Villa Nearly Gunned Down But Also Nearly Get A Point

Well, Villa played with spirit. Fielding the same team put out against the Palace, Villa at least stood up and put their bodies in the right places this time when it came to defending, and had the benefit of a fair amount of luck first half, as well as two superlative saves from Martinez. Shame that he was somewhat to blame for their first goal but, at that stage, the Gunners in fact deserved to be well ahead.

In the second half, Villa were a lot better, attacking-wise, than in the first half, in which Buendia again had at least one reasonable chance to score early on.  But Villa just did not seem to have the 'extra' to create a clear-cut chance. Then, no soon as Luiz came on as a sub, he again produced his now-famous corner piece and fashioned Villa's equaliser, and that was it from Villa really. As before - Villa then soon let in their opponents to score and in fact gain their winner.

What is now very worrying is that Villa are now in 19th place and in 24 hours might even be in bottom place. Perhaps that's where Villa will be after Saturday once Haaland has been to do his demolition job. And then Villa must find the spirit - and attacking skill - to get out of the mire. The best we can hope for this season seems to be escaping relegation rather than looking to 7th place.

It's the attacking side of things that is the biggest worry after watching yet another game where the opponents were not just smarter in getting the ball back, but seemed to know what their colleagues were up to and passed accurately. Apart from Everton and possibly West Ham, all Villa's opponents this season - even Bournemouth - have been quicker, more alert and more accurate when it comes to going forward.

The Villa do not seem to have the answer in how to create chances. Even their centres invariably go to the heads of defenders. There seems to be little method: there's just spirit and dead ball chances now.

In a recent article, Ally McCoist reckons the loss of Michael Beale to his coaching team is playing a part in Steven Gerrard's current form at Aston Villa.

The revelation awhile ago that Gerrard was happy to delegate the coaching to Beale was worrying to me, and particularly so now that he's gone. It's effectively just like losing Dean Smith last season all over again as a new coach is leading them this season, albeit working to parameters that I presume Gerrard must have set.

Well, there's little else to say just now. At least we can say it was only a one-goal defeat, but the scoreline does not reveal what happened. I will doubtless have a better idea of the situation after the City match.

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Reflecting On Cherries, Eagles and Hammers

Villa's opening defeat at Bournemouth was a result of an uninspiring and poor Villa performance and it looks decidedly worse when looking at Bournemouth's (the Cherries') record since, over 3 games: 0-4, 0-3 (home) and now 0-9. Zero goals were scored and 16 were conceded in that time. Certainly, those three defeats were against three of the League's best teams, but where, exactly, does that put the Villa's pretensions to coming close to these 'best teams'?

Well, at least Gerrard has not set his sights on emulating the strongest teams in the land just yet. He decided that West Ham and their performances of the last few seasons would be the immediate target. But, lo and behold, West Ham arrived at Villa Park today with zero points on the board and zero goals to go with it. So, just how did he set Villa's tactics to face such a team, who - surely - would be short of confidence after their opening lack of success this season?

It seemed to me that Gerrard set his team up to be cautious, not trusting West Ham's position in the league. That might have been a fair approach, but it was soon apparent that there was some nervousness in the West Ham defence. Even Declan Rice square passed across to a defender and expected him to stretch for the ball with every sinew.

More speed and less ponderous thought should have produced a good lead for Villa by half-time.

Surely, a team with Leon Bailey in their attack - especially supported by Buendia - would have punished them in that first half? I think so. The trouble was he was not hauled on until only 15 minutes remained on the clock, and in those 15 minutes he, Buendia and Ramsey - while not perfect - looked at least to be making a fighting statement. 

But David Moyes is too canny a guy. Having obtained a fortuitous lead, West Ham did pretty well everything they needed to do to keep Villa at bay. Their keeper did not have one really serious save to make all match. Not that Martinez had too much to do either, except pick the ball out of the net on one occasion, unluckily beaten by a shot that had a wicked deflection on it.

Villa for me, though controlling the first half, looked so ultra-cautious. And though I thought Luiz deserved a starting position after recent displays, he again reverted to passing backwards when Villa needed to go forwards.

No player - apart from Little Phil (more later) - wanted to take full control going forward until the subs came on in the 65th minute.

So, I can imagine David Moyes thinking at half-time, "If we muster up some energy we can beat this lot!". And they did - both mustered the energy and beat the Villa. Quite deservedly too based on their performance after the interval, although Villa's defence looked competent most of the time. It was the play going forward that was the problem - Villa could not get control second half.

Digne, in fact, did one great thing in this match in tracking back and robbing Bowen when he was about to pull the trigger. For the rest of the match, Digne seemed to me to be either forever allowing West Ham to block his passes out of defence or centring the ball straight to the head of a West Ham defender, and doing this over and over again.

