Manchester United vs Aston Villa Post-Match Analysis

[TonyD]

Only one person to blame for that tonight and that's Emery.  Said he wanted to win a trophy, yet blatantly surrenders his first opportunity to do so with an utterly ridiculous team selection against a United side there for the taking. 

Are you taking the piss

Some of the comments on here tonight have beggared belief.

No he right.  Unai picked a Gerrard team formation

The starting 11 he's being slated for went in at half time 0-0. We were pretty much at full strength when the collapse happened. Our new manager has a 4 year contract and is being paid a lot of money to sort it out. It's going to be a bumpy road ahead but he needs time. Crucially he needs to look at his squad in competitive matches before he starts the rebuild. Rome wasn't built in a day.

Had he started with Sunday’s team which was way way different to tonight’s team - then we would have won tonight.

With respect, Tony, you can't possibly say that definitively.

It's a game away to Man Utd, a game we wouldn't often expect to win and I think it's the brilliance of Sunday that has caused such a deep sense of disappointment. Perhaps we all got a little carried away.

If we had played the same XI as Sunday, then lost to Brighton, people would've been slating him for not rotating and saying our position dictates that the league should be our top priority.

Not great. Frustrating. But not a Bradford-style fuck-up either.

Rory.  True. But you cannot deny that if we started tonight with the same team and a high motivated team ( great team that created more space and move we have seen for years). -that we would have EASILY won tonight

[wince]

As I said before I’m
More interested in the league than the cup runs. New gaffer was hero on Sunday and now a villain for rotating the squad. All bit irrational and reactionary for my taste. Cup runs can come when we are established as solid in the league.

[TonyD]

The starting 11 was horrendous I couldn’t believe what I was seeing

apart from the fact half the team weren’t good enough and there was no creativity, for a manager that apparently likes to counter attack that must be the slowest starting line up in Villa’s history

100%

[BC Villain]

Already caning the manager nine days and two games into his appointment. Four days ago we beat these c*nts comfortably at home in the league for the first time since 1995. Criticism of team selection at this point is thoroughly and utterly mental.

No.  Caning a manager for needlessly discarding a cup competition that represents an opportunity for us to go far in - a week after he sat there and told us winning a trophy was important to him.

Sunday was brilliant,  but totally irrelevant in this in the context of tonight.

[Risso]

As I said before I’m
More interested in the league than the cup runs. New gaffer was hero on Sunday and now a villain for rotating the squad. All bit irrational and reactionary for my taste. Cup runs can come when we are established as solid in the league.

Doing well and progressing in the cups can breed confidence to take into league games. Now after a confidence boosting win at the weekend, the team has taken another battering, and you could read between the lines from from the Watkins interview that it's not a happy camp tonight.

[Rory]

Only one person to blame for that tonight and that's Emery.  Said he wanted to win a trophy, yet blatantly surrenders his first opportunity to do so with an utterly ridiculous team selection against a United side there for the taking. 

Are you taking the piss

Some of the comments on here tonight have beggared belief.

No he right.  Unai picked a Gerrard team formation

The starting 11 he's being slated for went in at half time 0-0. We were pretty much at full strength when the collapse happened. Our new manager has a 4 year contract and is being paid a lot of money to sort it out. It's going to be a bumpy road ahead but he needs time. Crucially he needs to look at his squad in competitive matches before he starts the rebuild. Rome wasn't built in a day.

Had he started with Sunday’s team which was way way different to tonight’s team - then we would have won tonight.

With respect, Tony, you can't possibly say that definitively.

It's a game away to Man Utd, a game we wouldn't often expect to win and I think it's the brilliance of Sunday that has caused such a deep sense of disappointment. Perhaps we all got a little carried away.

If we had played the same XI as Sunday, then lost to Brighton, people would've been slating him for not rotating and saying our position dictates that the league should be our top priority.

Not great. Frustrating. But not a Bradford-style fuck-up either.

Rory.  True. But you cannot deny that if we started tonight with the same team and a high motivated team ( great team that created more space and move we have seen for years). -that we would have EASILY won tonight

I think that's a reach. It probably would've made us more likely to win, yes, but every game is different. We might've won, we might've lost 6-0.

Not defending the starting XI tonight. Ultimately we lost, so it was the wrong team, but some of the reactions are a bit strong, I think, and verge on assuming that if we played our best team then a game at Old Trafford is a 'gimme'.

