This was an easy win, as much as we made hard work of it. The game should have been wrapped up in the first half really, but a win is a win.
I think this was a much more convincing performance, but we’re still not back to our best, in my opinion.
With that, I’m much happier that we will get there and it’s not the doom and gloom that was being felt everywhere on the internet a couple of weeks ago.
Here we go then;
Emi Martinez 6 Well, he never had a lot to do, did he? and the one proper shot he faced, he should have been better at, for me. Looking back, I don’t think he’ll be too happy with himself.
Matty Cash 7 As much as I don’t like him, I thought he did okay. He still frustrates the hell out of me, with the way he stops, allows the oppo’s defence to reset and then passes back. If these are instructions from Emery, they’re bad ones . If it’s Cash’s decision, just bloody stop it mate. As usual, he worked hard, as much as I don’t trust him and he played players short.
EMRI KONSA 9 It’s subjective from me as a few could have got the MOTM award. I just thought he had the Burnley defence totally in his pocket. Fair enough, that’s not saying a lot, as Burnley were mostly toothless, but you can only say as you see. He looked that Rolls Royce player we often hear about with Kamara.
Pau 8 He looked fine today, didn’t he? The way he plays forward is great, but he was never really threatened by Burnley’s attack, which is where he’s decidedly lightweight. His ideal game all round today and he’ll be thinking “can we play you every week?”, I’m sure.
Lucas Digne 7 Worked hard, but showed that he’s lost a touch of pace. That said, he was facing Kyle Walker, who still has a bit of speed about him. Put in a couple of decent crosses and played some good balls forward to the infield.
Bogarde 8 Wow, this lad is coming on in leaps and bounds. He’s comfortable defending and goes forward nicely too. Up in the running for MOTM, in my head, a great performance all round.
Kamara 7 I’m not sure many will agree, but he didn’t look 100% on it today, to me. Don’t get me wrong, he did nothing seriously wrong, but he didn’t look his totally accomplished self that he normally does either.
Malen 9 I know. Many will say he was the real MOTM and I’d be happy to accept the argument. I was incredibly happy for him to score twice and would have loved him to have got a hat-trick. I’ve been backing this bloke since he came, along with the vast majority of Villa fans. I think he did enough today, with his directness in running down the middle, to show that he’s a very viable option to Watkins.
McGinn 7 Didn’t do anything out of the ordinary, but he just does pretty well, game in, game out. His usual self, I guess.
Rogers 6 Yes, you know I’m his biggest fan. I’ll happily admit though, that he’s been rubbish this season. But I’m seeing signs that his confidence is coming back. The vision that he showed last season is slowly returning and he made a couple of really nice passes that didn’t quite pay off. Emery has showed immense patience in letting him play his way back into form, but I do think it’ll be worth the wait. There’s no better player when he’s firing on all cylinders, I think.
Watkins 6 He’s just not on it at all, is he? He looks unhappy to me. Played deeper behind Malen and that’s a position I’m happy with him to be in, as he runs his guts out. It would seem Emery thinks he’s not quite on it, striking-wise and I don’t think any of us would be surprised at that. I’m quite happy that if this continues for a while, he’ll get his scoring boots back on soon enough. He’s still a top player, but if the rumours that he’s seriously unhappy at the Villa are true, he can do one.
Guessand 6 A sub on for McGinn in the 67th minute. Hmm. Another player I really like the look of, but it just seems he’s struggling to get into the pace of the English game, to me. Again, I think it’ll come.
So while it was a decent performance, it wasn’t anything to write home about either.
Burnley offered next to no threat whatsoever and look like real relegation candidates at this stage. And if I prove to be ultimately correct, we really should have beaten Burnley by 3 or even 5 goals.
Still, I’m not complaining in the slightest. We won and that’s all I’m asking at this stage.
I will mention one thing though. Flemming’s elbow on Buendia. That was a natural movement.
Until he deliberately jerked his elbow upward at the last split second, which was fully intended. I firmly believe that was a red card.
And how VAR didn’t see it, is beyond me. Nothing new there though, I suppose.
A win’s a win and that’s four on the trot now, I think. That’ll do nicely.
UTV!
Another bloody international break next, isn’t it? Utter joke.
I totally agree with you in saying that we’re not back to our best, but there were definitely signs of the old Villa emerging today where we attacked with pace and created tons of space for our attacking players to feed off.
I think you are being harsh on Watkins, however, even though I’m not his biggest fan. His hold up play today was great and was pivotal in creating our first goal, and Rogers also did well to play it to Kamara, who eventually played the killer pass to Malen, who has a great finish on him!
Lamare Bogarde today played his best performance since joining Villa in my opinion, he was winning near enough everything, and was a stand out player for me. Malen is the obvious MOTM but he is a close second in my opinion.
