Villa Arsenal Post Match

[eamonn]

Look, I like Gregg Evans, even if he's a Baggie like Howell before him. He's our correspondent at The Athletic and paid to write articles of insight for Villans and he generally delivers.

Here's the latest...

They were not the statistics Steven Gerrard had planned to be mulling over as he granted his Aston Villa players a rare week of relative freedom.

One shot on target — in literally the last second of the game — and only 17 touches in the opposition box summed up just how much Villa struggled in their 1-0 defeat to Arsenal.

For the second week running there was a clear gulf in class between a club desperate to break into the top seven and another well on track to finish inside it.

The difference between the two games, however, was that at West Ham last weekend Villa gave their opponents a run for their money.

Against Arsenal at Villa Park they were limp and lacklustre. When Bukayo Saka scored the opening goal on 30 minutes, Villa hadn’t touched the ball in the opposition box. By the interval, they had managed to do so just two times and even later into the game, when they had a little joy as Arsenal backed off, Villa were still unable to muster up a meaningful effort on goal until Philippe Coutinho’s free kick was saved in stoppage time.

Before the game, Gerrard had made the decision to allow his non-international players the opportunity to travel to a warm-weather location for training in the week ahead.

Ten of the 20 players in Saturday’s squad have fixtures with their respective nations anyway, so Gerrard handed each of the others a personalised programme to stick to and suggested they combine it with some family time.

Touches in opposition box this season
Tottenham Hotspur vs Aston Villa
37
Norwich City vs Aston Villa
34
Aston Villa vs Watford
34
Chelsea vs Aston Villa
33
Aston Villa vs Southampton
27
Aston Villa vs Everton
26
Aston Villa vs Manchester United
26
Leeds United vs Aston Villa
26
West Ham United vs Aston Villa
26
Southampton vs Aston Villa
25
Brentford vs Aston Villa
25
Aston Villa vs Leicester City
23
Aston Villa vs Wolves
23
Aston Villa vs Brighton
23
Watford vs Aston Villa
22
Aston Villa vs Leeds United
21
Aston Villa vs Newcastle United
19
Aston Villa vs Brentford
19
Aston Villa vs Chelsea
18
Crystal Palace vs Aston Villa
18
Aston Villa vs West Ham United
17
ASTON VILLA VS ARSENAL
17
Aston Villa vs Manchester City
17
Manchester United vs Aston Villa
16
Arsenal vs Aston Villa
16
Liverpool vs Aston Villa
15
Newcastle United vs Aston Villa
15
Everton vs Aston Villa
13
Brighton vs Aston Villa
12
Average
22.65
The manager has been pleased with the work rate and attitude of the players in recent weeks and a change of scenery felt like a good idea.

Clearly, though, there’s still work to be done a lot closer to home.

Do Villa even believe they’re good enough to beat the teams currently competing for a place in European competition next season? In 12 games against the teams in the nine positions above them, Villa have taken points on just two occasions, first beating Manchester United at Old Trafford and then also taking a point off of them at Villa Park.

Gerrard is asked in every press conference whether his side are capable of kicking on and potentially grabbing a spot in Europe, but with such inconsistencies, still they remain some way off.

It felt like Villa offered Arsenal too much respect and were reactive rather than proactive in the approach.

The decision to play out from the back — goalkeeper Emi Martinez waited until the 44th minute before kicking it long — also backfired.

Villa had a clear plan to beat Arsenal’s press as Martinez used short passes to centre-halves Tyrone Mings and Ezri Konsa, while midfielders John McGinn and Jacob Ramsey dropped in deep to help the build-up play.

Each time, though, it was easily dealt with as Arsenal comfortably won back possession or broke up play with tactical fouls.

When Villa were able to keep hold of the ball for a little longer, they quickly gave it away when a long ball up to Ollie Watkins broke down. The striker won just one duel and lost six others and similar questions from earlier weeks cropped up again. Like can Emi Buendia and Coutinho play in the same team against quality opponents like Arsenal? Is Watkins better with Danny Ings alongside him? Will Morgan Sanson get another chance to start?

On days like these where attacks were few and far between and the supporters had to wait until stoppage time to feel any sort of excitement, it’s not always the system and the selection.

