Villa Post Match

[Fan65]

A fantastic win, not a great performance by either team, but a superb finish from a true master of his craft. Under trying conditions and fed on scraps for most of the game his chance came late on and B A N G !!!

Insua & Lucas deserve praise they both played hard and well, Lucas plays better as The defensive midfielder, his work rate is high as is Insua's effort. Both are young players who now have earned their positions in the first team. Rafa has emphasis on a strong youth programme and it's obviously working, I think we'll see a lot more yongsters with class coming through over the next few years. Ngog, Pacheco, Kelly, Ayala all look good prospects.

[Guest]

Our passing was good until the final ball, we kept the ball really well and shifted the ball through midfield much better than the recent hoofing and bypassing of midfield.

Agreed about Yossi, and Kuyt just needs taking out of the team...full stop.

I saw only the first 15 mins of the match amidst horrible broadband speeds at the moment. I thought after the first 5 minutes that our passing was sharp and crisp and that confidence was starting to come back.

It was all down to confidence, that we were so poor in our passing. I think the players' mental toughness were open to serious questions as we did an excellent job against Arsenal in the first half, then fell apart in the second as soon as Arsenal scored. The same thing happened against Portsmouth, our game just frittered away.

We seem to be more in control last night but our recovery will be complete when we'll find ourselves in the situation of a goal down - or equaliser, and thereafter win the game.

Kuyt needs a rest but I'm not sure who is going to replace him though. Babel? I don't have any confidence in the lad anymore.

[MrMichael]

only saw the 2nd half but thought lucas was excellent - passed it really well himself and took up great classic midfield positions to keep our passing going. though insua had a great game too - he really has something about him going forward and thought he defended very well last night despite being caught out once or twice. aquilani showed for the ball well and what midfielder doesn't give the ball away ffs? in fact i thought we passed the ball reall;y well and there were a few incisive one-touch moves that would have the pundits raving if it was any other team. was very concerned by johnson - thought he looked like he didn't know what he was doing most of the time. kuyt having a ****e season. torres is a ****in legend.

Pretty much agree with all of that.

I'm not sure what people want from Lucas, last night he was playing very firmly in the holding role, physically he didn't get a great deal of support from Aquilani and was forever having to cover for Johnson too, yet we didn't get overwhelmed in midfield. He didn't do anything spectacular but neither should he have.

When he's played in a more creative role I'm not very happy, but I thought he did a very solid job last night.

Johnson really needs to get a grip of the defensive aspects of the game if he's going to be a long term answer for us at right back - the odd lapse is excusable if he's bombing forward but I wasn't very impressed with his attacking play either. Kuyt is seriously struggling in this team at the moment, his lack of pace and the lack of options in front of him mean the ball inevitably goes backwards after he gets it, which isn't good for one of our forwardmost players. I'm not sure its entirely his fault, but Rafa absolutely has to bring in someone with pace and vision if this squad is ever going to look even remotely balanced, we were embarrassingly ponderous and narrow at times going forward and it makes our attacks far too predictable.

[The_weatherman]

How exactly ?! He offers absolutely nothing. Didn't even break up Villa's play or win many tackles.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/chalkboards/create

According to these he had the most passes on the field, 54 successfull and 5 unsuccessfull. Also most tackles 14, of which 9 were won and three interceptions.

He stood head and shoulders above anyone else on the pitch - Insua also had good stats and got lot of the ball.

[Guest]

Thought we were decent but gave the ball away far, far too much.

Lovely finish from Torres who, to be fair, looked pretty disinterested until that point. I feel sorry for him playing up front by himself.

Two wins now against Reading in the FA Cup and Spurs in the league would make this season seem vaguely salvagable...

Strongest team against Reading please Rafa.

You never give outright praise ever do you? Torres seemed 'disinterested'? Or is it that he's currently being hampered by ankle and groin injuries which forces him to play through the pain barrier?

It's not a case of Torres 'playing upfront by himself' which was the problem, more so of the low confidence in the ranks.

[Vermilion]

You never give outright praise ever do you? Torres seemed 'disinterested'? Or is it that he's currently being hampered by ankle and groin injuries which forces him to play through the pain barrier?

It's not a case of Torres 'playing upfront by himself' which was the problem, more so of the low confidence in the ranks.

[MrMichael]

Kuyt needs a rest but I'm not sure who is going to replace him though. Babel? I don't have any confidence in the lad anymore.

This is the problem

Babel had one good moment in his cameo but was anonymous apart from that. Benayoun just isn't a winger, and El Zhar.... well, I dunno if he's all that good.

Much though Rafa has done many good things in his time at the club, and brought in excellent players in most positions over those years, one of his major failings has been that he has never really managed to nail down a long term quality option in either wide position on the pitch. We've had a collection of players for those areas of either dubious ability, dubious mentality, or who have been adapted from other roles, and none of them have ever looked really convincing. It'd be nice for that to change at some point soon.

[badpiggy]

You never give outright praise ever do you? Torres seemed 'disinterested'? Or is it that he's currently being hampered by ankle and groin injuries which forces him to play through the pain barrier?

It's not a case of Torres 'playing upfront by himself' which was the problem, more so of the low confidence in the ranks.

torres has some amount of pressure on him playing up front on his own and with the way kuyt is playing he's more isolated than ever. how many times last night did torres end up in a right wing postion? he can't do ****in everything on his own ffs. one chance and he finishes it in a serious pressure match and that's not good enough?

