]

10 minutes ago, Genie said:

Villa would have gone 9th if a winner was scored. 

Our form suggests that in a few months we'll be nowhere near as close to 9th as we are presently. Yet it's increasingly likely we'll be as close to the bottom three (or worse) at that time.

We're close to 9th due to the fact we're only nine games in, not because we're doing things right. 

Edited October 11, 2022 by roonst83

[Genie]

7 minutes ago, fightoffyour said:

If my Aunty was called Dave, she'd have been my Uncle.

The point was Villa are very close to being in a much more respectable position in the league.

The football is dire though, and i’m sure we wouldn’t finish near 9th on this trajectory even if someone did lash in a 90th minute winner.

Edited October 11, 2022 by Genie

[sidcow]

2 minutes ago, roonst83 said:

Our form suggests that in a few months we'll be nowhere near as close to 9th as we are presently. Yet it's increasingly likely we'll be as close to the bottom three (or worse) at that time.

We're close to 9th due to the fact we're only nine games in, not because we're doing tings right. 

Yep, 9th will gradually move away. 18th will move closer. 

[Adam2003]

7 minutes ago, ROTTERDAM1982 said:

Not sure some of the players we thought were good , are as good as we think.

Maybe, but neutrals I talk to seem to think they are good as well. People whose view I respect look at us and say “how on earth are Villa that bad with those players?” This is friends, colleagues and also the many journalists quoted on here.

We and they may all be wrong and the past records of so many of these players may be irrelevant and they have all forgotten how to play. But before selling 20+ of them and overhauling the squad (even if we could do that) I’d be interested to see if a real manager could turn their form around. I am pretty sure they are better than Forest, player by player, as one example.

[MWARLEY2]

God i am bored by my team. Went to the England USA game on Friday and really enjoyed seeing 2 teams going at one another. Our women had so much bravery on the ball. A clear pattern to the play . An identity which gave options all over the pitch all of the time. 

The exact opposite of us. Bored bored bored 

[ROTTERDAM1982]

Define tactical creativity, and give me an example of one available with this current squad.

In the last 2 games I have seen enough examples of spurrned opportuinities,.

Watkins should have had at leas 2 against Leeds,.

[StefanAVFC]

Are you really asking for ONE example of potentially creative tactics, from a professional coach earning millions a year?

The bar may as well be underground.

[bannedfromHandV]

The results are frustrating yes, we should have won the last two games. 
 

We’re not firing in attack, obviously, but we are looking pretty solid in defence, again last night Forest did nothing of note except for put in one decent set piece which a) we should have defended better and b) was a dubious decision from the ref.

I don’t know if it’s poor coaching or the players are not carrying out the plan / simply not playing well enough or are just not good enough. We are also missing some key players at the moment.

People are going on as if we look like the side that went down 6 or 7 years ago, that team was getting battered week in week out which isn’t happening now, half of the overall approach is working well enough (defence), we just need to find a way to get it going up top.

[StefanAVFC]

1 minute ago, bannedfromHandV said:

The results are frustrating yes, we should have won the last two games. 
 

We’re not firing in attack, obviously, but we are looking pretty solid in defence, again last night Forest did nothing of note except for put in one decent set piece which a) we should have defended better and b) was a dubious decision from the ref.

I don’t know if it’s poor coaching or the players are not carrying out the plan / simply not playing well enough or are just not good enough. We are also missing some key players at the moment.

People are going on as if we look like the side that went down 6 or 7 years ago, that team was getting battered week in week out which isn’t happening now, half of the overall approach is working well enough (defence), we just need to find a way to get it going up top.

The issue is, a complete lack of plan, other than panicking because we looked SO shit in the opening games, and shutting up shop and expecting magic from players.

That isn't coaching. Why have a manager if that's all the plan is? Our squad is better than parking the bus out of panic and scoring 7 goals in 9 games against mostly poor opposition.