Despite the fact that this is the first Gerrard full season and that you would not expect everything to be not yet quite right and dusted, for me he has passed up a good chance of getting 9 points on the board so far this season. Perhaps 10. These opening fixtures were not against the top rank. And who do we face next? Oh, just the Gunners and Man City!

Just where are Villa's goals going to come from? Little Phil must surely be rested now; he does try but seems not to be up to the rigours of the Premier League in his more advanced years. Buendia is significantly more effective in my opinion, but still we are missing something in midfield, and I actually now think there is a problem with McGinn. For me he is not the player he was before Gerrard arrived and after being made to be more of an automaton, it seems to me. The captaincy is not helping methinks.

As things stand I do not think that Gerrard is good for Villa. Even as a statement of the club's aspirations, he needs to back it up with capable team selection and management. He is failing i.m.o. But if Gerrard goes, then there's also an argument that Purslow should accompany him, but it may well be that his achievements on the business side will save him from that ignominy.

Well, if Villa get taken apart by the Gunners and Man City there will surely be nothing left by way of an argument for Gerrard to stay. Continually getting rid of managers is certainly not the best way, but looking at the achievements of Vieira and Howe in such short a time I really do have to ask just how can we be so bad by comparison?

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Hardly A Trot Against The Trotters

Well, we won ... and a 4-1 result looks good for the record books doesn't it?

On the other hand, we played with a strong team against a team two tiers down in the league. What's more, up until a fortuitous goal direct from a corner after 35 minutes, we were a goal down and against a side that played with not very different movement and commitment than Palace last Saturday. Bolton - a club with so much history - was certainly up for it and a banana skin situation looked very much on the cards. They played with skill.

What for me was most alarming is that wee Phil had so much opportunity with his three chances to score first half, but put two shots straight into the keeper when given space and a free-kick that went straight into a wall. Has he lost confidence? I feel divided in my feelings about him; he's a player with proven and visible class but just can't seem to get himself going. I want him to succeed, but something isn't right just now. Last night was his big chance to get his confidence back and I'm sorry to say he fluffed his lines.

Let's take a look at the four goals we scored against a goalkeeper who was clearly not of Premier League class though he saved well on a couple of occasions:

1. Luiz's goal direct from a corner. The 'keeper was certainly not focused properly, though you have to give credit to Luiz for such a well-delivered ball.
2. A penalty. A second dead-ball goal.
3. The chance was well spotted but the 'keeper was way out of position, giving a clear chance to Digne.
4. Well, this was a coup de grace - a superlative late goal by Bailey delivered against an already defeated Bolton.

In short, only one real quality goal from open play - the last. And by then Bolton was well defeated and could have conceded another two in the final minutes, and two chances that Villa should have taken.

Archer came on too late to make a big difference, but as always his sharpness was palpable. There lies a talent that needs to be given better chances to play. For goodness sake, he scored last season against a strong Chelsea and has always shown up well.

Going forward, for me Luiz did quite well, and Bailey (coming on at 71m) again was bright and scored a very good goal. I sadly can't see enough in Ings to warrant his selection in front of Archer. Sadly, the main strikers failed to score in open play.

Coutinho I've already talked about; Buendia (71m) showed up fairly well without being a bright light. Otherwise in the middle of the park we had Kamara and McGinn giving away too many free kicks and sometimes in dangerous positions. McGinn seems to have gone backwards. Perhaps he is trying too hard to justify his captaincy?

Captaincy seems to be a burden as Mings has been almost majestic these past two matches.

In short, a good score for the record books but not enough hope in the performance to envisage a good performance against the Hammers in the next match. Midfield really is a problem, apart from the general malaise that was still apparent - particularly first half.

But, this is all part of the usual Aston Villa story. We should be used to it.

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Vieira For Manager!

I'm sorry to have to put such a title to this piece, I really am, but after that performance - hardly an improvement on the Bournemouth match - it really does beg the question as to just what is going on at VP under Gerrard. And to compare Gerrard with Vieira's record seems very relevant to me.

Vieira was appointed manager at Palace four months before Gerrard's appointment at Villa, and Palace did not seem to have progressed too far when Gerrard arrived at Selhurst Park and gained a second successive win since his appointment two weeks before.

What is poignant about that match is that Matt Targett scored Villa's first goal, but his replacement (Digne) scuffed an even better chance yesterday in a performance that was far from impressive. The penalty decision against him, however, can be claimed to be ridiculous, but that's the nature of the penalty laws these days, just like the VAR offside decision against Palace first half - equally ridiculous. Perhaps if that goal had stood it might have caused Gerrard to kick his side in the rear at half-time.