[MrMichael]

You never give outright praise ever do you? Torres seemed 'disinterested'? Or is it that he's currently being hampered by ankle and groin injuries which forces him to play through the pain barrier?

It's not a case of Torres 'playing upfront by himself' which was the problem, more so of the low confidence in the ranks.

Torres' body language last night actually didn't look great. He is obviously unfit and was lacking sharpness of touch and acceleration, but there was a slight sense of frustration about him. Probably because he knew himself he wasn't really able to do what he could when fully fit. I do think it would have helped him to have had more support, playing that role on his own up there when not really able to be consistently threatening, and with a lack of any meaningful supply, must have been hard. And it almost didn't work, Villa could quite easily have scored in the closing stages. It did of course, and Torres is the sexiest man alive, but in purely descriptive terms, he did look a bit off colour mentally as well as physically last night.

[Guest]

Buying a quality 'right forward' costs a lot of money, unless a bargain is found, so I don't think criticising Rafa for failing to bring in someone who could do that job is fair. He's trying to improve the players we have at the moment and at the same time to promote youngsters to fill in that job (or allow flops like Babel to flourish).

Thing is, with money to burn, it's easier to build a winning team quickly, than the other way round. Our problem is that we don't have many players who can fill in when our best players aren't performing or are off form.

Quality replacements for Torres, Gerrard, Benayoun, Agger and Reina cost a lot of money, and we haven't really got any one to cover those positions effectively enough. Rafa has a method that he's sticking to, such as buying a lot of potentially good youngsters and is trying to develop them into players that could fill that void, without costing the club much in terms of outright transfer fees.

Things are levelling out in the PL. If you look at it, despite our horrible season, we're still 7 points off Man. Utd and 11 or 12 points off Chelsea, which says a lot about the competitiveness of the league.

If we weren't in such dire straits financially, I'd have been very confident that Rafa would have built on that second place last season, but there is also a case of the top teams (apart from Man. City for teams in the top 6) not being able to build on previous seasons too.

Chelsea are stalling, as well as Utd, and the real development in terms of forward progress by any team, is coming from the likes of Man. City, Villa, Spurs, Birmingham and Sunderland who are splashing out more money than anyone else.

[dww]

That, and they were also missing Ashley Young last night.

He adds quality and pace but I don't think he changes the way they play. I guess having more runners from deep helps you pen back a team but against United and Spurs it encouraged O'Neill to play on the break more than keep possession.

I was wondering actually if we exaggerated our narrowness in a direct counter to their width - keeping the ball away from their threatening area and making the lack of quality in the middle more of a factor. Lack of width (at least as an option) remains a problem for us when Riera is not fit. Last season Benayoun and Kuyt both showed they could do a disciplined job staying wide when needed though and it is a shame that we had 4 players in very close proximity too often with only Torres and the fullbacks going wide. Gerrard could certainly do with looking for gaps in those areas more often.

[BigChief]

Torres would have been a lot happier had Kuyt, Johnson and Aquilani played better through balls into a path that he'd been weaving for himself in trying circumstances. Had Johnson, Aquaman and Kuyt been more confident in their injuries/ability Torres would easily had a hattrick.

Did anyone notice his body language at the final whistle? The release of pumped up tension in his two fisted punch of joy was very sexy...I'm going all girly again.

[Roboklopp]

Kuyt is really struggling. Torres isnt fit & does look frustrated & very isolated, but is still a match winner. Stevie looks more like his old self. Lucas was really really good- bit more progressive than Masher in that role. Insua was very good. Johnson was poor- albeit maybe cos he isnt fit. Yoss struggled out wide. Defence looked much better- Pepe was awesome. Thought Skrtel had cost us the game thought with his clownish antics when he came on. Aqualani was OK & there looked a much better balance to the side with him in it.

Team played pretty well until the final third, which was a real problem. 6/10 performance but great result. Just need to batter Spuds now. I think both they & Villa will crack, but I worry about City cos of the depth they have.

Let's hope we can go on a run now & let our experience count.

[Vermilion]

Chelsea are stalling, as well as Utd, and the real development in terms of forward progress by any team, is coming from the likes of Man. City, Villa, Spurs, Birmingham and Sunderland who are splashing out more money than anyone else.

They are, but i think their owner realises this, hence the links to players like Aguero, Villa, etc, which seem to suggest they are ready to spend big again in the not to distant future, this is the luxury they have of course.

[dww]

Torres' body language last night actually didn't look great. He is obviously unfit and was lacking sharpness of touch and acceleration, but there was a slight sense of frustration about him. Probably because he knew himself he wasn't really able to do what he could when fully fit. I do think it would have helped him to have had more support, playing that role on his own up there when not really able to be consistently threatening, and with a lack of any meaningful supply, must have been hard. And it almost didn't work, Villa could quite easily have scored in the closing stages. It did of course, and Torres is the sexiest man alive, but in purely descriptive terms, he did look a bit off colour mentally as well as physically last night.

I agree he looked frustrated and off form but 'disinterested' is patently unfair. His running and movement off the ball was superb if you ask me. Gerrard on the other hand seemed a bit static and unimaginative, leading to him being easily marked.