wazzap24 Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 I've no idea why people still try to argue otherwise. Because they have a different opinion maybe? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 (edited) And if we had Matic, I guarantee you there would be people on here complaining that he didn't effect the game enough. Except there wouldn't be because Matić actually does protect the defence. Matić's contribution isn't judged primarily on the debatable and vague concept of 'ticking over'. Your claim is that all defensive-midfielders are underappreciated which is nonsense. Matić is universally rated as one of the best at that role in the world. Coquelin's importance since coming into the fold this season has been recognised by most. Edited April 26, 2015 by Isa Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keyblade Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Claiming that Westwood is the same type of midfielder as Matić is absolutely ludicrous. Agreed, except nobody's done that? If Ashley Westwood's job is to protect the back four and pass it to the players to cause damage then he has undoubtedly done an abysmal job at that. The tables show that, the results show that, the chances created show that and I've no idea why people still try to argue otherwise. Incredibly faulty reasoning. Using your logic, the tables and results show that Ron Vlaar is has done an abysmal job at defending his goal. I don't know how you can watch the game at the Etihad and argue that he isn't at least competent at sweeping up in front of the back for and distributing the ball to our attacking players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woodytom Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Claiming that Westwood is the same type of midfielder as Matić is absolutely ludicrous. Agreed, except nobody's done that? If Ashley Westwood's job is to protect the back four and pass it to the players to cause damage then he has undoubtedly done an abysmal job at that. The tables show that, the results show that, the chances created show that and I've no idea why people still try to argue otherwise. Incredibly faulty reasoning. Using your logic, the tables and results show that Ron Vlaar is has done an abysmal job at defending his goal. I don't know how you can watch the game at the Etihad and argue that he isn't at least competent at sweeping up in front of the back for and distributing the ball to our attacking players. Yep, there's been very few shining lights over the last few years. None consistently. That's why once again, we are down the bottom all season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Claiming that Westwood is the same type of midfielder as Matić is absolutely ludicrous. Agreed, except nobody's done that? "The Westwood's of this world" followed by listing Matić as a player that would be equally underappreciated. It's quite clear how it would read like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wazzap24 Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Claiming that Westwood is the same type of midfielder as Matić is absolutely ludicrous. Agreed, except nobody's done that? "The Westwood's of this world" followed by listing Matić as a player that would be equally underappreciated. It's quite clear how it would read like that. In true VT fashion, you picked up on one player I mentioned and made the whole point about Westwood not being similar to Matic, not about the overall point. But hey ho, you are right - Matic and Westwood are not the same player. You win. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Actually I addressed the overall point - which seemed to be that every type of defensive-midfielder would be underappreciated by our fans - above. So I'll reiterate, if Westwood actually did defend well, your initial point may have been valid. Yet even his biggest supporters on here accept that he doesn't possess the capabilities to play that role. Also, I'm happy to openly admit that I was never a fan of Petrov either. Well, during the MON years anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ozvillafan Posted April 27, 2015 VT Supporter Share Posted April 27, 2015 Actually I addressed the overall point - which seemed to be that every type of defensive-midfielder would be underappreciated by our fans - above. So I'll reiterate, if Westwood actually did defend well, your initial point may have been valid. Yet even his biggest supporters on here accept that he doesn't possess the capabilities to play that role. Also, I'm happy to openly admit that I was never a fan of Petrov either. Well, during the MON years anyway. I'm not a huge fan of Westwood - but he does defend well. You won't see him sliding in or dispossessing their attacking mid (often) but you will see him taking positions to limit their play and tracking them well. He offers a good screen and an easy out ball for the defenders - which is exactly what he should be doing. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 I disagree. Although you are right that it is not all about tackling/dispossession, Westwood lacks defensive awareness in general. He usually leaves a great deal of space inbetween the lines and on the edge of our area. He is also weak at tracking opposition runs, especially into our box. As the stats show, he isn't a strong interceptor either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobzy Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 I disagree. Although you are right that it is not all about tackling/dispossession, Westwood lacks defensive awareness in general. He usually leaves a great deal of space inbetween the lines and on the edge of our area. He is also weak at tracking opposition runs, especially into our box. As the stats show, he isn't a strong interceptor either. I disagree again, then His defensive awareness is pretty good in general. The positions he takes up when the opposition are around our box are pretty much always correct. The game against Liverpool (in particular) highlighted this. Since you've brought up stats, statistically he's the player in our squad who makes the most key passes, the most through balls and also has the most clearances of any player who isn't a defender. All of these point to him being defensively aware and positionally strong. He isn't in the same mould as Matic because he's not a defensive midfielder - he's a deep lying midfielder. His job isn't to be the demolition man and break up play, it's to provide a link between the defence and the rest of the team. He's not a world beater or even one of the Premier League's best midfielders, but he does an important job for us which is highlighted even more so by Sherwood's apparent ambition to get the ball forward quickly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Risso Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 Westwood has been more than OK for the last two games, and hasn't been the problem. Against Liverpool their only goal came as a result of some horrible play by Okore, and against Man City it was Enckelzan, Bacuna and Richardson who need to hold their hands up. The midfield is performing as well anything I've seen from a Villa team since the days of Milner and Co. