Aston Villa (A) | PL | Post Match Thread

[Damanino]

nothing surprised in this game. went as I expected, slow not dangerous attacks from City with little end product from attacking players. they were able to unlock all our tactical setup with couple quick runs , our setup with these players is asking for trouble. I wonder if we practice in training this that our defence need to defend huge area behind them when they put the ball behind them for a runner. quite a general situation we struggle with in almost every game yet we keep asking a very bad Lewis/Gundogan duo to read these situations before they occur. good luck with that.

I am fed up with our wingers creating nothing or not scoring ever again but partially blame is on Pep, he is asking them to receive the ball wide deep and with their back to the net and recycle it. Cash even allowed huge space there for Grealish we couldnt use, he got the balls from long balls, Cash closed him down every time, and opportunity was lost, rarely anything came from it. teams respect our wingers less and less because they provide no threat anymore. they would not do that to Sake or Salah on the right side.

this run we have is absolute brutal, any half decent team can beat us, the Forest win was a strange one, I guess we have a payback.the better sides or better managers can beat us without much risk and heavy tactical gimnastics.

Emery knew what to do, there will be much harder home 3 points for them this season than this was. but same story elsewhere.

look at Palace-City 2-2, Arsenal goes there they win 5-1 2-3 weeks later.
Sporting-Arsenal 4-1
Arsenal goes there and wins 5-1 2 weeks later.
Spurs beating us then they lose a couple on the bounce.


Pep gave two extra days off for the players after the derby loss, wonder now he gives them all week off before we play Everton. there isnt any hard work on training anyway, because if there is and this is the result what we see week in week out, I do wonder wtf is happening on trainings.

like practicing service to Haaland. or track runners in a pushed with a defence. or corners. do we practice these until nosebleed? really?

 

[Fordyboy46]

It just goes to show that no matter how many days rest we have in between games it makes not a jot of difference to performance and fitness levels. We play better when we're playing every few days in my eyes, we're generally shit when we have a week's gap

 

[hertsblue]

We should start coming out late after half time and pick up the fines as no idea what happens at half time but we are even worse in the second half’s.
Some of our defeats, we have played well bar finishing in 1st half’s but had total collapses after half time.

 

[Millwallawayveteran1988]

I really don't know what to say about today but when I saw the team sheet I knew we were in trouble. The first few minutes showed how slowly and lazily we approached the game. We seem oblivious to the idea that the opposition are going to press us like we used to press teams. Gvardiol clearly was not ready to play a game and was switched off as the game started!

Unless we change our approach we are going to lose far more games than we win, it's as simple as that. I know Pep has his principles but he simply has to change his approach NOW to save this season.

Our midfield must now be the worst in the league. It offers absolutely no threat going forward and no cover to the defence. It's a pointless midfield and something needs to change for the next game. I'm sick of watching paases going backwards than forward. It's incredible how useless it is really given the players we have.

Haaland was anonymous again and unless we sort the midfield out there's absolutely no point playing him. He offers no threat to the opposition. He's a world class player who's getting no service from a useless midfield. He needs dropping until we can pass the ball forward.

We need to resort to the absolute basics and stop conceeding goals. Until that happens were sitting ducks. I have no confidence in the defence either and are capable of cocking up.

Pep needs to have a really hard think about this now. It's not a blip, it's beyond that, we've been found out and also our squad is too injured. We cannot keep playing this passionless, slow game as it's not working now.

Pep clearly has no confidence in the players in the Academy so we might as well sell the lot of them. If none of them are better than the ones on the pitch we cannot carry this deadwood and it needs to go.

Everton is a massive game for us now. And I'm honestly not confident of winning it. If they come to us and use their pace, physicality and counter well I think they will score at least 1 goal. We are going to have to be far better than recent to match that.

Today was horrible. That second half was the worst of the lot. Dreadful performance from the team and from Pep.

 

[Big Joe Corrigan]

Why when we are training don't we just get the EDS in to play a low block and try to practice playing through it and/or getting the big man on the ball. It always looks like it comes as a complete surprise to us.

Didn’t the kids beat the first team 5-0 in training recently, or was that just a rumour?

 

[MMA]

Didn’t the kids beat the first team 5-0 in training recently, or was that just a rumour?

Haahhahahah...

Fuckin hell..

It wouldn't suprise me.

 

[chaddblue]

We should start coming out late after half time and pick up the fines as no idea what happens at half time but we are even worse in the second half’s.
Some of our defeats, we have played well bar finishing in 1st half’s but had total collapses after half time.

It used to be the other way round

Our opponents used to be dead on their feet after an hour

More signs that we have a squad full of unfit and old players that have all hit the wall at the same time

 

[Millwallawayveteran1988]

That start as well! What the fuck are we doing there. Absolutely woeful from Gvardial and only a miracle save from Ortega saved us. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

 

[The Stockport Iniesta]

Seventeen games into the season - every team is exactly where they deserve to be - no ifs, buts, maybes - half way through the season the table the table does not lie. I wouldn't make excuses for Chelsea - they're in the bracket of spend, spend, spend until the team plays as a unit. 'Unprepared' because they were overloaded with eye wateringly expensive players is not an excuse. We won that game deservedly. Megabucks sides are judged on results.

I don't think they knew their best team/tactics at the time but they do know.

Not that long before we play them at home, we'll need a huge improvement in form if we are to get a result.

 

[itisrising]

This group of players has ran through walls to get the trophy haul and put our club on the map - guided by the greatest manager of our time

This squad and I'm talking about the experienced players have all hit a brick wall at the same time - for those expecting them to go at it every year and perform like they have over the last years (whilst being pushed to the brink by both the dippers and arsenal) do you not think at some point this would happen?

For those of us that lived through the "actual" shit times, this is nothing, but the final song of a team that brought success we never thought possible coming to its end.

Yes it hurts to see it, and this season is going to be tough, real tough which will only highlight those players that have come to the end of their journey and need to move on

Here's the issue I have - we have to differentiate the players in this squad.

There are those like KDB, Bernardo, Gundo, Dias etc that have been instrumental in our success and it's hard to have any gripes with them in terms of application.

However, there's another load of players that haven't been instrumental in our success and absolutely deserve calling out. Grealish, Doku, Gvardiol, Nunes, Rico etc have not been pivotal to our success and if the senior players are having a dip, they do not/have not shown the quality to step up.

They can't behind the quality of KDB, Bernardo, Gundogan etc.