SHA 1 Aston Villa 1 Post match thread.

[robbo1874]

You said it was bizarre. It certainly sounds like it was !

[dave17]

We look organized at least. Sadly we look unfit too and lack balance. I worry about the Brighton game

[ChicagoLion]

The midfield remains unbalanced and more so when McCormick came on.it looked like we went to a 4-5-1
It needed changing as we were getting over run and the equaliser looked inevitable.
It came, we hung on.

[Matt Collins]

Went to a 451? We were 451 from the start I thought

Midfield much more solid now but we do lack quality. It really reminded me of a MoN team

[tony scott]

Was it me or does Mike Dean look like Jasper Carrot.?

[Des Little]

What's the score with Tshibola? We desperately need someone in the middle to link the play otherwise we can expect to be under the cosh like we were all second half. No one seemed to want to carry the ball away from the back four, so it was like playing against a brick wall.

We are also way short of fitness across the team - a RDM legacy - and this needs addressing as a priority. Second to too many balls and zero pace when we looked like we may counter, which was rare. Only Gabby offered this when he came on and I never thought I'd ever say that again!

Overall, a point gained. Lots to do.

[Percy McCarthy]

Was it me or does Mike Dean look like Jasper Carrot.?

No, it's definitely Mike Dean.

[KevinGage]

A bizzarre day for me. I was booked for matchday hospitality in the Jasper Carrott suite (I'm a magician ). It felt very strange working there , not to mention for this game !
To be fair , the staff were all lovely. The fans , by and large , were ok as well. It surprised me when the host asked half hour before kick off if there were any Villa fans in the room, there were a lot.
Warwickshire cricket  players were there watching the game, and Ian bell and a young lad( I'm not a cricket fan so don't know his name -he was the one holding the trophy on the lap of honour )celebrated when we scored. Much to the rest of the suites displeasure. In particular the player liaison officer for Blues.
When they scored the equaliser one individual in particular wanted to come through the glass to get to the above two. In fairness , their security handled it well.
I thought it was a poor game. As the above post the front two rows of out allocation were left empty. I have a great pic of our fans, if I knew how to post on here I would ! There was a tier above our lot that was closed with advertising slogans.
I enjoyed the day but in a strange way!!

Fair play to Ian Bell.   Should be on his way to India when you see some of the filth in that England batting line-up.

[Witton Warrior]

BBC Football page reporting along the lines of  "Solihull-born Gardner... (ran) ...to the 1,988 visiting fans" - what is this sudden obsession with this number? Every match attendance for 30 years has been reported as tickets sold not bums on seats!

Also "On The Line" tonight is titled "Football Violence" and reports on the Policing of the match - wonder if they will be interviewing bored and disorientated Villa fans trying to get to their cars in Small Heath from Duddeston?

[cdbearsfan]

Also, stick this Solihull rubbish. He may have been born there as there is no hospital round by us, but he's definitely Yardley Massive.

[badluckeric(gates)]

As paulie said early in this thread, under RDM we would have lost that.

[Brend'Watkins]

Without a doubt. We are not great but we are now hard to beat.  Under RDM we had become very beatable.

[pbavfckuwait]

Draw a fair result, concerns as stated by the way the midfield are being asked to play. or if that is the only way they can play. We have on paper some good forwards, but they all seem to play as individuals, no sort of team ethic. Ayew not sure what he does. Westwood gets stick, but he really is a nothing sort of player.
Get to January and beef up the midfield with some nous and creativity and the mongrels are the same as they have always been, dirty bastards that play for them, even dirtier bastards that support them.

[auntiesledd]

I thought Amavi looked really good for the most part today.

Funny you should say that Paul, because I mostly thought the opposite! Defensively he looked suspect and his distribution was absolutely dreadful. Admittedly his options were limited by the constant lack of options available to him when he had the ball, but it doesn't excuse him over-hitting long, high balls to non-existent forwards; or giving the opposition the ball via the aforementioned 'tactic'. He wasn't the only one, to be fair, but that doesn't excuse him. Additionally, he should be told that when taking a throw-in he is required to throw the sodding ball to somebody in a claret & blue shirt! It drives me nuts when professional footballers ignore the basics of the game: and it's inexcusable. I'm of the opinion that Bruce needs to find a pair of full-backs who are a damned sight better than those he's inherited, but I live in hope that he can get a better tune out of those at hand. At least his defensive central trio look like they're up to the job - and that's certainly something he can build on. I'm confident SB will get things sorted in time, but he'll need funds in the January window if we're to have a team that can get out of this division. Let's hope Dr X has a few more million to spunk on players then eh? We go again...

[aj2k77]

We definitely need a right back in January and Centre Mid with a bit of pace and engine. We also need to solve the conundrum of our formation. Having to play 3 central midfielders every game is severely limiting us going forward right now, it's like we have 3 totally separate departments in our team that all work as individual units.