Hello.
I hope we all had a great Christmas and let’s hope it’s rounded off with another Villa win today.
I’ve left it a bit late, as I haven’t been sure what to think, hence it’s a bit of a brief one.
Straight into squad news and little has changed. Injury-wise Torres, Mings and Barkley are all still out and tobe honest, I’m not quite sure I believe our manager with his injury updates. Perhaps his wording is somehow lost in translation, but I thought he said “a couple of weeks” over a couple of weeks back?
Evan Guessand is at the AFCON, which I’m hoping will do him a favour, in taking a break from the demand sof the Premier league, which frankly has looked beyond him up till now. Anyway, again, he’s no major loss, in my opinion.
And then Jadon Sancho is available again, after not being eligible against Utd.
As for Chelsea, it doesn’t matter much, with their addiction to signing loads of players somehow meaning they’re not having FFP issues. It wrankles that some clubs seem to be able to sign who they like while we have to sell if we want to get someone in, but it’s old ground, that’s been covered many times.
Whatever, Jorrel Hato is ruled out, but the good news for them is that Jamie Gittens, Liam Delap and Estêvão Willian are all available again. Levi Colwill, Dário Essugo, and Roméo Lavia are all long term absences, but when you have dozens to choose from, they’re not exactly short of players.
Yes. I’m annoyed.
So while I’ve been scarily optimistic and somehow freakishly correct with my predictions over the last weeks, so that run comes to an end for me.
I think today is the day we come unstuck.
It’s not so much that I think Chelsea are better than us. But they are a good side and they have that home advantage, which I think gives them the edge.
my heart says we can get a point, which I’d be incredibly happy with, but my head says this is a 2-1 loss, which is what I’m going with.
The one saving grace is that Chelsea are not unbeatable at the Bridge. Both Brighton and Sunderland have turned them over.
So there is definitely hope that we can equal our best ever run of wins.
UTV!
Really poor in the end. We just got so overrun. Losing Onana did not help at all especially with Kamara already out, but honestly just so overrun. We need to beat Forest at home now otherwise we will end up going on a poor run of form, considering Palace away is anticipated to be a tough game. Not sure if I’ll be going to that one, getting out of South London just sounds like a vile way to spend your entire Wednesday night.
Our defence came up as what it is, to my mind. Weak. Especially when we get a couple of injuries.
We played 6 at the back quite often when they were attacking and still couldn’t keep them out.
Martinez was terrible more than once and it looks more than just bad form to me. I honestly think something is not right somewhere.
Watkins was piss-poor, even though he got one, which Malen made and deserved.
The midfield was overrun in the second half and Arsenal were just the better side.
To cap it all, the consensus in the pub I was in, thought the ref was shocking. I’m very minded to agree.
Having said all that, they were just too good for us overall and you have to just hold your hands up and admit the better side won, sometimes.
We obviously had a plan, because this was no rope-a-dope game and we went all out from the off.
When it was 0-0 at HT, I had a sneaky feeling the plan wasn’t going to work.
I honestly think we need to start training in the dark arts, as yet again we didn’t employ them anywhere near as much as the opposition did. The amount of holding and pushing in the modern game makes me nearly puke, but it’s a necessary part of the game it seems.
Hey ho, as has been said, you can’t win them all and at least other results went our way.
It’s not very often I cheer when the dogheads score.
Onwards and upwards and UTV!
Morning all. Have to add Garcia’s speed dashing up the right wing was a bonus. He should feature more. Emi does need to stop his tussle at corners, he needs to focus, not scrap. The ref was also on their side. They should have been a man down and had a goal marked as offside. And that elbow was far too close to Emi’s face.
Now for hard part. Ollie. We all love Ollie for many different reasons, BUT the primary role of a striker is to be incisive and put the ball in the back of the net. This, he is not doing. We could have gone 1-0 up last night. It was his 30th birthday yesterday but should we be urgently succession planning? We can’t just applaud his hold up play every game. Defenders are going to stop ganging up on him simply because they’re learning he can’t bloody score! A tough point but one that needs addressing.
It had to happen sometime, we just ran out of puff. An away loss to Arsenal is no shame and third place running up to the New Year is way beyond anything I could imagine after our terrible start.
I have faith that we will bounce back again against Forest and then we’ll be off again.
Happy New Year to all Villans everywhere!
Happy New Year!!!!! See you all on Saturday!
Here’s to a happy new year everyone end of year leaving a bitter taste after last night.
Last nights game was like the year personally very bad when everything went wrong.
Last nights loss I could take against any other team apart from arsenal or Chelsea both teams are arrogant and arteta the worse.
Losing onana was the difference plus ollie not putting away those chances in first half.
The mystery to me is why is malen and buendia not good when they start but come alive as substitute??
Maybe buendia needs to go if it funds a new striker.
Any thoughts on who we could possibly loan in the window i can’t think of anyone apart from former Brentford striker who’s name i can’t remember Happy new year
Roy. It’s a funny old game!!!!
Happy New Year one and all.
So a New Year beckons with optimsm for Villans. Let’s hope it’s a good one.
Leeds hold Liverpool to a draw, and almost won. Results helped us even further the past few days.
Hi all , not disappointed that much things like bad referees, booking player that wasn’t warranted, that weakened our team, then you come up against moaning manager like Arsenals twat. And to crown it letting players elbow goalkeepers in the face. Aston Villa will over come things like that remember we have two future Kings knowing we was robbed again so sod them all. The FA corrupt in my mind but happy times will come . UTV .
If you haven’t read it Bill, this article should put a smile on your face – about Kamara.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/czdg84m99vvo
So Mr Glass is out again for a number of weeks according to Emery after going off at HT against Arsenal.
Mings, Torres and Barkley are also out. We are at risk of blowing a top 4/5 finish with a weakened squad. The signing of Alysson is likely one for the future hopefully but we urgently need new players who can compete now! Emery and the players have achieved an incredible run after the first few games. It’s up to the owners now to ensure all the hard work isn’t wasted.
But can our owners bypass PSR?? I’ve never heard of them holding back on worthwhile investment…
Agree with you Bum Bum; it’s not the owners but the dual financial restrictions imposed by the EPL and EUFA.
Meanwhile, Manure – £1billion in debt – can do what they like.
It’s a scam – protecting the old money. Villa are £34m in debt and only because our owners decided as debt (and debt repayments) are outside PSR / SCR, why should they continue to invest by strengthening the balance sheet with their own money (buying new share issues) when balance sheet strength appears to be totally ignored in all the measures of financial sustainability.
Question – what is the principal regulatory measure of banks financial status; answer – simplistically balance sheet strength.
It’s completely nuts and flys in the face of reality – but then football has just become a virtual reality industry.
Right – that’s yet another Hitchens rant over – I’m off to open a decent bottle of malt whisky.