Ball possession

[villan from luton]

Whats our best team for the coming games then?

For Everton away (assuming Vlaar and Benteke will be fit), I'd be tempted to go back to:

                        Guzan

Hutton    Senderos  Vlaar   Cissokho

                   Westwood

          Cleverley        Delph

Weimann       Benteke         Gabby 


I would like to see us try a different formation at home, with either Cole, N'Zogbia or Grealish coming in as a "number 10" behind Gabby and Benteke. 

I would have Nzob in the hole and Baker ahead of Senderos just about

[silhillvilla]

                        Guzan

Hutton    Senderos  Vlaar   Cissokho

                   Sanchez

          Richardson        Delph

N'Zogbia       Benteke         Gabby 

That team takes points at Goodison.

[PeterWithesShin]

I would have Nzob in the hole

[PeterWithesShin]

It just never gets old. Whoever made that gif should be king of the internet.

[pauliewalnuts]

It just never gets old. Whoever made that gif should be king of the internet.

As far as I am concerned, they are the king of the internet.

[PeterWithesShin]

It just never gets old. Whoever made that gif should be king of the internet.

As far as I am concerned, they are the king of the internet.

And me. But it should be official. They should be given a crown and a sash.

[pauliewalnuts]

Posession matters, but posession stats are a red herring. Whether a team hoofs from the goalie and loses posession or knocks it among the back four for a minute and then hoofs and then loses posession the outcome is the same.

Exactly.  60% possession my look on paper like a team were dominant, but if a lot of that possession consisted of them playing it around the back while the opposition sat off then it can be a bit misleading.     

That's true, but the point I was making with those statistics isn't that in any one game we gifted the possession, it is that we pretty much always gift it.

It's also not just possession, it is pass completion, too, and in both of them we are amongst the worst teams in the league - if not the worst.

We fail to keep hold of the ball, and we do not pass it around anything like enough.

I dont understand why people keep bringing up the "yeah, but in this game, we had this tiny amount of possession and still won" or "team x had 99% possession today and lost". Nobody is suggesting for a moment that possession = victory. It isn't anywhere near that simple.

I also don't see why people seem to think that raising it means we're overlooking areas where we have improved. We are tighter at the back, yes. FWIW I also thought we deserved the points at Liverpool

There's really no need to reduce the argument to "we're always shit" or "if you have the ball more, you're always going to win", neither of which are true, but they're not even the matter at hand.

The issue being raised is that a team which *never* passes the ball much and pretty much never has the lion's share of possession is going to struggle to achieve anything, and it is a situation for us which doesn't seem to be improving at all.

We have had three whole seasons of this now. Attendances are taking a nose dive. Maybe if we played a bit of football - or tried to - we'd have more people willing to pay to watch us?

The football we play, particularly at home, is not unlike Pulis's Stoke, except without the crafty cynicism, and some of the excuses we hear for it sound exactly like Stoke fans used to when they were defending their way of play.

I just think we're Aston Villa, we're better than that, we shouldn't be playing like a pub team, with next to no artistry, we should be playing the game the way it is meant to be played.

[PaulWinch again]

This is it, we may well still get some results with counter attacking football but we should be above this. It's fine to counter attack when we go to Chelsea, Man Citeh, Liverpool etc but it shouldn't be our only tactic. At Villa Park and against poor sides we should be able to retain the ball and create chances by playing through them. It's about entertainment and Villa should offer more than we are. I'm pleased we've got more defensive grit this season, but that's not enough on it's own, 9 shots on target from 6 games is simply not enough. We need to aspire and show that we're aspiring to be better than that.

[SoccerHQ]

This is it, we may well still get some results with counter attacking football but we should be above this. It's fine to counter attack when we go to Chelsea, Man Citeh, Liverpool etc but it shouldn't be our only tactic. At Villa Park and against poor sides we should be able to retain the ball and create chances by playing through them. It's about entertainment and Villa should offer more than we are. I'm pleased we've got more defensive grit this season, but that's not enough on it's own, 9 shots on target from 6 games is simply not enough. We need to aspire and show that we're aspiring to be better than that.

We did this v Hull though.

That's what I don't understand, games where we actually play good football and create chances we're still getting criticised like Hull and Stoke.

Yes I accept the criticism point but I save that for extreme games against team on our level like when we won at Southampton last year with something ridiculous like 25% of the ball and home v Swansea which was something like 28%.

Those are unacceptable games, not Hull at home when we should've been five up at half time.

[peter w]

For all this griping, and it's understandable, you have to remember that in the last 3 weeks we lost at home against Arsenal when the team were ill, at Chelsea who look head and shoulders above everyone, and at home against the current champions. Against Liverpool we were talking about (I think it was paul e's point) how we were very reminiscent of a Serie A team circa 1990(s) in controlling a game 1-0 without having the ball.

We started well against Arsenal and ran out of steam understandably after about half an hour. First half against Chelsea was very even, and Man City just played better than us.

I wouldn't get too down hearted about it because we are set up to play the way we are. We expected to get very few wins during this run of games and so it has proven - with a good win at liverpool. Everton next, and then a series of games that we should see exactly where we are and how good the team really is.

[JD]

For all this griping, and it's understandable, you have to remember that in the last 3 weeks we lost at home against Arsenal when the team were ill, at Chelsea who look head and shoulders above everyone, and at home against the current champions. Against Liverpool we were talking about (I think it was paul e's point) how we were very reminiscent of a Serie A team circa 1990(s) in controlling a game 1-0 without having the ball.

We started well against Arsenal and ran out of steam understandably after about half an hour. First half against Chelsea was very even, and Man City just played better than us.

I wouldn't get too down hearted about it because we are set up to play the way we are. We expected to get very few wins during this run of games and so it has proven - with a good win at liverpool. Everton next, and then a series of games that we should see exactly where we are and how good the team really is.

Good post Peter and exactly how I see it.

[PaulWinch again]

It's not really griping though, it's identifying an issue that we clearly have. Our record at home has been really poor for years and it's because we struggle to engineer opportunities if we're not counter attacking. So really instead of just saying 'it's the way we play', it should be something that's looked at and addressed. Also it's not particularly entertaining for the crowd for their team's tactics to be based on sitting back and soaking up pressure at home.

[Ads]

If Clark takes his chance agaisnt Arsenal and Richarson against Man City, then who knows. Small margins in these games.

[pauliewalnuts]

It's not really griping though, it's identifying an issue that we clearly have. Our record at home has been really poor for years and it's because we struggle to engineer opportunities if we're not counter attacking. So really instead of just saying 'it's the way we play', it should be something that's looked at and addressed. Also it's not particularly entertaining for the crowd for their team's tactics to be based on sitting back and soaking up pressure at home.

It is also not something that has just appeared this season, we've been like this for three years.

Playing that way doesn't mean you never win games - of course it doesn't, look at Hull or Liverpool - but if your opposition almost always passes the ball twice as much as you do, or if you never have the lion's share of possession, there's not much football going on there.

I also thought we'd realised - after having it graphically proven over the course of a couple of seasons - that just expecting to counter attack all the time is not good enough, because that is not always going to be an option.

Hopefully that will change this season, but I haven't seen much evidence of that so far.

[pauliewalnuts]

If Clark takes his chance agaisnt Arsenal and Richarson against Man City, then who knows. Small margins in these games.

To resuscitate that disagreement you were having with Jimbo - you could say "well, if Coutinho hadn't hit the post..." surely?

These things happen, both in our favour and against us, over the course of a season.