I just think Cash gives the ball away far too much still, and puts us in dangerous positions. Martinez, yes, bang average again, we’ve now reached the point where it would not remotely concern a Villa fan if Marco Bizot started the next three games, which is quite astonishing considering Martinez has been a clear fan favourite during his time at Villa, along with McGinn etc.
That being said, nothing to write home about, but a really positive performance in my eyes, but we really need to be winning more convincingly because a team with a little bit more about them will punish us, and it will hurt, last season we were killed by the amount of winnable games at Villa Park ending up in 1-1 and 2-2 draws.
Good win though and things are looking up a tad! International break has come at the wrong time but is there ever a right time when the games are more or less meaningless.
UTV
The only caveat is – he does not attempt the killer defence-splitting pass which is most likely to be picked off. That said: Bogarde is the top player in the whole Premier League for % of accurate passes.
It is incredible that a player who is a stand-in starter when others are injured tops that metric.
OLL you may well be correct (‘killer passes’) but watching the Burnley game I was struck by how many times he retained the ball and completed an accurate pass whilst under pressure. One in particular when he had three players around him and yet still managed a controlled forward pass to a Villa player in space.
In other words the high % completed passes weren’t simple sideways, backwards defensive passes.
One swallow etc. but at 21 he looks a really exciting prospect.
Good win but made hard work in the end,martinez and cash to blame for goal, why didn’t he head it back to emi,and then the corner emi pushed player out of the way instead of concentrating on the corner bizot better at the moment I think.
And buendia I don’t know what var looked at because it was deliberate elbow he had seen buendia by him and that was deliberate plus didn’t even get booked discussed, buendia didn’t look good when came off so it wasn’t just a brush off was it..
Buendia got a yellow card for ‘leading with his arm’. If that was a yellow then Flemming should have received two red cards – that was a deliberate elbow and extremely dangerous play.
VAR is so discredited now it’s hardly worth mentioning!
Oh – and the coms – ‘Buendia ran into the elbow’ was their verdict.
Give me strength!
Just a quick add – it was good to see Barkley back; we’re going to need all the squad fit and no rumours of discord in the ranks.
Reports are he had a niggle, but also some personal issues, so something private at home. It could be a serious family matter, we don’t know and have to respect that. He sure tightens things up when he comes on the pitch.
And now he’s out injured again after 1 game back. Unbelievable!
I think we’ll miss Cash when eventually, like all players, leaves the club. You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone, sang Joni Mitchell. Bogarde is a revelation. Can he keep it up? Malen looks great. Guessand is slowly adapting to the EPL, and has immense energy. As with Malen, he adds to the ‘bulk’ in our team. Too often we get shoved off the ball. That Fleming elbow was shocking. One of the worst I’ve seen in a long time. He saw Emi coming and that was a deliberate elbow on a shorter player. I hope Burnley go down after that.
Prediction: Watkins will leave AVFC in the January window. I think something was broken when he was left out of the CL for Rashford. A Quantum Of Solace has been reached. (The point in a relationship where there’s no going back).
And now he’s out injured again after 1 game back. Unbelievable!
If I’m honest, I don’t see him as a liability yet. Our problems are mid and forwards, which I hope are being seen with the current changes. We are now moving forward; that’s what I like to see us doing.
I am going to have to revise my opinion about Buendia, he now delivers an end product. Two good goals and he has contributed just when the alternative Tielemans is injured.
Yesterday he was on the end of a quite deliberate foul, Flemming looked to see where Buendia was before aiming his elbow. It was obvious enough once in real time, the VAR replays confirmed the first opinion.
Enzo Barrenechea is one game away from triggering the compulsory purchase of him, going to them for 12 million euros. That and his 3 million loan fee will be a nice little earner and we also have a 30% share of any future deal, capped at 10 million. I assume it was Monchi who sorted that deal, but it’s a good one as all parties are seemingly happy.
It looks like Youri Tielemans is likely to be out for a few more weeks yet, as his injury is worse than it was thought;
https://sportwitness.co.uk/aston-villa-injury-even-worse-player-to-be-out-longer-than-expected/
Which is discouraging news.
I did note the comment at the end of the article regarding Onana being called up to the squad despite only just returning from injury which has clearly displeased Villa.
There’s going to be hell to pay if he returns with his injury aggravated unnecessarily.
These IB’s are a pain in the butt.
Well all 3 are in tonight’s game, let’s see how they perform. My theory is some are not giving full effort at Villa, hope it proves me wrong.
Goal number 1 Rodgers, Goal number 2 Watkins . all inside 13 minutes.
Konza next .
Watkins injured – hope it’s not serious
I don’t know if I’m that worried Hitch, tbh.
It’s harsh, but when I think of him, I tend to think Banjo and cow’s arse lately.