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobzy Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 Westwood has been more than OK for the last two games, and hasn't been the problem. Against Liverpool their only goal came as a result of some horrible play by Okore, and against Man City it was Enckelzan, Bacuna and Richardson who need to hold their hands up. The midfield is performing as well anything I've seen from a Villa team since the days of Milner and Co. I can see where Lambert was coming from when setting us up to retain possession. Not that this was the right thing for us (evidently) but all of Westwood, Cleverley, Delph, Sanchez, Grealish, N'Zogbia, Gil and Cole are technically good players. We're starting to see how well this works now that we're getting the ball forwards quickly. All of them (perhaps Sanchez and N'Zogbia aside) seem comfortable playing one-touch passes on to the next man and I've noticed a lot of our current attacking play stems from keeping the ball in tight areas. On the whole, it's a joy right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 (edited) I disagree again, then His defensive awareness is pretty good in general. The positions he takes up when the opposition are around our box are pretty much always correct. The game against Liverpool (in particular) highlighted this. Since you've brought up stats, statistically he's the player in our squad who makes the most key passes, the most through balls and also has the most clearances of any player who isn't a defender. All of these point to him being defensively aware and positionally strong. He isn't in the same mould as Matic because he's not a defensive midfielder - he's a deep lying midfielder. His job isn't to be the demolition man and break up play, it's to provide a link between the defence and the rest of the team. He's not a world beater or even one of the Premier League's best midfielders, but he does an important job for us which is highlighted even more so by Sherwood's apparent ambition to get the ball forward quickly. Deep-lying midfielder, defensive-midfielder. It's all semantics. Regardless, he plays the midfield role with the most defensive responsibility. In his own words, it is his job to protect the defence. On the whole I don't believe he does this well for reasons given. Seemingly most others don't believe he does either thus the repeated calls to play him further forward previously. Edit: He's often likened to Petrov and that is the best comparison in my view. I struggled to rate Petrov (under MON) mainly due to his lack of ability to close space. He split opinion in pretty much the same way and I think it will always be the case regarding Westwood - just not my cup of tea, so to speak. Edited April 27, 2015 by Isa 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Risso Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 In the last three matches, we've outplayed Spurs, Liverpool and Man City, and only some horrendous individual errors and awful officating stopped us winning yesterday. I've softened my view on Westwood, because like most of the rest of the squad, he's upped his game since that blithering idiot Lambert left, and more than justifies his place in the team. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 In the last three matches, we've outplayed Spurs, Liverpool and Man City, and only some horrendous individual errors and awful officating stopped us winning yesterday. I've softened my view on Westwood, because like most of the rest of the squad, he's upped his game since that blithering idiot Lambert left, and more than justifies his place in the team. Liverpool represented another level of performance from him, I wouldn't say the others have. Also, he didn't play against Spurs. Even if I accept what you say, it requires a bigger sample of games for me to change a view built up over seasons. I'm not calling for him to be dropped, to be clear. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omariqy Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 I agree that these last few games has been the best I've seen our midfield perform since the MON days. We have a good system in place with good protection, good energy (Delph and Cleverley) and creativity (Grealish). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Risso Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 In the last three matches, we've outplayed Spurs, Liverpool and Man City, and only some horrendous individual errors and awful officating stopped us winning yesterday. I've softened my view on Westwood, because like most of the rest of the squad, he's upped his game since that blithering idiot Lambert left, and more than justifies his place in the team. Liverpool represented another level of performance from him, I wouldn't say the others have. Also, he didn't play against Spurs. Even if I accept what you say, it requires a bigger sample of games for me to change a view built up over seasons. I'm not calling for him to be dropped, to be clear. No, fair enough he didn't play against Spurs, but my point was really that Sherwood has got the midfield as a whole performing to a consistently high standard. This is in itself a huge turnaround from Lambert's time, when to a man I'd have given them a free transfer at the end of this season. I'd be delighted now if we spent £8m on Cleverley, and I'd give Westwood a new contract. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dudevillaisnice Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 Yeah i'd probably agree with that and I was one of the most vocal against Cleverley. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted May 2, 2015 Share Posted May 2, 2015 In a half where Benteke and Delph will rightly get the plaudits, he's been absolutely outstanding. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isa Posted May 2, 2015 Share Posted May 2, 2015 That was an extremely assured performance. Positionally as good as I've seen him from a defensive aspect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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