Worst attacking performances 21-22
Shots On Target

Newcastle United vs Aston Villa
1
Aston Villa vs Watford
1
Aston Villa vs Chelsea
1
Aston Villa vs Arsenal
1
Liverpool vs Aston Villa
0
Season total average
3.93

Gerrard agreed that his side lacked belief and insisted he asked his side to think differently when the original approach wasn’t working.

Far too often Martinez would play it out, the defence and central midfield would pass it between themselves, then play broke down.

Yet when the goalkeeper, who was booed by the travelling supporters, mixed it up and went direct, there was a little more concern in the Arsenal back line.

“I said to the players if we can’t play through Arsenal’s initial press, can we go over it, get it forward, show some more positivity, and can we put the two centre-backs under some more pressure, and at least challenge them and see what reaction we get?” Gerrard said. “We created some interesting moments from doing that, but we were waiting for too long.

“Yes, we tried to change it tactically and do something different, but there was nothing wrong with what we tried to do. It was the lack of belief because when we took the handbrake off, there was a difference.”

Coutinho’s late effort ensured that Villa avoided the embarrassment of failing to register a single shot on target for the first time at Villa Park this season.

But that was the only thing to cling onto during a difficult afternoon that highlighted, in front of owners Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens, the need for further support to assist Villa’s plans of mixing it with the Premier League’s big-boys.

[PaulTheVillan]

We only seem to lose when we are crap, not because we’ve been whipped by an opposition being world class.

Arsenal first half were better than us easily but felt the setup was wrong. We just couldn’t make anything work.

[CT Villan]

That 'touches in the box' data is meaningless without correlating it to points won.

[Skerra]

I think that our manager is over thinking things. Especially when playing at home, press the opponents right up to their penalty area. That’s what Arsenal were doing to us and, we let them come to the half way line before trying to stop them. Football is a simple game only made difficult by managers trying to be clever and over think the tactics.

[Drummond]

That 'touches in the box' data is meaningless without correlating it to points won.

We we had fucking zero points on Saturday. And in relation to comparisons, the fewer touches in the box, the far less likely you are to score goals.

[john e]

My biggest concern about Saturday is that we appear to be going backwards. Under DS we were going toe to toe with Arsenal and we even had the club trolling them for a while. We even had the cheek to offer 30m for Smith-Rowe now look at us. We were meek almost to the point of accepting second best on Saturday. It's not acceptable and I'm sure hoping that SG will be making that point in no uncertain terms on the training ground today.

The last time we played Arsenal at whatever their new grounds called we were rubbish
The worst performance of the season Apart from a cracking goal by Ramsey when it was all done and dusted
It was another nail in DS’s coffin at the time

You’re correct though we did have some decent results against top-class opposition under Dean  for a while, But that’s not how it finished

[The Edge]

My biggest concern about Saturday is that we appear to be going backwards. Under DS we were going toe to toe with Arsenal and we even had the club trolling them for a while. We even had the cheek to offer 30m for Smith-Rowe now look at us. We were meek almost to the point of accepting second best on Saturday. It's not acceptable and I'm sure hoping that SG will be making that point in no uncertain terms on the training ground today.

The last time we played Arsenal at whatever their new grounds called we were rubbish
The worst performance of the season Apart from a cracking goal by Ramsey when it was all done and dusted
It was another nail in DS’s coffin at the time

You’re correct though we did have some decent results against top-class opposition under Dean  for a while, But that’s not how it finished

To me it felt like we were getting under Arsenal's skin we were a team on the rise while they were a team in decline. I didn't have that feeling at all on Saturday like we were back to square one.

[N'ZMAV]

The Arsenal team, tactics and style on the weekend was better than any of the Arsenal teams we’ve beaten under Smith. I’m not undermining Smith’s wins but Arteta has found a way to get those players playing very well.

[Risso]

You can't really pick one game and use it as evidence that we are going backwards. As John rightly points out in any case, the game against Arsenal earlier in the season was absolutely dismal, one of the worst in years and years, we were astonishingly bad. Gerrard has got us to 1.44 points per game, a big improvement on where we were with Smith at the time with 0.91 points per game. Gerrard is now finding out that largely the same players who were playing badly under Smith mostly can't be relied upon to be consistently good. Who knew?