Didn’t know you played a banjoBadger 😇
Yep. I was the one who played in that Burt Reynolds film, Deliverance.
“Squeal like a pig!”
After last night of Emery doesn’t play Rogers as a 10 one woukd have to ask why?
It’s where he’s excellent and, with his international place in his mind, where he wants to play.
Villa 2 Wales 0.
The Telegraph are gushing over Chesty’s England performances, rating him over Bellendham.
Needs to do it for Villa.
Think he’ll be played back into form? I’d trust Emery.
Playing players back into form is just like the Martingale Strategy on a Roulette Wheel (Google it if you need to). There is a good chance it is going to work but:
1) There is a chance it doesn’t work.
2) You need a suitable cashflow to allow for consecutive losses (so in Villa’s case we need our other players to step up if it takes Rogers a few games to get back into form)
I think that’s a good analogy, but feel free to disagree… obviously I am aware a gambling reference is undesirable but it’s what came to mind.
There’s a very good chance it will work, because it’s not all about luck in football.
A good player is a good player who’s underperforming in Roger’s case.
Yet he has performed well for England.
That suggests there’s something not right. Being played out of position doesn’t help, but I suspect Emery’s aim here might be to make him a better player and the lad knows this.
Or perhaps he’s just not happy about it at all. Who knows?
Good comment, but don’t be put off by the ‘You can’t say that’! brigade.
On a similar note, there’s an interesting documentary on Netflix about trying to beat the Irish lottery. Lots of maths and probability but very interesting!!!
Looks like Ollie is out for a handful of games. Malen in the main role?
Onana, who has been injured all season, starts for Belgium against Wales tonight. WTF ???
Emery will be apoplectic and rightly so!
That’s infuriating!!!!!
Brian little looking cool as f on the villa website today absolutely luv that man
Absolutely top bloke – great player, Villa legend and all round good guy.
UTV
Konza, MOM for me last night , controlled and distribution was perfect. He covered all the back line , proud to know he’s a Villa player .
I agree Bill, Konsa is vastly underrated because he plays for Villa. I thought Anderson playing in front of the back four was outstanding as well, and I think he is only 21. He’ll be a big star if he avoids serious injury.
I see that one of the local MPs has organised a protest against supporters of Maccabi Tel Aviv, our next Europa League opponents, which resulted in the Safety wonks persuading the police there would be disorder if any away fans were allowed at this match.
If this MP is on Villa’s list for the odd freebie ticket, as is usual, I hope his name is removed. As it says on the shirt sleeves “No room for Racism – Kick it out”
While I agree that politics shouldn’t be anything to do with football, I do think that there would be an enormous risk of serious trouble if the Israeli fans were to attend.
I think that’s more of an indictment of the state of the country personally, in that nobody has a proper grip of things.
This situation just wouldn’t be allowed in pretty much any other country outside Europe.
Fortunately I’m now of an age where I can just ask “what are you going to do about it, because I can’t affect anything?”
I am concerned about this decision in that it not only raises the whole issue of antisemitism but brings politics into football and puts Villa at the forefront of the ‘debate’ without the club having any say in the decision made by Birmingham CC and the police.
One Israeli spokesperson has already said that Villa should be ‘punished’ for this decision by being forced to play the game behind closed doors suggesting that the club were responsible for the decision to ban away fans.
Maccabi already play all their games outside Israel – what does it say, not only about about Birmingham but Britain as a country, when no other location has banned Maccabi fans from attending Europa League games.
Shameful, embarrassing and just wrong.
It is shocking their fans have been banned because of Birmingham’s demographic. This is only going to get worse.
Shameful and totally wrong, football belongs to the fans and political involvement shouldn’t be allowed. We have for many years been envy of many nations with political correctness and now we have you will do this because it causes animosity to the country. Why are we going backwards in this country of ours and letting politicians decide. We are run by a load of cowards lately,
(Treading on eggshells). I don’t think that it is anti-semitic to protest against the actions of a sovereign state, Israel. Israel does not represent all Jews as protests in Israel have shown. Lobbing bombs indiscriminately into dense civilian areas cannot be defended.
However, with my Villa hat firmly on, no away fans and the focus being on the football seems okay to me.
It’s a fair point 1874.
It’s the broader point about what a ban says about the direction our country appears to be taking that is of concern here.
Reference has been made to the violence seen from the Legia Warsaw fans but isn’t the primary issue with Maccabi the actions of third parties rather than a concern over the behaviour of the fans themselves. If so, merely banning the fans won’t necessarily stop third party action and the risk of violence on the night?
On a brighter note, I’ve just treated myself to a pair of these!
https://shop.avfc.co.uk/en/aston-villa-adidas-spezial-trainers-claret/p-460013872484383640+z-98-3444008383?_ref=p-TKOR:m-ORIT