Stoke City v Aston Villa Post-Match Thread

[Monty]

We've still not scored in the first half this season have we?

First game of the season.

[eastie]

I didn't think it was a red card offence personally - if anything I felt the ref was lenient towards us - Weimann was not going to get the ball and a yellow was the right decision for me .

We could easily have gone down to 10 men at times with some of the tackles flying in .

I agree we have been robbed on occasions this season by refs but no complaints today from me.

[supertom]

We've still not scored in the first half this season have we?

First game of the season.

Ah yes. Seems a long, long time ago that one.

[Lizz]

Haven't read all this thread, so apologies if it's already been mentioned. I normally manage to listen to about half of 6-0-6 every Saturday. Seldom hear calls from Villa fans but as previously stated only hear at best half of the programme. Tonight when Robbie Savage did his 6 callers, 6 seconds thing, the last one was Dennis, the Villa fan who was caller of the year last season, or something like that. Savage let him stay on air longer. It is either careful editing, or symptomatic of some kind of Brummie malaise, but it's rare that we bother calling up national radio phone ins IMO. BBC ones that is. Though to my eternal embarrassment, I was once live on 6-0-6 when David Mellor was the host, my stance being defending Stan Collymore.

[FrankyH]

What we miss, what we absolutely miss, is a midfield. We do not have one. The one we have, to a man, is rubbish.

We're not quite in the shit yet; but if Palace get a win against us on Boxing Day, we are in the shit good and proper.

We definitely need to strengthen, but I think Delph doesn't deserve to put in the rubbish category .I would love to see Gardner given a run, but that's another young inexperienced player.

[ChicagoLion]

Haven't read all this thread, so apologies if it's already been mentioned. I normally manage to listen to about half of 6-0-6 every Saturday. Seldom hear calls from Villa fans but as previously stated only hear at best half of the programme. Tonight when Robbie Savage did his 6 callers, 6 seconds thing, the last one was Dennis, the Villa fan who was caller of the year last season, or something like that. Savage let him stay on air longer. It is either careful editing, or symptomatic of some kind of Brummie malaise, but it's rare that we bother calling up national radio phone ins IMO. BBC ones that is. Though to my eternal embarrassment, I was once live on 6-0-6 when David Mellor was the host, my stance being defending Stan Collymore.

And what did Dennis say?

[SoccerHQ]

They had two tubby fullbacks, that pie fiend Adam and Walters, one of the most average players ever to appear in this league. I'm disappointed as a Villa fan we don't have the quality to put out to dominate a team like that. Not only that but they passed the ball better than us. Stoke...Stoke City...

The reality is we have now played Stoke 11 times since they were promoted and we've won...........2 of them. They are a proper bogey team for us, probably the equivilant of Leicester in the 90s. You can't blame Lambert for all of those results, indeed comfortably our best performance at the Britannia has come under his management.

We really needed Vlaar and Gabby available today. Those two in and we wouldn't have lost that game and probably would've won.

Stoke are nothing special and will finish mid table. Like us.

[Lizz]

Everything's shit basically. I think. Tend to switch off to a degree though when 'it was better in my day' callers have air time. And I'm speaking  as a grumpy old woman.

[rougegorge]

Any manager that witnesses a performance like that from his team is bound to be nervous. Especially since it was the second such effort in three weeks. Stoke were shocking too. There was only one moment of quality in the game that I remember, the cross for Stoke's winner.

The behaviour of a number of our players during the game was a disgrace. This is where Lambert really misses a couple of solid pros in the dressing room with him to sort some of this sh*te out. Clark continually getting booked for ridiculous lunging tackles, Herd, Lowton and Delph giving away multiple stupid freekicks. Weimann mouthing constantly at the ref. Once it starts in a team its infectious, far too many of our players were more interested in starting fights that passing the ball to a teammate.

I honestly think if Lambert was given money he still wouldnt address the crippling lack of leadership and experience in the squad. That for me is the worrying thing about keeping him on.

This concern me last week against Man. United when Baker tried to impress the crowd by trying to get himself sent off in the last 15 minutes. Irresponsible given we've lost Ron.

Plenty of poor challenges in the second half that on another day with another ref would've been a straight red for one of the players.

I don't think we're a dirty team but the players do seem to lose their heads, I couldn't see someone like Petrov accepting that if he was still playing and captain.

The current situation is frustrating but I think people are going OTT about relegation, we'll bob along in mid table all season, it will be one of those nothing seasons I'm afraid.

Will it get better than that soon? Well we simply need better quality of players in our first 11. Over to you Lerner, I genuinely think Lambert is doing the best he can apart from the quality of football he's got us playing.

The players certainly do lose their heads and as a result lose focus and shape. We have now surpassed Stoke as the 'dirtiest' team in the league. We had a bad record last season too.
The referee may have been lenient with Wilson, but we spent much of the time afterwards feeling hard done by, tackling rashly, giving away needless free kicks.
In all, a lack of discipline to add to a lack of quality and method.

[hilts_coolerking]

What does £300 million mean then?

A colossal, barely credible waste of money.  I wonder if he regrets ever getting involved.

[SoccerHQ]

Just had a lot on the Oatcake and most on there think Crouchy used his hand for the winner. I thought that at the time and I was near the corner flag by the tunnel!

On balance though, we could've had someone sent off in the second half. Who on earth was the ref today, can't say I recognised his name.

[eastie]

@MatKendrick: Villa are one point & one place better off than at the same 17-game stage last season. 19 points instead of 18, 13th instead of 14th. #avfc

[paul_e]

I didn't think it was a red card offence personally - if anything I felt the ref was lenient towards us - Weimann was not going to get the ball and a yellow was the right decision for me .

We could easily have gone down to 10 men at times with some of the tackles flying in .

I agree we have been robbed on occasions this season by refs but no complaints today from me.

Wilson shoved Albrighton into the hoardings a couple of minutes earlier when the ball was already out of play, that was just as petuant and dangerous as the fouls/actions he booked Clark and Herd for.  The ref decided tt wasn't even a talking to, which pissed Marc off enough that he went in very heavily on the next tackle and got booked (which was arguably a harsh booking, both had their feet up and he clearly won the ball).  Silly from Albrighton but it was a direct result of the ref completely failing to protect the players.  Everytime the ball was put in behind their left back he ignored the ball and just blocked the run so Wilson could get across and clear, 2 or 3 times it was right next to Massey and she just completely ignored it.

On top of that I know the handball rule is specifically stating that there should be some intention but it's very rare you'll see the ball bounce up, hit someone on the bicep and fall to their feet to score a tap in and not see if given as a handball, we were very unlucky with that one.

Regardless, if you nick the ball over a defender on the edge of the box and he clatters you when there is no covering defender you'd expect to see him get red, there have been a hell of a lot of incidents like that in the past that have been red cards, again unlucky.

The only time I think he was a touch lenient was with Delph where a 2nd yellow could well have been shown.  I'll accept we might've been a bit lucky with that.

So 3 major incidents, they got the benefit of 2 to our 1 and, given the nature of one of them those decisions clearly affected the result.

Im not saying we didn't play badly but I don't think we deserved to lose and I don't think the ref helped us.

[frankmosswasmyuncle]

Thought the big lanky twat handled it at the time then amfy "confirmed" it via text a bit later.
If I can see it from over 100 yrds away why can't the ref and a linesman?
Perhaps I have some kind of superpower?

[lovejoy]

Or perhaps the ref is incompetent/ on the take