Aston Villa 2 Brighton 2 Post Match Thread.

[andyh]

In reality, it’s a team responsibility.
The attackers don’t put the chances away.
The midfielders don’t do a great job in protecting the defence
And the defence are prone to errors……regularly.

But why on earth our defenders are suddenly deciding it’s a great tactic to let the ball bounce in front of them though and waiting, is a new one that has crept into our game over the last few weeks.
That needs stamping out, right now.

[Taylor]

More than anything, I just think we’ve been really unlucky this season.

[tomd2103]

In reality, it’s a team responsibility.
The attackers don’t put the chances away.
The midfielders don’t do a great job in protecting the defence
And the defence are prone to errors……regularly.

But why on earth our defenders are suddenly deciding it’s a great tactic to let the ball bounce in front of them though and waiting, is a new one that has crept into our game over the last few weeks.
That needs stamping out, right now.

The sloppiness at the back crept in last season, but didn't really cost us too much.  It has continued into this season and has cost us on a number of occasions now.   

I think it's probably more of a mindset and concentration issue than anything. 

[KevinGage]

we all knew that if it went into the last 15 mins at 2-1 our bottle jobs would cough up a goal and so it proved
another game where we should have scored 3/4 at least but we didn’t which is worrying because we concede 2 goals minimum in most games

We'll be fine if we can manage to score three goals between the gimmes we present to teams early and late on.

So just the little matter of 100+ goals scored over a 38 league game campaign to have a decent season, then. Piece of piss. 

[paul_e]

More than anything, I just think we’ve been really unlucky this season.

In sport luck is normally very closely tied to confidence. When you're playing well 50/50s seem to fall for you but that flips when you're not quite right. As a squad we seem to be a little down on ourselves and it's creating all sorts of tiny problems that manifest as the sort of silly mistakes that have crept into our game. I'd say we're playing at about 95% right now but the 5% that's missing is killing us.

[VillaTim]

Or the defence that can't defend a simple long ball put pressure on the attack, which still did their job by putting us 2-1 up with 10 to go. Your attack scoring twice at home to a side that hadn't won in 6 isn't the failure.

Quite - and it’s not just the “defence”, although that first goal was entirely Konsa, it’s the whole defensive system.

In your opinion.

[trinityoap]

Could it be explained to our boys that" a ball over the top" means over the top of the opposition's defence and not over the top of their crossbar?

[cdward]

I agree with the confidence/luck scenarios.
Watching Man City and their recent bad run of form, they were creating chances (Gvardiol header), in almost every game they lost, but that last 5% whether it’s luck or confidence was missing.
The same goes with teams on a good run, everything seems to just click, and confidence grows.
We are very Spursy at the moment, you never know if you are going to win a game even when we’re winning a game.

[cdbearsfan]

We don't seem to win any games against the run of play and we quite often fail to win games that we dominate. That's not a good combination. More of a threat on the break would almost certainly help with the former, at least.

[rob_bridge]

We don't seem to win any games against the run of play and we quite often fail to win games that we dominate. That's not a good combination. More of a threat on the break would almost certainly help with the former, at least.

We won many of them last season and 2nd half of 2022/23 (think 2.0 at the Bridge when we had 4 good chances, they had 6 or 7). We still took the odd pasting but got more points.

This season not happening. We played really well in 3 CL games and well in another. In the league recently we have played well v Brentford and City. Not enough in 10 games.

[RamboandBruno]

But I think we’ve lost something because of it. I’d therefore be tempted to throw Maatsen in for the next two or three games.

Yes, let's break the side that doesn't need fixing whilst we have huge problems in centre and RB positions. .

You’ve just picked out part of what I said. I acknowledged Digne has been one if our better players this season. My point about Maatsen in relation to Moreno and Ramsey in 2023, is that it was a distinct aspect of Unai’s tactics and balance of the side. Digne is excellent at what he does, but he doesnt attack in the same way Moreno did and Maatsen has done for other teams.
Doesnt mean we don’t have to look at other options on the right.

[PaulWinch again]

Or the defence that can't defend a simple long ball put pressure on the attack, which still did their job by putting us 2-1 up with 10 to go. Your attack scoring twice at home to a side that hadn't won in 6 isn't the failure.

Quite - and it’s not just the “defence”, although that first goal was entirely Konsa, it’s the whole defensive system.

In your opinion.

Clearly, but it’s quite apparent too. Just watch some of play from first half of last season versus this. Many of the same players, but the cohesion just is not there.

[olaftab]

Just watch some of play from first half of last season versus this. Many of the same players, but the cohesion just is not there.

Equally we could compare second half of last season to first of this and you will find we have been better. So to make top 5 we need to get closer to our point per game retention in the first 19 games of last season. It's not an insurmountable task. We are actually in a great position to do so.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

Pleased to hear it didn't kick off big time last night, what with Brighton being a Category A game.

[Beard82]

Just watch some of play from first half of last season versus this. Many of the same players, but the cohesion just is not there.

Equally we could compare second half of last season to first of this and you will find we have been better. So to make top 5 we need to get closer to our point per game retention in the first 19 games of last season. It's not an insurmountable task. We are actually in a great position to do so.

Your right of course - but it just doesn’t feel like it’s going to click