Ratings & Reactions Villa 0-0 Chelsea

[Cracker1234]

It just shows how good we played today when a Chelsea fan says

A bit of respect to Villa would be nice, cos they worked hard and could have even scored late on and got all three points.

Glad this one is over.

Might have been a lot better for us if Heskey or Gabby had been on the field, but if they had plays back from injury too they might have scored.

Draw was fair, but I can't wait till Houllier can bring in his own players and play with some of the ones we already have....I CAN'T WAIT!!!!!!! I will though, well I don't have much choice.

[rjw63]

Carew let the rest of the team down tbh. Fonz was ok

Really? Were you drunk? Carew wasn't nearly as bad as most are saying, and I don't remember Delfouneso actually touching the ball

[Gringo]

Carew let the rest of the team down tbh. Fonz was ok

Really? Were you drunk? Carew wasn't nearly as bad as most are saying, and I don't remember Delfouneso actually touching the ball

You're a dying brand Rob, you lot standing up for Carew.

Thought he played a good game first 25 mins, seemed to be carrying his right leg after that. But still quite influential for the first half. Can't understand the lazy label.

[darrenm]

Carew let the rest of the team down tbh. Fonz was ok

Really? Were you drunk? Carew wasn't nearly as bad as most are saying, and I don't remember Delfouneso actually touching the ball

Carew was pretty bad. I'm not the biggest Delfouneso fan but he was OK, he did have a few decent touches.

[claret75]

Good defensive team performance tonight, did a good job limiting Chelsea's chances, but had to sacrifice attacking to do it, but couldn't be helped.

Haven't re watched the game on TV yet, so difficult for me to rate the players. Not sure on my MOTM, difficult to pick one from a pretty good all round team effort, but maybe Collins.

Good to see Ireland playing even if he isn't 100%, showed some good vision, which we've lacked in the last year or so and looks like he's going to link up well with Young.

Overall, considering problems at CB, upfront and with a new manager - 8/10.

[markavfc40]

Stand out performers were Petrov and to a lesser extent Downing. Stan once again put himself about, broke up play well and spread the play well. Downing put in a good shift both going forward and chasing back.

Draw was a fair result. After a lively start from us I thought for the last 25 mins of the first half and the vast majority of the second we were on the back foot. Having said that we restricted Chelsea to only a couple of chances which is some going against them. Had Reo Coker been blessed with a brain as well as a great engine then we would have won. Knew he wouldn't take that chance though.

Crowd very quite for most of the game especially first half was was a little disappointing.

[smetrov]

Warnock was my MOTM today - not usually much of a fan - but thought he was outstanding.

Coker - also played very well with some biting tackles.

Although we passed the ball about nicely - to much of this was stroking the ball about without ever really hurting chelsea - yes it was pretty to watch - but a lot of it was very ineffective. It early days but I think this slow build up play wastes the talents of ashley young.

We had 2 early chances today - then it was another 80 minutes before we managed another shot on target

[Hanky]

Carew let the rest of the team down tbh. Fonz was ok

Really? Were you drunk? Carew wasn't nearly as bad as most are saying, and I don't remember Delfouneso actually touching the ball

I also agree with this.

[kurtsimonw]

How come ALL the 50/50 balls on top of some of the Refs decisions went to Chelsea?!!

Ido think he was shit but it wasn't that one sided.

He booked that young lad of thers for winning the ball from Beye, not only that but it was Beye that jumped into him!

[Oddsox]

"Really? Were you drunk? Carew wasn't nearly as bad as most are saying, and I don't remember Delfouneso actually touching the ball" COPY QUOTE - i don't know how to do all that copying stuff this late on a Saturday

RJW - i think the 5.30ko must have meant extra time at the cider farm?

1) if you thought carew was ok - or acceptable - or anything but very very poor

2) De Fonz won every header in the last 15 mins & was the reason Villa had a late goal threat & a bit of pressure with a few corners. With Carew on, the ball was coming straight back. Foz winning headers meant they were turning & running to their own goal & dragged Villa up the pitch.

Apart from his effort in the second minute, I cannot remember Carew contributing one positive single thing to whole the game.

[Spl1304]

Fair result. Saying that if our three chances fell to malouda, anelka and essien i think they would have taken two for sure. Oh Well, theres not a single Villa fan that would not have taken a great point before the match.

[Hanky]

Habib Beye probably had one of his best games in a Villa shirt as well today. Was a decent selection as he did well against the pace of Cole I thought. Helped that Downing was working hard on that side as well.

[bickster]

Friedel - 8 - Hard to fault him really

Warnock - 7 - decent game

Dunne - not on long enough to rate really

Collins - 8 - solid

Beye - 5 - he's a bit cack really isn't he

Young - 6 - not at his best today, not a bad performance but he can do much better

Downing - 9 - MOTM - was involved everywhere

Petrov - 8 - couple of silly passes aside he was great today

NRC - 7 - Mostly Dr Jekyll but sometimes Mr Hyde still came out to play

Ireland - 5 - still seems out of sorts to me, he's yet to convince me

Carew - 5 - didn't take his chances and unfortunately thats what he gets paid to do

Subs

Clarke - 8 - Great game off the bench, did little wrong

Delfouneso - 6 - didn't really get into the game

Sidwell - not on long enoug to rate

Was a decent team performance, solid at the back and didn't let Chelsea run through us in the middle of the park but we did lack the vital spark up front.

