Crystal Palace v Aston Villa post match thread

[LukeJames]

Think we’re going to have to change the shape a bit to get Grealish further up the pitch and give us some more presence in midfield. Probably means losing a winger.

Thats ok with me, Trez hasn't been great and Jota will be better suited to a 4-2-3-1, also gives us the added addition of Hourihane/Nakamba next to Luiz. Jack on the 10 or on the left if the 3.


                                Wesley

    Grealish              McGinn                Jota
 
                    Hourihane          Luiz

Edit.. I think we can only play this succesfully when Targett replaces Taylor as we will need our full backs to bomb on.

   

[Toronto Villa]

The truth is shit like this generally balances itself out. The harshest part of today is that we need to be better. Palace could and should have won handily today.

Nobody is going to feel sorry for us. And we cannot feel sorry for ourselves because that’s what leads to relegation. Dean Smith needs to figure this midfield thing out because two wingers isn’t working. We are not playing close enough to Wesley. The wingers are isolated as is our CF. We are being pushed back too easily by 4 and 5 man midfield systems.

This is Dean Smith’s big test. It was always going to happen so he needs to figure it out in the next week during the break. Next up West Ham and then Arsenal won’t be any easier than today.

[ChicagoLion]

Can we afford to only have one defensive midfielder in a 3?
Particularly away.
Why not play SJM and Jack further forward and strengthen the middle.
Games are won and lost in the middle of the pitch.

[QuintonVilla]

Not going to go on about the goal as we all know it should have stood etc etc. However, we were very very poor today. We made Palace look good and they're not, they're a poor side at home but could have been 2-0 up at half time.

Grealish is playing far too deep. The one time he ran at their defence we 'scored'
McGinn looks lost
Luiz is a passenger and offers zero protection to the back four and nothing going forward
Our wingers were crap and not in the game at all and didn't protect our full backs

The midfield is the issue, something needs to change in there. We're not seeing enough of the ball and not creating anything, Wesley was feeding on scraps today. For me we need two in front of the back four and then a fluid three behind Wesley. This would give us more protection, more possession and give Grealish more of a free role. Our biggest chance of scoring in this league is going to be from a set piece yet our only decent free kick taker Hourihane isn't playing. Trezeguet's free kicks are shit.

Massive two week break for us now and that West Ham game already looks huge. Lose that and all of a sudden we've lost four of the first five and have three points from fifteen.

I'm not expecting us to be top six but I am expecting us to have more control in games and look good against teams like Palace after spending £130m.

[frank black]

The truth is shit like this generally balances itself out. The harshest part of today is that we need to be better. Palace could and should have won handily today.

Nobody is going to feel sorry for us. And we cannot feel sorry for ourselves because that’s what leads to relegation. Dean Smith needs to figure this midfield thing out because two wingers isn’t working. We are not playing close enough to Wesley. The wingers are isolated as is our CF. We are being pushed back too easily by 4 and 5 man midfield systems.

This is Dean Smith’s big test. It was always going to happen so he needs to figure it out in the next week during the break. Next up West Ham and then Arsenal won’t be any easier than today.

Problem is when the shit happens to rebalance things VAR will intervene. Sod’s law is the only law.

[ChicagoLion]

Think we’re going to have to change the shape a bit to get Grealish further up the pitch and give us some more presence in midfield. Probably means losing a winger.

Thats ok with me, Trez hasn't been great and Jota will be better suited to a 4-2-3-1, also gives us the added addition of Hourihane/Nakamba next to Luiz. Jack in the 10 or on the left if the 3.


                                Wesley

    Grealish              McGinn                Jota
 
                    Hourihane          Luiz

 

Yes something like this

[PaulWinch again]

Jack is never particularly effective when he’s playing too deep.

[Villa75]

I can't believe var even looked at the incident and said, Yes, definite dive.

The thing is do we know that? Maybe VAR was and the ref on the pitch decided not to use it. VAR is just a human or group of humans with a bunch of monitors at different angles specifically tasked with helping the three officials on the pitch. Frankly I’m astonished that neither assistant didn’t catch it. Friend is directly behind both fouls as they happened. That’s fucking gross incompetence on its own. But had he gone to VAR he may well have been told it wasn’t a dive but he seemingly chose not to use it.

That's what i think. It all happened too quickly for var to have been used.

Part of VAR is to be retroactive and ultimately get the decision right. So there was time for Friend to get an opinion from the VAR and make the correct call. He could have been told Grealish didn’t dive, and while it was a foul it went on to Lansbury who then scored. Palace would have had no grounds to be upset when they reviewed it after.

Unfortunately this would not have been possible.

Once the referee blows his whistle the game is deemed to have been stopped.

As he blew his whistle before the goal was scored, VAR could not have given it even if the 'dive' was overturned.

[Ads]

VAR could have given a penalty though.

[ktvillan]

For me Friend had clearly bought into the "Grealish is a diver" mantra as spouted by the likes of Leed, SHA and the Bitters.  He seemed determined to treat every challenge on Jack as a dive. The clear barge by McCarthy first half went unpunished by even a foul. Let alone a yellow card, which were being dispensed to Villa players at the first possible opportunity and on the merest pretext.  It set a tone.  The climax was the epitome of this attitude.  Clearly looking to punish Grealish above all else.  And made an utter twat of himself to the whole world in the process.  It doesn't help us that he has been shown up as a ******. 

And to be fair we were a bit shite.  But it grates when the result comes down to an official that very obviously has some kind of axe to grind.  He's got form with us.  He's the latest reincarnation of Elleray and Halsey who gave us less than nothing.  We need to ask the PL to keep him away form us in future based on more than one dodgy performance.

[Villa in Denmark]

They've just had this on the PL review show on channel 3.

"Grotesque" was the word one pundit used. All agreed that VAR couldn't overrule the "non-goal" but couldn't understand why the dive verdict couldn't be overturned to a penalty.

[Dogtanian]

Just got back in, what an awful day.

This was a difficult fixture and although there were some positive points, it’s clear we sill have to up our game, especially away from home if we are going to survive in the Premier League.

The referee was awful today, and it was easy to predict in the first half that we were going to get someone sent off today because of how he was handling the game.  The goal being disallowed would have been an awful decision on its own, but on top of the rest of his performance it seems unprofessional.

I do believe that it is rare that a game is lost solely based on poor refereeing and that had we performed better then we may not have been so susceptible to a wrong decision denying us points.  I believe that there is more to come from this squad and that we will improve, we just have to make sure we improve fast enough to make it count this season.

[wince]

Beer is the answer tonight. In short somedays you’re the statue somedays you’re the pigeon......

[Steve67]

Probably not a popular opinion, but Grealish wasn't fouled, and he wasn't looking for a penalty either.  It was a perfectly good pass, played when he was a bit off balance.  The goal should have stood as there was no dive and no penalty.  Grealish's head is in the direction of where the ball has gone, and there is absolutely no appeal from him for a penalty.  How the hell twathead has missed that, or come to the conclusion that he has is deeply frustrating because the EFL is run by a bunch of complete boys network wankers. 

What a complete tool Trezeguet is.  Stupid tackle.  We need to be far less naive with and without the ball. 

[Sexual Ealing]

Sorry to harp on about our songs, but "England's centre half" at Mings? Is this really how diminished we are?