[paul_e]

If I was the manager I wouldn’t have swapped Emi for Olsen, because I know how bad Olsen is. Playing him is like giving the opposition a 2-goal start. He is worse than Nyland, and verging on Kalinic territory. Hopefully Emery now realises that he can’t be relied upon. It’s just a shame that it cost us our place in the cup.

A problem for us is that without European football we don’t play enough games to justify having a strong back-up GK. Teams playing in 4-competitions can afford to play their back-up in the lesser competitions. It would almost be better to get rid of Olsen and have a back-up who was content not to play unless Emi is unavailable. We can only play 50 games even if we reach the finals of both cups. Ederson has played nearly that many games for each of the last two seasons, so I don’t see the point in rotating. If you don’t progress in the cup, the potential fatigue that your first choice might experience is all academic anyway.

The problem there is that if your keeper picks up a long-term injury you're at risk of dropping lots of points unti lthe next window. Having 2 good keepers is reliant on the 2nd choice knowing he has guaranteed gametime in cups. The decision to play Olsen tonight isn't the problem, the problem is that he's a liability one the evidence so far.

As much as I'm annoyed to have gone out and think Olsen was shit tonight I'm not agianst him being handed the rope as he was. Yes it's cost us a place in the cup but, in our circumstances, I'm willing to accept that for this season if it helps Emery work out which of the fringe players he can trust.

[OzVilla]

Thought we played well overall and Dougie, Kamara and Ollie looked lively.

Defensively though we looked hapless and the introduction of Mings really created an axis of incompetence with Olsen already on the field.

Frustrating. MOTM Luiz for me.

[Taylor]

As I said before I’m
More interested in the league than the cup runs. New gaffer was hero on Sunday and now a villain for rotating the squad. All bit irrational and reactionary for my taste. Cup runs can come when we are established as solid in the league.

Doing well and progressing in the cups can breed confidence to take into league games. Now after a confidence boosting win at the weekend, the team has taken another battering, and you could read between the lines from from the Watkins interview that it's not a happy camp tonight.

I should hope it’s not a happy camp, they’ve just lost. But hopefully our new manager has the man management skills and experience to convince our fragile players that it wasn’t a “battering” (coz it wasn’t), and concentrate on the many positives to prepare them for the game on Sunday.

[martyn ellis]

Can't believe that Peter Schmeichel (goalkeeping legend?) on Sky actually said, and I quote, 'Olsen had a really good game tonight' and that he was 'calm' throughout the game apart from his mistake. Which match was he watching do you think?

[Risso]

They had 18 shots, and should probably have had another 2-3 goals.

[OzVilla]

Can't believe that Peter Schmeichel (goalkeeping legend?) on Sky actually said, and I quote, 'Olsen had a really good game tonight' and that he was 'calm' throughout the game apart from his mistake. Which match was he watching do you think?

Must the exclusive goalkeepers club talking surely. He was the absolute antithesis of 'calm'.

[Villatillidie1982]

I'm convinced we win that with a proper starting 11, especially at the back. Not impressed with Unai tonight. He has over a month with most of them to work out if they are good enough, not chucking away our best chance of a trophy. As for Olsen, he's shit, Steven Wonder knows he's shit, it doesn't take another shambolic first team performance to find out he's shit.

Convinced? I'm not. We looked terrible when our so called best defenders came on. Mings was an absolute shambles.

I could see from the first few minutes that the defence had no confidence in the goalkeeper. That affected the performance of all of the defence. Is Steer fit if there is a next time that Martinez is unavailable or rested?

[Drummond]

Copybook 0-1 Blot

[Villan82]

Already caning the manager nine days and two games into his appointment. Four days ago we beat these c*nts comfortably at home in the league for the first time since 1995. Criticism of team selection at this point is thoroughly and utterly mental.

No.  Caning a manager for needlessly discarding a cup competition that represents an opportunity for us to go far in - a week after he sat there and told us winning a trophy was important to him.

Sunday was brilliant,  but totally irrelevant in this in the context of tonight.

It didn't occur to you that he wants to bring silverware within the next four years to a club that hasn't won any in 26 years? You don't think it is a bit OTT to think we should win it in season one and bea them twice in the one week when we have beat them four times in 27 years?