Aston Villa v Norwich City Post-Match Thread

[Fin Feds Dad]

Holman great workrate but overall not good enough with the ball.

Ever watched a dog with a balloon ? Same as ....

[tarzansbrother]

Paul Lambert hails "unbelievable spirit" of his team.

http://www.avfc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10265~2961940,00.html

Forget spirit he should be looking at tactical ineptitude and zero quality.

If was Bent I would tell him to Fuck off. His treatment for todays game was shocking!

[Ron Manager]

Ive just got back. Havent read the posts but this is what I saw. First half was awful apart from Bentekes goal which was well made and he took it with confidence. Led the line very well without any obvious help from Agbonlahor. KEA was frustrating. He wins the ball but too often
gives it away. Bennett  appeared out of his depth yet again. Guzans run of excellent form continues.

Second half was an improvement Benteke again led the line with confidence. Bennett got himself sent off and Agbonlahor was substituted
 things were going well until the manager took Benteke off. Did he look tired I dont think so and with Bent playing the target man (which he doesnt do) we had nobody to hold the ball up and their pressure paid off with the equaliser.

Plus points Herd did well in a position he doesnt play normally. Albrighton ran and ran without doing too much. Lowton was ok thats
about it.

With the games we have ahead in November we could be in serious trouble unless Lambert can find a formula that works.

As of today it does not look obvious that he can.

[olaftab]

Lambert got lot of things wrong today.
Wrong midfield with both Albrighton and Delf in. They are both a liability.
Wrong substitution at sending off. In fact Bennett was having a nightmare of a game and should have been subbed at HT.
Wrong tactics and poor team instructions post sending off. Our ten man approach was clueless. Just couldn't understand why we were so bad.
Wrong substitution again bringing on Bent. This man everyone knew would be useless in the prevailing match situation and he was.
Needed some composure and class. Ireland was on the bench FFS.

Big Lambert fan but today there is a chink in my confidence in him.

[PaulWinch again]

Can't understand the relentless uninformed criticism of the midfield. I was worried at half time when we were only a goal to the good - but we had started the second half brightly before Bennett went. A poor decision from Dowd - didn't need the red card but we would have screamed for one the other way around. The substitutions though were incomprehensible. Beneteke had to come off as Gabby is very functional as a lone striker...Holman was clearly knackered Weimann for him fair enough - but the closest Bent got to touching the ball was headbutting Bassong. Had we not switched off at the corner we'd be celebrating a win.
The other thing of not was the complete dissection of Norwich for the goal. We haven't scored a goal like that for YEARS. Which is not downplaying Benteke's delicate and unstoppable finish. Top half finish and I feel sorry for Swindon...

I Salute the optimism, but I think you're quite wrong on a lot of it. The midfield was dreadful all game, except Holman's cross.

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

Paul Lambert hails "unbelievable spirit" of his team.

http://www.avfc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10265~2961940,00.html

Forget spirit he should be looking at tactical ineptitude and zero quality.

If was Bent I would tell him to Fuck off. His treatment for todays game was shocking!

Lambert brought him on. The general consensus amongst fans seems to be he should not have been brought on.

[Steve R]

I don't understand the 'signing players from lower leagues' gripe. We signed 4, of which Lowton does not look out of place and two have barely featured.

We signed 4 other players in the summer if you include Guzan - all internationals.

The truth of it is that from where we were at the end of last season, 8 players was not going to be enough, but there is a limit on the numbers you can absorb. We have probably exceeded that limit with what we did, but that's was still preferable to doing less.

We have to go back to the market in January and beef up midfield.

We are nowhere near the worst in league in defence or up front. Maybe we will not see the best of either until we have a midfield worthy of the name.

[jembob]

Lambert got lot of things wrong today.
Wrong midfield with both Albrighton and Delf in. They are both a liability.
Wrong substitution at sending off. In fact Bennett was having a nightmare of a game and should have been subbed at HT.
Wrong tactics and poor team instructions post sending off. Our ten man approach was clueless. Just couldn't understand why we were so bad.
Wrong substitution again bringing on Bent. This man everyone knew would be useless in the prevailing match situation and he was.
Needed some composure and class. Ireland was on the bench FFS.

Big Lambert fan but today there is a chink in my confidence in him.

Agree with this totally. Today was very poor all round and I really didn't expect to see a performance as poor and aimless as we saw at VP last season but today that's what we got.

[Percy McCarthy]

It's still frustrating rather than depressing for me.

We've seen the blueprint: Newcastle away and Swansea at home. Someone will tell me if I'm wrong but Albrighton and Delph didn't play in those games - was it Bannan and Ireland? We pressed well, we passed well. Guzan and Benteke have been big positives since then, so we should be improving, but we've gone backwards in midfield and from the outside looking in it seems a really simple problem to solve - team selection.

