I know some of you love stats, so here’s a cracker I found.
Brighton’s last three home wins have all come in different years.
Ok, how’s that work then? I had to ask myself and on reading found this;
The last home win was against Spurs at the end of january just gone.
Previously the only win they got at home in the whole of 2020 was against Arsenal last June.
And the last one before that was against Bournemouth in December 2019.
Perhaps it’s just me but as someone who doesn’t really care much for stats, I find that astounding. One home win in a whole calendar year!
So tomorrow should be easy and it’s a foregone conclusion; We’ll win comfortably.
Squad news and on our part we’re all good.
Only Hause and Wesley are unavailable., which I still find surprising, given the time of year.
Is that indicative of players itching to play, as opposed to wanting to hide or just being wusses, I wonder?
Whatever, it’s good news.
As for Brighton, Adam Webster is a doubt because of an ankle injury as is Davy Propper who had a groin issue.
Both will be assessed late on.
We’re still waiting to really see Sanson, but I don’t see him starting this game.
I think a lot depends on how Dean Smith judged Ross Barkley’s kicking the bottle incident when he was subbed off last time out.
I saw certain opinions, where it was expected that Smith would read the riot act at Barkley.
I don’t subscribe to that at all and if I was Smith, I’d probably have called him in for a chat, explaining how I was sympathetic, explain why I did it and tell him that while I understand, it’s not good to show disagreement in public.
And then tell him he’ll back in for the next game.
Oh and then tell him that if I want to sub him, I will, simple as.
End of story and back to work.
We’ll no doubt see, but I’d be surprised if Barkley has been punished and been dropped.
I just don’t think Smith works like that.
The side showed plenty of energy last time out, so I can’t see him changing it at all.
If Smith is nothing else, he’s very predictable isn’t he?
Find your best eleven and stick with it. it’s certainly worked well up to now, so you can understand it.
I watched parts of Brighton’s game against Leicester and they looked okay to me, but they were away.
Their home record is somewhat weird, but we all know that if a team is doing extremely badly in some area or has had a really bad run, Villa are usually the best possible team to face to end that run.
So while we ought to be able to count our chickens here, I’m banking on nothing.
I’m just really glad we’re not facing Brighton like Spurs were and the home club hadn’t won in over six months.
I think I’d have been betting against us!
As it stands, I think we’ll get something at least.
In what I expect to be another good game (are we involved in any other kind these days?) I’m going for a win.
2-1 to the Villa.
COYL!
We are absolute crap
Actually we are worse than crap
How are Brighton not ahead?
Barkley, McGinn and Traore could all easily be subbed off.
I don’t remember the last time we looked so disorganised and it’s like none of them have ever played together before.
Press us hard and it’s like we’ve never played the game before,
Hopefully a major bollocking coming up at HT.
At least McGinn is putting in a shift. Barkley is just a waste of space at the moment. He might as well be wearing a blue shirt – perhaps he thinks he’s still playing for Everton 🙂
Good job we have Martinez
Well that was as poor a half as I’ve seen. Feels like West Ham all over again. Need to get sanson on for barkley to try and add some energy as all he’s done is give the ball away. Traore too, needs a kick up the arse. Watkins barely had a touch. Grealish getting marked put the game again.
Barkley doesn’t deserve to be on the pitch second half. Grealish has been poor too. A major bollocking is required. No-one providing any support to Watkins. McGinn and Luiz have had to put in a shift defensively because the trio of Grealish, Barkley and Traore are non existent.
It doesn’t help when you have a centre half who can only play one ball forward. Konsa has never attempted a pass up the wing to Traoré. If he can’t dump it of to Cash he squares it to Mings. That why Traoré has no service.
Whole of our left sided attack is completely predictable, so no surprise Brighton’s defence is set up for it.
Hope that’s cramp and not a hamstring
Agreed, OLL.
And teams have got wise to us.
We need to look to play it down the right much more to balance it up.
Cash off, Elmo on.
Shit.
Having said that, there’s not much happening down the right anyway.
Just awful
The space we’re giving them around our box is a disgrace.
Shocking performance all round 🙁
We’re even worse if that’s possible.
Once again Smith appears to be devoid of ideas as to how to change things.
Appalling performance – worst of the season.
This is pathetic now
All but Martinez been crap tonight. Can believe in wasting my Saturday night in this
Barkley off – and not before time
Welbeck to score then?
Emi looks like he’s thinking “who are these idiots in front of me?”
Not just Martinez saying that, I think the whole of the defence is asking what the rest of the team have actually contributed?