So, in this season's fixture at Palace we saw something that could only be fashioned by the creative skills of Patrick Viera: a side pulsating with drive, understanding between players and passing accuracy. By comparison, we looked like a damp squib, apart from our early opening goal and one or two other incidents. Therefore, nine months on we seem to have gone backwards and Palace has very much gone forwards, with much less financial backing. Well, Gerrard himself said that Villa took a step backwards, but I don't think he was comparing this season's match at Palace with last season's.

The first thing to look at yesterday is Villa's starting lineup. I think a lot of people were expecting Chambers to start yesterday, including sections of the press. And Konsa looked vulnerable through a lot of the match apart from one or two defensive successes. I somehow think that Chambers would have done better against Zaha to prevent that first goal. And Digne seems to get worse match-on-match (re-sign Targett!).

I thought that Buendia did OK first half, but overall did not have as much impact as he should have had, mirroring almost Coutinho's contribution to date. What did Phil do this time around after his entry in the 73rd minute? I struggle to remember any touch he had worth remembering, though he was busy.

The surprising thing to me is that the match stats showed that Villa had as much as 49% possession, but I am certain that was because of Villa's increased possession in the last 20 minutes - when they were already 1-3 down. And the Villa player that showed more ability on his entry (73rd minute) was Douglas Luiz. Further forward he looks a much better player and perhaps he should start in the next match.

Disregarding the possession stat, however, the more realistic stat is Palace's number of shots on goal - 9 as against Villa's 5 (plus Bailey's brilliant attempt hitting the woodwork). And that more indicates the true pattern of the game. It seemed that every time Palace went forward they looked dangerous. Villa's threat was very spasmodic and their players generally too easily muscled off the ball. Neither was Villa's passing particularly impressive; it certainly wasn't decisive enough.

More worrying is that Villa looked half-asleep by comparison with Palace.

So, it's time for Villa to wake up and be reminded that the season has started. But who can help them to do it?

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Gerrard

The news of Diego Carlos's injury is devastating. He may be out for six months and Gerrard must be feeling that it is an awful blow to his plans only two games into the season.

Thinking back over the years I can think of other big name signings who were totally lost to Villa within a few weeks or months of their first game - Pejic, Fashanu, Nilis to name three - but, hopefully, Carlos will come back.

Nevertheless, this situation causes me to raise the niggle that's been in my mind these past few weeks, especially after the Bournemouth fiasco. And that is that while I am able to understand the need to strengthen the team to make headway in the success stakes, I have so far failed to see why Villa's defence has been tampered with so much. 

Yes, to pass the captaincy to someone else in the team is understandable given Mings's quite blatant gaffs at times, and I am glad to see him back on the pitch putting in such a strong performance on Saturday. However, the continued omission of Chambers as a first-choice c-b worries me. What more does he have to do to get that recognition? And in the absence of Carlos I would have thought Chambers would be the clear-cut replacement, but we hear that Gerrard is out looking for another signing.

With Konsa also a good contender, how many centre-backs do we need? Hause will soon be back and was given a new contract last season with Gerrard speaking highly of him. For me, four good centre-backs is enough, especially as at least two of them are some of England's best. [Addendum Aug 16, pm: Hause now appears to be leaving for Watford, the reason seeming to be the progress of Feeney.]

What I am alluding to is that Gerrard is perhaps too keen on playing his team rather than looking more closely at existing talent. What happened to Targett is a case in point. As a respondent told me, "A player does not become a bad one overnight". As a defender, I thought Targett was well on the way to making his name, apart from a dodgy start to last season (perhaps due to lack of fitness initially), he subsequently quickly proved himself at Newcastle. What has Digne brought that is so much above Targett's contribution?

Then we have an issue with Coutinho. Yes, you can see talent being there, but how often has he contributed something solid to the team in his last 10 games or more, barring the last match of last season, at Man City. Even in the pre-season games, he failed to impress me very much. 

Similarly, Jacob Ramsey seems to be favoured, yet I feel that he does not yet have the maturity to help Villa take the next step, though he clearly promises much. I do suspect that Villa is looking for some more punch in that role, however, so perhaps a further signing is on the cards.

Archer (to me) is a different kind of youngster. He plays with alertness and speed and is always capable of coming up with a goal, which is exactly what we needed at Bournemouth. Why bring him on so late? Will he ever get enough minutes on the pitch, I wonder.

In summary, I do not feel our manager has sufficient clarity - he certainly lacks experience as a manager, in the PL at least. One of the factors he observed after his part season in charge was what he called Villa's "lack of consistency". However, has he bothered to consider that the result of a match also depends on how the opposition is set up? Surely after all his playing experience, he should be able to understand that principle and his match strategy seems strange at times.