We don't know what happens in training, but on the evidence of the actual games Lambert should by now be coming to some pretty obvious conclusions.

Such as:

Guzan keeps his place;

Lowton keeps his place;

Clark: decision to make because Baker has done well;

Bannan and Ireland should be back in for Delph and Albrighton;

Weimann should either be in the team, or first attacking substitute.

Benteke starts.

Gabby/Bent: I'd pick Gabby as a wide left striker/winger, balanced by Holman's industry on the other side. Bent or Gabby does not have an obvious solution for me, because they divide opinion with us, so it's easy to imagine that Lambert might be in two minds on this one.

Sorry for rambling, but as I say, I'm a bit frustrated that PL doesn't seem to be learning from our performances - good, bad and indifferent.

[E I Adio]

We are nowhere near the worst in league in defence or up front.

That may be so, but I haven't seen another team this season that has played as badly as we did today.

[saunders_heroes]

I don't understand the 'signing players from lower leagues' gripe. We signed 4, of which Lowton does not look out of place and two have barely featured.

We signed 4 other players in the summer if you include Guzan - all internationals.

The truth of it is that from where we were at the end of last season, 8 players was not going to be enough, but there is a limit on the numbers you can absorb. We have probably exceeded that limit with what we did, but that's was still preferable to doing less.

We have to go back to the market in January and beef up midfield.

We are nowhere near the worst in league in defence or up front. Maybe we will not see the best of either until we have a midfield worthy of the name.

I thought Lowton was poor all afternoon. He isn't good enough for the PL. neither is the other fullback.
And 4 lower league signings is more than a third of the team. Add them to the youth rubbish already here it's a recipe for disaster.

[CJ]

Don't know where to start with that.  I said before kick off Dowd would send one of ours off but Bennett can't complain about his bookings. About 10 minutes after his first card he launched in again and should have been hauled off at half time as it was pretty clear what would happen, especially with one-eyed Dowd. As usual he applied one rule to us and another to the opponents - fouls which attracted yellows for us didn't even get free kicks when Norwich committed the same thing. He missed the foul on Benteke and didn't give anything when Bent was tripped when running on to a through ball. Just before Herd's card some stats came up on the big screen showing we'd committed 7 fouls in the game so far (including at least 2 by Bennett of course) and he then booked Herd for consistent fouling! The only good thing that can be said relating to Dowd were the chants 'have you ever had a salad' and 'when did you last see your prick'. 

But to blame Dowd for today's result is just papering over the very wide cracks.  Guzan was enormous again, and I think Benteke and Herd did well. But yet again the midfield was dominated by the opposition. Albrighton was poor all game - bar one decent cross in the second half which found Benteke at the back post - and is just not good enough at this level. The same applies to Delph, and to a lesser extent Holman and KEA. Too many sloppy passes, no creativity, and no real bite. And how we switched off for their goal was simply amateurish. We need some experienced signings in midfield in January or else I fear the worst.

I also think Lambert got his selection wrong today and got his substitutions even worse.  Going down to 10 men meant bringing on Lichaj, fair enough, but to take Gabby off, and then replace Benteke with Bent was just wrong.  Gabby was the only one who would chase things down so although he's not scoring he would have added more to the team effort.

All round not good. And it was bloody cold.

[Shrek]

I don't understand the 'signing players from lower leagues' gripe. We signed 4, of which Lowton does not look out of place and two have barely featured.

We signed 4 other players in the summer if you include Guzan - all internationals.

The truth of it is that from where we were at the end of last season, 8 players was not going to be enough, but there is a limit on the numbers you can absorb. We have probably exceeded that limit with what we did, but that's was still preferable to doing less.

We have to go back to the market in January and beef up midfield.

We are nowhere near the worst in league in defence or up front. Maybe we will not see the best of either until we have a midfield worthy of the name.

We may not be the worst, but we are among the worst 3 teams in the league and that's what counts.

We are soo poor, Lambert seems lost and looks clueless which makes things worse.

[Californian Villain]

Lambert got lot of things wrong today.
Wrong midfield with both Albrighton and Delf in. They are both a liability.
Wrong substitution at sending off. In fact Bennett was having a nightmare of a game and should have been subbed at HT.
Wrong tactics and poor team instructions post sending off. Our ten man approach was clueless. Just couldn't understand why we were so bad.
Wrong substitution again bringing on Bent. This man everyone knew would be useless in the prevailing match situation and he was.
Needed some composure and class. Ireland was on the bench FFS.

Agree with this completely. PL has made some baffling decisions before, notably making Darren Bent captain for five minutes, but today he got everything wrong. I never really understood why PL's stock was so high in the first place, and I have even less idea now.

[Ron Manager]

Ive read most posts now and we are mostly in agreement. After stating Delph had something in all my previous posts I realised after about 35mins I  was wrong and he is a liability who doesnt provide anything.