Dean Smith's Aston Villa 1-0 Swansea City Post Match Thread

[XXVilla]

Apart from the game review, could someone give a review on the tribute to Doug
Who was there
what was said
Was it respected

Brian Little laid the wreath

[Legion]

Link to Pravda FB video

[Lastfootstamper]

Loved the football. Looks like things being done with some kind of forethought.

Loved Terry's little altercation with the Swansea bench towards the end.

Loved the post match interview.

I'm not going to let the service in the UT concourse put the dampeners on a fine day. But still, worse than fucking useless.

Onwards and upwards.

[olaftab]

Smith’s post match interview included meaningful tactical analysis and gave the impression he’d actually been at the game. It’ll never catch on.

Yes but he needs to learn a few football phrases otherwise he will never survive these tough situations called post match interviews.

[olaftab]

Stats don’t make great reading but a win is a win

Aston Villa 1-0 Swansea is a stat that makes great reading.

Not sure about stats as haven't seen any yet but after watching the match at VP a more fair scoeline would have been 5-2 in our favour.

[CT]

There was a noticeable buzz before the game today.

I had that buzz too. I haven't felt that in a long old time.

Early stages, but very promising signs today. I thought we'd pressed them hard and as often as we could. We were trying to pop the ball around quicker too.

Fair play, John McGinn won so many tackles in midfield and set us up countless times by harrying, chasing and sticking his foot in.

How refreshing to see us making subs that stuck to our gameplan and didn't just involve bringing on every defensive player available whilst retreating towards the North Stand car park.

My lad loved it today. All he's known is us being shite. I'm hopeful we're turning a corner. Everything is changing.

Viva la revolution.

[ktvillan]

That's the first live Villa game I've attended since RDM was sacked where I wasn't looking at my watch, bored shitless, after about 20 minutes.  There was a bit of tempo in our forward play, the players seemed to know what they were supposed to be doing,  including movement off the ball and pressing high, Taylor was getting forward beyond the strikers on overlaps and looked a decent player bar a couple of errors.  It was all very unfamiliar.

Still a lot to work on though, Swansea had far too many free headers in our box, and we have to be more clinical with our chances.  Still can't believe the two sitters Abraham missed, the header was harder to miss than score.   I also thought the substitutions weren't great.  Elmo and Albert had been tracking back to cover, Bolasie and Kodija looked rather disinterested in putting in much effort in that respect, which gave their full-backs a licence to get forward put us under a bit of pressure.

Really impressed with McGinn even though not everything comes off he tries to make things happen and if he loses it tries his best to win it back.  And well done to Taylor and Nyland who showed they can play a bit.  Biggest disappointment for me was Grealish who still seems to deliver much less than he promises.

[Steve67]

I was unhappy with the line up with Albert, Taylor and Elmo in there, but fair play, well done on the result and clean sheet.  One of the posters said the players will get blamed for not playing for Bruce?  I think they were confused and disorganised with him in charge.  Under Smith, this won't be the case and therefore, I was completely wrong about the line up and with more consistency, Taylor and Albert may come back to some sort of form.  Clean sheets need to become the norm.  It's so tight in the top half of the table.

[rougegorge]

Good win and a great atmosphere.

We should have put some of the chances away and some of the final balls were pretty poor at times. I have been frustrated with McGinn but he lasted a full 90 minutes and won so many balls, especially if he himself lost it. 
Tuanzebe is improving now he's in the centre, but loses out in the air a bit too often. Still not sure about Bolasie.

[jembob]

There was a noticeable buzz before the game today.

I had that buzz too. I haven't felt that in a long old time.

Early stages, but very promising signs today. I thought we'd pressed them hard and as often as we could. We were trying to pop the ball around quicker too.

Fair play, John McGinn won so many tackles in midfield and set us up countless times by harrying, chasing and sticking his foot in.

How refreshing to see us making subs that stuck to our gameplan and didn't just involve bringing on every defensive player available whilst retreating towards the North Stand car park.

My lad loved it today. All he's known is us being shite. I'm hopeful we're turning a corner. Everything is changing.

Viva la revolution.

I often wish that we had a thumbs up/liked feature on H&V. Agree with everything here and pleased that your lad will get some encouragement at last.

[olaftab]

Albert 5 - lacked any dynamism in his performance for me when you see what we have waiting in the wings to replace him

I can not agree with that. I thought today Albert had his best game of the season so far. He worked very hard and was lively all the way through.

[London Villan]

Kodjia and Bolaise are two lazy footballers... i can’t imagine that will last too long, via one route or another.

[Villan For Life]

I thought that McGinn was immense and played like a nasty little terrier in our midfield. I also think that Smith will wean us off the “pass it to Jack” style of football. We looked a better side when he went off.

I spent most of the second half waiting for Swansea to score and thankfully they didn’t. If we can learn to play a better final ball and take our chances when presented then we will be ok. Over to you Dean Smith.

[Legion]

I think "Give it to Jack" was the only tactic Bruce knew.

[robleflaneur]

Smith’s post match interview included meaningful tactical analysis and gave the impression he’d actually been at the game. It’ll never catch on.

Yes but he needs to learn a few football phrases otherwise he will never survive these tough situations called post match interviews.

Yes,fine about setting traps,overloads and second phase delivery but doesn't he know it's the Championship.
Good to see how much better our movement off the ball was,especially in the first half when Barney got the ball off the defence and then found Jack in space whose pass nearly put Tammy in on goal.Likewise in the second,Hutton, instead of belting the ball down the line,played it into midfield and several passes later it ended with ,I think,Albert putting it the wrong side of the post.
Back to the training ground and the highly coachable players,more new buzz words.I bet the players are shocked.