Bournemouth was very much a case in point - they knew they did not possess a real talent to compete with one or two of Villa's ball players and therefore came out with a plan in mind based on solidity and spirit. Theirs was a team performance and that is what Villa has to learn from.

Man City certainly knew how to play Bournemouth on Saturday!

With a stats record not too dissimilar in the PL to Dean Smith, is Gerrard really the answer to Villa's needs? Perhaps I am doing him a discourtesy; a certain Alex Ferguson nearly got the boot early on at Man U, though they did give him time to assert himself along the lines of the club's objectives.

A big thumbs-up to Gerrard and Villa for obtaining Kamara, however! Now there is a freebie to savour, and I honestly think that Chambers is of a similar category.

At the moment, however, I am uncertain of the man in the hot seat at VP, but we have no option but to sit, look and wait to see how it will pan out. I was mildly enthused during the Everton match but considering their situation we do not have much real data to work on to figure out how Villa will finish this season.

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The Toffees Did Not Entirely Melt!

Everton is always welcome to Villa Park, but mainly for the reason that we generally meet them early in the season at Villa Park and get a good result from their visit to get the season rolling! 

On this occasion we had the peculiarity of our left-back conceding an own-goal, as he also did for Everton against us while still with them last season! A peculiar double.

And in fact my criticism of the Villa this week begins with Digne. I still find it hard to see a better player than Targett in him, though I admit that at the end of last season he was beginning to make a difference. What has happened since? Is this down to new tactics being played by Villa?

In fact, last week's slow and dogged performance going forward seemed to be replicated today to some degree. It could have been the heat that was at least partly to blame, but where was the Coutinho imagination to stimulate interest in the game? I did see one neat flick to create a path in the penalty area for a Villa player, but precious little else besides. But when Buendia comes on it's a different game, and although Watkins was officially given credit for his assist for Buendia's goal, it was Buendia himself who strove forward to release Watkins, who repaid the compliment.

Today's performance from Villa was 'better', but when we take into account Everton's capability - which I estimate as mid-table - it does not auger well for Villa's pretensions as a top-6 side. There appears to be a lot of work to be done before a top-6 position can be achieved.

However, as Villa have at least won this one, perhaps we should accept that Villa may be just getting used to new players and a full-scale 'Gerrard Approach'. All that may not pay dividends very quickly.

In terms of other differences to last week, I felt that the defence looked better with Mings back (though he was not perfect), and for much of the match, they kept Everton at bay. And Chambers again demonstrated that he is a real player, coming on late but still providing the concentration to provide a superlative block to prevent Everton from equalising.

Watkins also provided much positivity going forward, but again at the vital moment, a wrongly judged touch on the ball took him away from a more clear scoring chance.

Well, bring on the next match and let's see what happens. I for one will be expecting to see some improvement match-on-match to convince me that life under Gerrard is viable at Villa Park.

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Did Villa Think That Bournemouth Were Pushovers?

Gerrard was facing Scott Parker today and is due to face Frank Lampard next week - both former England colleagues in midfield. And it was Parker that showed today that he could do much better with the limited resources available to him.

The new season opened so disappointingly, the Villa conceding a goal within three minutes. The defence did not look fully awake, not at all helped by the fact that Digne was off the field unloading jewellery he should not have been wearing.

Throughout the match, the Villa looked bereft of ideas on how to prise open a resilient Bournemouth defence utilising a back-5. 66% possession and 15 shots (against their 7) does not tell the story of how sluggish Villa were, while Bournemouth were dangerous on the counter-attack.

Villa's team selection, containing Coutinho and Ings, was not my best choice, but who am I to say. Bailey looked bright enough, but he was too well covered.

Buendia's entry at the start of the second half added a bit more brightness, but it was all just not enough, proving that even an ordinary side can win when there is both method and commitment involved. Villa gave the appearance that all they had to do was turn up to win. Bournemouth had other ideas and their second goal, like the first, was mainly down to bad defending by Villa, though credit to their players for being in the right place at the right time.

The question is, therefore, why change Villa's defence of last season, which generally did well apart from the odd Mings slip-up. Somehow, however, I think that Mings would have tried harder to prevent Bournemouth's two goals today.

It could well be that Digne and Carlos will turn out to be superlative acquisitions, but when I look at Coutinho, who has now had 20 appearances in the Villa shirt, I ask whether these three players are worth the hype that they've been given? Buendia still stands out as the better option for me compared to Coutinho, and if you are going to have Ings starting as leader, would it not be better to have a three of Buendia, Archer and Bailey in support?

However, I do wonder what Chambers has to do to earn a regular spot.

Further, I do think that we still need a dominating midfielder, but perhaps Gerrard knows that.

So, will Frank Lampard also score points against Gerrard next week?

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