Aston Villa Silhouettes vs Manchester City Post-Match Thrashing

[The Edge]

.just got in not read any prevoius posts. Fuck me that was embarrasing. I've stuck with him up until now but sorry  Deano you'''ve got to go.

[brontebilly]

Drinkwater played as a man-marker?

Not really but was the holding one out of the three, Luiz (right) and Hourihane (left). There was yawning space between our backline and midfield that City kept exploiting. Even at Leicester I don't think Drinkwater ever played that role, from what I can recall he played next to Kante with licence to cover ground all over the pitch.

I saw it for Burnley at Xmas against the same opposition and it was abundantly clear that those days for Drinkwater are long long gone. He isn't just not match fit, he is woefully unfit generally. Everything we don't need in midfield and more.

[Lastfootstamper]

Tell you what, though. Them De Bruyne and Aguero chaps, they're a bit good at football. I'm not going to comment on those in claret and blue, they deserve no more of my time or thought today.

[aj2k77]

Fucking rubbish, not even chasing shadows, just jockeying around as they passed the ball through us.

No physicality, no menace, no desire, no competitiveness.

Stop fucking around and get a fucking Striker in. If we fail in these next 3 games it's almost certain we will go down. Get someone in ASAP, ready for them. Drinkwater, everything we expected from a player incapable of getting in the side of fellow strugglers and who hasn't played much in 2 years. A gormless, braindead signing.

[Aldridge Villa]

Do hope this is our nadir moment , Southampton and Watford appear to have had theirs and I can but hope we respond in a similar vein , but good god we need inspirational signings who must hit the ground running, not convinced signings of such magnitude will materialise.....

[auntiesledd]

You could tell from the start, out only hope was if City went easy on us.

We literally looked clueless, no idea who should be where or what to do with that hot potato of a football.

Games against Man City may not define our season, the manner of the defeat does. I think we're gone following that. I'm not sure how we come back from it, we gave up, again.

We left at 6-0. I figured if the team had given up, I would too. Bad fan in some eyes, but I'd had a gutsfull of it.

Bad fan?! Behave yersel. That pathetic capitulation - you paid good money to witness - would've led to that vast majority of us running for the exits at H/T. I only stayed to suffer the second half in the boozer because a kindly mate bought me another pint! Thank feck I was well on the way to being shitfaced - otherwise I'd have cried &/or belted someone during the rest of the extended aberration. Still, our penalty at the death certainly brought a sense of respectability to the final score. 

[RamboandBruno]

Nakamba is a must to start in these sorts of games even though he is not in the best of form. He is the only one who really presses the man in possession.

I would also have played Guilbert as he would have added some support higher up the field. The whole point of playing three central defenders is to let the wing backs get up field and support. By playing Taylor and Elmohamdy you are playing 5 defensive players.

Having said that we need more quality in midfield.

Fair enough.

I think your right about Guilbert, I’m not sure why he keeps leaving him out. Not scapegoating Taylor, but he’s unfortunately not up to this level.

I really thought Nakamba was quality when he first game, but he’s been that poor lately, then again.....lots have. Brighton are decent at home, a point would be a good result

[nick harper]

I’m not sure if it’s correct (Getting my stats from a unreliable Bad English picture)

We fouled five times and they fouled 12.

Obviously not the most important statistic today, but it’s a little damning.

On top of that our midfield won 4 tackles between them in 90 minutes.

They were however very good at letting City run off them time and time again. Not one tactical foul. City stopped Grealish every time he had an opportunity to run with the ball.

We are naive and soft.

[LukeJames]

The whole point of playing three central defenders is to let the wing backs get up field and support. By playing Taylor and Elmohamdy you are playing 5 defensive players.

This with bells on it, the wing backs are critical in a 3-5-2. You need fast, technical, forward thinking players with bags of energy to play these roles, we played two of our slowest players whos first instinct is to always play the ball backwards. Picking Taylor I can kind of forgive in the circumstances but on the other side we absolutely had to have somebody bursting forward to support our attacks and push City back. Picking Elmo there was the worst decision Smith made today. We gave City absolutely nothing to deal with out wide.

[olaftab]

Drinkwater played as a man-marker?

He man marked his own shadow (and passed to it a few times) by the looks of things!

Shadow left him dead several times.

[David_Nab]

I’m not sure if it’s correct (Getting my stats from a unreliable Bad English picture)

We fouled five times and they fouled 12.

Obviously not the most important statistic today, but it’s a little damning.

On top of that our midfield won 4 tackles between them in 90 minutes.

They were however very good at letting City run off them time and time again. Not one tactical foul. City stopped Grealish every time he had an opportunity to run with the ball.

We are naive and soft.

Been the same all season in mf apart from McGinn.We are a soft touch we have no fighters in there at all.

We need a striker because our best way out of this is to play 5 defenders hit it to the striker to hold up or Jack to pass to the striker to score.The cup game was the first goal we have scored that Jack wasn't somehow involved in for weeks.

After this debarcle we need
DCM - Strong not afraid to kick people if need be
Striker
Pacy winger
Another LB would be nice too but likely a step too far at this point 

[Steve67]

The whole point of playing three central defenders is to let the wing backs get up field and support. By playing Taylor and Elmohamdy you are playing 5 defensive players.

This with bells on it, the wing backs are critical in a 3-5-2. You need fast, technical, forward thinking players with bags of energy to play these roles, we played two of our slowest players whos first instinct is to always play the ball backwards. Picking Taylor I can kind of forgive in the circumstances but on the other side we absolutely had to have somebody bursting forward to support our attacks and push City back. Picking Elmo there was the worst decision Smith made today. We gave City absolutely nothing to deal with out wide.

On top of that, Elmo was fucking awful today.

[Richard E]

So what was the actual game plan today? How was it supposed to work?

[aj2k77]

Elmo, for fucks sake,he keeps cropping up over and over again. In and out of the team, he's a solid Championship player, solid, not even a good one, yet he still keeps reappearing. It's madness.

[LukeJames]

Elmo, for fucks sake,he keeps cropping up over and over again. In and out of the team, he's a solid Championship player, solid, not even a good one, yet he still keeps reappearing. It's madness.

Yep. Same as Taylor, solid Championship left back, not a good one.