Villa v Man City Post-Match Thread

[Smirker]

That linesman is a disgusting bastard.

[Goldenballs]

If the lino had done his job properly than VAR would've given the goal. Unfortunately he was a nobhead and fucked it up, so nothing VAR can do.

[Bad English]

It's a fucking swizz.

[colin69]

Absolutely brilliant. I said in the pre match thread I fancied us to do ok and so it proved. Everyone did well today but for me Ashley Young and Ollie Watkins really stood out.
We must build on this now because we’ve proved we are better than we’ve shown so far.
Atmosphere in the ground was superb also.
A happy Saturday night for a change.

[RichardBatchelor]

Weird game.  Lucky not to be further behind until Bailey equalised, then played really well and robbed of a winner by the officials.

Hopefully the penny's dropped with Gerrard over McGinn.  Anonymous again, improved after he went off.

Yes, but we were bloody good when he was there too. He didn’t have a bad game, but we looked better with Phil.

[paul_e]

Gerrard showing both the good and bad in his comments on the BBC:

Good:

What happened with the Coutinho goal? "I saw a legitimate goal but obviously I am biased. The referee did the same at the other end with [Ezri] Konsa on the keeper, he was desperate on the whistle which went against us twice in the game."

Abso-fucking-lutely - you're one of the biggest names in English football, take advantage of that and call out this sort of bullshit, should've been doing this a lot more.

Bad:

We've been close to that performance but the moments have gone against us, they have been kinder to us today but that's got to be the start of us today.

No we haven't, today we had a shape in midfield and attack, everyone knew their job and, other than the captain, they all did them as expected. Don't put it down to getting a bit of luck, learn from it.

[dorsetvillian]

The extra man in midfield is what we finally got. Hopefully Gerrard will see his preferred formation just won't work.

[Beard82]

Thought we were great - the setup was much better we seemed to have a plan and a formation that worked - fullbacks in better positions and midfield functioned

Thought Watkins, Luiz and Young were great.

Ramsey looks much better when he’s getting the ball in the final 3rd.

You could see the confidence growing as the game went by - take that into the next two and the fat lady might be able to take a seat again

We’ll done to all.  I think that McGinn is 100% the weakest of our midfielders at present

Also special word to the farce that is Var - no goal despite not being offside.  But we have seen 100s of times where they play on forever only to see the flag raised

It wasn't VAR, the game had been stopped before the shot so VAR can't do anything, that's why the flag is supposed to be delayed.

No that’s what I mean - Var couldn’t help because the ref didn’t follow the rules that would have allowed Var to do its job.  The whole thing is a mess due to the inconsistent applicantion of it

[Ger Regan]

Bailey dropping a "working our bollocks off" on sky, lovely stuff!

[Three Spires Villa]

I am delighted, I moan and groan, but today gave me a great day. Yes it’s only a point, and Norwich beat City the year they went down, so it might not mean anything, but hell I enjoyed it. UTV

[Ger Regan]

One minor gripe, but not sure if it's fair or not, my initial feeling was that martinez didn't do great for their goal.

[LeeB]

One minor gripe, but not sure if it's fair or not, my initial feeling was that martinez didn't do great for their goal.

It was an unbelievable cross that probably only he can do so I'd say that's a bit harsh

[Three Spires Villa]

One minor gripe, but not sure if it's fair or not, my initial feeling was that martinez didn't do great for their goal.

Hey my friend have a beer! 👍

[dr.chekov]

Ashley Young was great, I thought.

[pelty]

Good performance by the team, though McGinn and Ramsey (assist aside) were too anonymous. Gerrard deserves some credit and I hope he sees that he needs to drop McGinn. Refs abysmal. Everyone rightly calling out the offside decision, but how about the huge short tug and Bailey getting choked both be non-calls? Disgraceful.