Villa 1 Man. United 2 Post match thread.

[The Edge]

Aston Villa 1-2 Man Utd: Why Villa will still make the Premier League's top four - Stephen Warnock - https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/68269251

A very considered article; I like Warnock.

He does come across as a cut above some of his contemporaries. Compared to some of the other clowns out there and I'm looking at you Micah Richards and Danny Mills he's practically a genius.

[garyellis]

I’d rather focus on how Emery got us to play. We were good to watch, controlled the tempo and controlled the game. We looked very good. Individual errors cost us the game, not Emery. Errors from some of our players and refereeing decisions.

Emery has completely turned us around and we’ve played some fantastic football along the way. He’s helped turn Villa Park into a ground most teams fear again. Yesterday was not his fault. If we defended the corner better (which shouldn’t have been), buried our chances, it would have been a great win. All ifs and buts, but the way Emery has managed us since he’s arrived is incredible and other than the score, we played extremely well yesterday. There’s also players coming back from injury now and Ramsey was a huge plus yesterday.

Totally agree Ian. Took time to reflect before posting because I hate losing to these. All the pundits felt we deserved more from the game but needed to be more clinical. Players on their way back from injury and getting match fit, our best home performance since Man City for me we need to keep on that trajectory there is a lot to play for. Keep the faith UTV

[London Villan]

I'm much more positive after that performance. It was as well as we've played since man city. Another day we win 2-1/3-1.

We have key players coming back, we have some winnable games coming up and a 5-point gap. It's a learning curve for these players too - many have never been at the right end of the table where there is a different kind of relentless pressure to perform every week. It's what winners do and we need to learn and adapt.

[RamboandBruno]

I’d rather focus on how Emery got us to play. We were good to watch, controlled the tempo and controlled the game. We looked very good. Individual errors cost us the game, not Emery. Errors from some of our players and refereeing decisions.

Emery has completely turned us around and we’ve played some fantastic football along the way. He’s helped turn Villa Park into a ground most teams fear again. Yesterday was not his fault. If we defended the corner better (which shouldn’t have been), buried our chances, it would have been a great win. All ifs and buts, but the way Emery has managed us since he’s arrived is incredible and other than the score, we played extremely well yesterday. There’s also players coming back from injury now and Ramsey was a huge plus yesterday.

People will come back with the scores the most important thing, which it is. However, i do agree with your sentiments here.
Theres a lot of focus on bringing Bailey off, maybe that made a difference, maybe it never, I was surprised he went off and thought maybe Ramseys race was run. Whatever, the reason we didnt win was because Watkins never buried that chance early in the 2nd half, Luiz never buried that chance at 1-1, someone else never buried a chance in between, that trickled past the post and if I’m being harsh, Cash lost his man for their winner and Emi maybe could of had stronger hands.
We always want to find the one reason or mistake with a horrible defeat like that, but there are a few, mainly if you miss a lot of sitters its harder to win.

I think the main thing now is to try and not fall away, if we can get to the end of March still around 5th, when hopefully Torres and Konsa will be back in defence, Ramsey and Moreno will be building up that partnership again etc etc, i still think we have a real chance of champions league qualification.

[Gareth]

Not read any of the comments on here as ignored football the moment the final whistle went…straight down the steps as listening to that vulgar bunch celebrating year after year is worse than losing to a local rival.  Sod off back to Torquay & Woking you bunch of horrible entitled gobshites.

It’s obvious we weren’t clinical enough, totally annoying that their crap keeper suddenly decides to make a couple of worldie saves.

Thought in general we were good, certainly the opposite of the couple of bottle jobs in the last two home games.

Did sky show 46 angles of the ball going out for the award of the corner for their first goal?

Was good to see the left side start to tick again with Moreno & Ramsey…obv JJ left his shooting boots at home but that that is by far the best performance he has put in since the injury so bodes well for a string finish to the season.

For their winner how many of them piled into the crowd? How many did the incompetent oaf with the whistle book? 

Hope Kamara isn’t a bad knock but with our luck this season he is out for a couple of months now…annoying because for me he was the best player on the pitch before that.

That substitution of Bailey was baffling…taking pace off and replacing with a pedestrian Teilemans was odd.

Dropping 6 points to such a poor team is annoying but it is time to get back on the horse in the next 3 games.  Hopefully by the time we play Spurs we have a fit Kamara, Torres and Konsa back on the pitch.

[brontebilly]

To be fair that was a quality winner from them. Mainoo showed great feet to start with, inch perfect first time cross from Dalot and McT dominated Cash to nod it in. This wasn't like Chelsea where you could point multiple players to blame. Cash did make a decent effort to get to the cross but McT was just too strong. It was sickening as it felt like they were trying to hold on for the point at that stage.