One thing that did but bug me though was Young coming back to full back position to get the ball from Friedel, please stay up the pitch Ash and let Warnock pass the ball to you where you can do damage to the opposition.

ANother thing, has Carlos Cuellar been disrespecting the entire French nation in training or something? First of all he gets overlooked for Dunne again, then with Luke Young out he doesn't step in at right back either and we play Beye who quite frankly makes Cuellar seem like Zambrotta, then when Dunne goes off injured Clark comes on. How do you go from being Man of the Match against Wolves to not getting in the team given those circumstances, very odd if you as me.

Thought the ref started off well but then just started making silly decisions.

I think we were marginally the better side but lacked that cutting edge up front so the 0-0 draw was probably what we deserved, solid defensively but lacking in front of goal

[Mantis]

The only thing that worried me today really was all the injuries. How many players injured now? Heskey, Gabby, Dunne, L Young, Albrighton...

[AVFC-Prideofbrum]

Oh and I thought the Ref was pretty good. 1/2 small decisions wrong, perhaps a little card happy for BOTH sides, Essien's and McEcheran's cards were laughable especially the latter.

Can't expect a Referee to get every single decision right just like you don't expect a player to have 100% passing rate or score every chance.

[theunderstudy]

I wpuld like to point out I did have a pop at a few Chelsea fans about those comments.

Saying that, most were fairly respectfl of Villa.

[Ponky]

I think McEachran was booked for having a funny shaped head.

[rjshare]

Friedel - 8 - Hard to fault him really

Warnock - 7 - decent game

Dunne - not on long enough to rate really

Collins - 8 - solid

Beye - 5 - he's a bit cack really isn't he

Young - 6 - not at his best today, not a bad performance but he can do much better

Downing - 9 - MOTM - was involved everywhere

Petrov - 8 - couple of silly passes aside he was great today

NRC - 7 - Mostly Dr Jekyll but sometimes Mr Hyde still came out to play

Ireland - 5 - still seems out of sorts to me, he's yet to convince me

Carew - 5 - didn't take his chances and unfortunately thats what he gets paid to do

Subs

Clarke - 8 - Great game off the bench, did little wrong

Delfouneso - 6 - didn't really get into the game

Sidwell - not on long enoug to rate

Was a decent team performance, solid at the back and didn't let Chelsea run through us in the middle of the park but we did lack the vital spark up front.

One thing that did but bug me though was Young coming back to full back position to get the ball from Friedel, please stay up the pitch Ash and let Warnock pass the ball to you where you can do damage to the opposition.

ANother thing, has Carlos Cuellar been disrespecting the entire French nation in training or something? First of all he gets overlooked for Dunne again, then with Luke Young out he doesn't step in at right back either and we play Beye who quite frankly makes Cuellar seem like Zambrotta, then when Dunne goes off injured Clark comes on. How do you go from being Man of the Match against Wolves to not getting in the team given those circumstances, very odd if you as me.

Thought the ref started off well but then just started making silly decisions.

I think we were marginally the better side but lacked that cutting edge up front so the 0-0 draw was probably what we deserved, solid defensively but lacking in front of goal

how can you rate downing and beye so far apart? you are the only person on this entire thread who has said anything negative about beye and i thought he was no worse than any other player in the side bar carew. carew certainly had room for 5 points of improvement but i cant see what more you could realistically expect beye to have done playing against such talented opposition. as a unit downing and beye worked well so i cant understand how you can effectively only credit one of them with a good performance.

as for cuellar, i know it seems unfair on the surface but houllier is obviously trying to get the team to pass the ball more and retain possession - and cuellar has got to be the most guilty player in the entire squad of hoofing/poor passing/poor control. i can see why he would be considered behind beye and clark in the pecking order despite him being probably the best out and out defender out of the three. total football was not about having the best defender in defence it was about the entire team being able to play as a unit and follow a system. perhaps a bit harsh on cuellar because he hasnt let us down or done anything wrong but now we have a manager who actually has an idea about tactics/playing style there are inevitably going to be some collateral casualities within the squad.

[PaulMcgrathsknees]

NRC was man of the match.

Clark looks good, but nearly did us with some (at least 3) very dodgy passes.

Carew knackered after 60mins again.

Fonz was a huge disappointment. How people think he was winning headers I'll never know. 2 at the most and one of those was flicked out rather than on! At least 50% of Carew's headers hit one of our players (normally Ash).

Chelsea knew Petrov would always go sideways and he played himself into difficulties because of it.

Not enough movement from Ireland.

Downing was man possessed in the first 45!

Could have won it, could have lost it. A point at the start of the day would have been taken.

[AValon]

Fair result.

Thought both sides were lacking certain key players and defensively our boys worked their conkers off. Strange game, because there could have been a fair few goals, had Ireland/ Reo Coker and both sets of woodwork not transpired to get in the way. I thought we showed glimpses of how GH wants us to play, particularly in regards to keeping possession and when we did you could see that it stopped Chelseas freeflowing style.....I expect that to get even better the more the season goes on.

Shame the Hesk never played, because JC looked jaded and disinterested after twenty minutes. He used to hold the ball up brilliantly, but yesterday so many good moves were broke down because he gave the ball away cheaply. I would also have liked to see Albrighton, had he been fit, because Cole was definitely not at his best.

All in all, pleased with the result.