[Drummond]

You can't really pick one game and use it as evidence that we are going backwards. As John rightly points out in any case, the game against Arsenal earlier in the season was absolutely dismal, one of the worst in years and years, we were astonishingly bad. Gerrard has got us to 1.44 points per game, a big improvement on where we were with Smith at the time with 0.91 points per game. Gerrard is now finding out that largely the same players who were playing badly under Smith mostly can't be relied upon to be consistently good. Who knew?

Well he has had the benefit of a fit Buendia, Ings and the signings of Coutinho, Chambers and Digne....

[Chris Smith]

You can't really pick one game and use it as evidence that we are going backwards. As John rightly points out in any case, the game against Arsenal earlier in the season was absolutely dismal, one of the worst in years and years, we were astonishingly bad. Gerrard has got us to 1.44 points per game, a big improvement on where we were with Smith at the time with 0.91 points per game. Gerrard is now finding out that largely the same players who were playing badly under Smith mostly can't be relied upon to be consistently good. Who knew?

You can pick one game when it’s the post match thread ;-)

If Gerrard is going to get credit for things that go well, then equally, like on Saturday, he has take his share of the blame. He set us up wrongly to start with and was too slow to change things.

[Risso]

Buendia and Ings both played in 9 of Smith's 11 games. Chambers is a back up defender. Coutinho was obviously the big signing, but can't do it all by himself when Luiz and McGinn are playing so badly.

[Risso]

You can't really pick one game and use it as evidence that we are going backwards. As John rightly points out in any case, the game against Arsenal earlier in the season was absolutely dismal, one of the worst in years and years, we were astonishingly bad. Gerrard has got us to 1.44 points per game, a big improvement on where we were with Smith at the time with 0.91 points per game. Gerrard is now finding out that largely the same players who were playing badly under Smith mostly can't be relied upon to be consistently good. Who knew?

You can pick one game when it’s the post match thread ;-)

If Gerrard is going to get credit for things that go well, then equally, like on Saturday, he has take his share of the blame. He set us up wrongly to start with and was too slow to change things.

Absolutely. Saturday was shit, a piss poor performance, he was way too slow to make changes and his treatment of that reporter was a disgrace.

[Toronto Villa]

Saturday was shit, especially in the first half but it was a million miles from some of crap we've all had to witness in the past 10 years. Fuck me there is library to pick from of some of the worst displays ever from a Villa side; home or away. So lets get a bit of perspective there.

While Gerrard is still new in this job; it's only been 5 months or so, we knows he needs to learn fast. I had no issue with him being fucked off coming across in his interview. The questions were stupid but he needs to learn to manage that better. He might get away with it once or twice because of who he is, but he's not Ferguson or Mourinho or Klopp etc. He's won nothing in England so it will end up being noise and a distraction.

He needs at least 2 more windows to bring in players to play his style. He need improvements in some key areas; physically and mentally. That will be about 200m worth of players to buy with about 30-40m worth leaving

[RamboandBruno]

My biggest concern about Saturday is that we appear to be going backwards. Under DS we were going toe to toe with Arsenal and we even had the club trolling them for a while. We even had the cheek to offer 30m for Smith-Rowe now look at us. We were meek almost to the point of accepting second best on Saturday. It's not acceptable and I'm sure hoping that SG will be making that point in no uncertain terms on the training ground today.

The last time we played Arsenal at whatever their new grounds called we were rubbish
The worst performance of the season Apart from a cracking goal by Ramsey when it was all done and dusted
It was another nail in DS’s coffin at the time

You’re correct though we did have some decent results against top-class opposition under Dean  for a while, But that’s not how it finished

To me it felt like we were getting under Arsenal's skin we were a team on the rise while they were a team in decline. I didn't have that feeling at all on Saturday like we were back to square one.

We beat Arsenal 1-0 with a dogs of war performance in the year we stayed up. The team we have now is better than that team. Football just doesn’t work in straight lines. They’ve improved after a long period of relative decline for them, we have a much more stable established place in the premier league, but progress has been stalling in mid table for over a year, so we’re missing the thrill of the obvious step up from relegation fodder to mid table. We’re at an important stage now, teams who end up mulling around mid table for a number of years, can get drawn downwards and are subject to decline at the loss of one or two players or a manager, Everton are an obvious example, or even teams like Stoke in years gone by. We need to move beyond mid table next year, to where West Ham, Spurs and Arsenal are, but the only way we can do that is 2 or 3 very important signings.