Dalot getting great credit in the media today, it was his awful clearance that Luiz should have punished. He scores and I think we go on and win comfortably such was our dominance at the time. Small margins.

All about Fulham now, go there and win and we will be setup nicely for the rest of the season.

[Beard82]

After sleeping on it, Im still really gutted!

Stuttering form and crippling injuries meant that yesterday gave us a really good chance to give ourselves some breathing space.  Did we expect to be in such a good position at the start of the season, No.  Are we still in a great position? Yes, but the last 25 years have shown that if you don't take those chances when they come - you may be waiting a very long time for the next one.

Emery is brilliant - but FFP means we will never be on a level playing field against the clubs with better turnover - and the reality is without UCL football we will have to sell some significant players to continue to invest at the level we need.  We also need to talk about some of our transfer business.  FFP means we can't afford to spend 50m on a player and have him being rubbish for more than he is good / wait a season hoping he comes good.  The same goes for Carlos (although that's the past regime).

Zanilio has been worse than bad, and Tielemens has had some great games, but only about 50% of them, Lenglet has been pretty average too.  Letting Dendonker go - only for Kamara to get injured in virtually the next game is also a worry.   I know they have to make different decisions to balance the books - but if we want to progress we need to get these calls right and I think currently we're 1 good decision for every questionable one.  I appreciate this last point may be a bit knee jerk - but what else are Monday mornings for.   

[Risso]

I’d rather focus on how Emery got us to play. We were good to watch, controlled the tempo and controlled the game. We looked very good. Individual errors cost us the game, not Emery. Errors from some of our players and refereeing decisions.

Emery has completely turned us around and we’ve played some fantastic football along the way. He’s helped turn Villa Park into a ground most teams fear again. Yesterday was not his fault. If we defended the corner better (which shouldn’t have been), buried our chances, it would have been a great win. All ifs and buts, but the way Emery has managed us since he’s arrived is incredible and other than the score, we played extremely well yesterday. There’s also players coming back from injury now and Ramsey was a huge plus yesterday.

Bailey was terrorising them, and as soon as went off, it looked like we'd settled for a draw. It was a really, really bad decision.

[Demitri_C]

Emerys record against ten hag has been abit poor to be honest

Played 5
W 1
L 4

[Ads]

I'm still seeing more positives than not, despite how ball crunching the result was. Makes ETH less likely to be sacked in the summer, which is a bonus for everybody else. The longer that 1 dimensional chequebook merchant is there, the more chance the rest of us have of Champions League football. I'd hate for them to get it right again.

[Smithy]

It's always horrible losing to that lot.  Over the years it's happened plenty, and I've always been left with the horrible feeling that that's just the way it is - "they're a better side than us right now", "they have better players than us", or "they have a better manager".

I don't feel that way today.  At all. I'm still totally gutted to lose, obviously, but on reflection we played more than well enough to win that game, and on another day, we do.  We certainly played better than when we beat Arsenal.   If we'd lost to Arsenal, and won yesterday maybe I'd feel better.  Probably not.

The difference now is that we lost an important game to our rivals. That hurts. But when we play them now we aren't the plucky underdogs hoping to pull a rabbit out of the hat any more.  We performed pretty well throughout most of the game and were clearly the best side for large parts of the game - against a team that starts every season with champions league aspirations.  That's where we are now. That's the company we now keep.  Now, we are going to lose some of these games. Some where we've lost to the better side on the day, and some like yesterday where we definitely deserved more. It's going to happen, and it'll probably happen again this season that we lose a game we didn't deserve to.

However, I'm going to spend the rest of the week trying to think positively about the performance, and the imminent return of Pau and Digne, and try not to focus too much on us losing a match that pretty much everyone agrees we didn't deserve to lose.

Onwards and upwards.

[VillaTim]

all well and good playing well etc and saying things like "on another day we win that" , but that is a game we had to win or at least not lose. It's a huge momentum shift. Absolutely gutted as you can sense what happens now . Hopefully Kamara is back soon but again knowing how things go it's 2-3 weeks out which turns into 5-6 weeks.

[AV82EC]

all well and good playing well etc and saying things like "on another day we win that" , but that is a game we had to win or at least not lose. It's a huge momentum shift. Absolutely gutted as you can sense what happens now . Hopefully Kamara is back soon but again knowing how things go it's 2-3 weeks out which turns into 5-6 weeks.

Both can be true you know. I err on the optimism side of that equation others don’t and that’s fine.

[VillaTim]

i think not signing another decent striker (or keeping Archer) really really hit home yesterday , Watkins misfiring and no replacement on the bench . That chance 2nd half that Watkins missed is bread & butter for Archer

[darren woolley]

We played much better but we didn't take our chances.