On the face of it, this was really easy.
But that’s not strictly true, as what came out of this game, from what I saw/heard is that we played very open and quite simply took our chances.
Whereas Crewe possibly had more chances, but quite simply, didn’t take them.
No doubt one of of the stat sites will back me up or tell me I’m wrong, but that’s how it seemed.
It was very much a case of Dean Smith’s “you score 3, we’ll score 4” attitude, but it made the game somewhat misleading, in my opinion.
Which is all good when you’re playing lower level opposition, such as Crewe.
The worrying part, is that Crewe created a boatload of chances and a better quality side would probably have outscored us.
The fact that their solitary goal was scored by a player running past 4 defenders is worrying.
But not quite so worrying that we need to be concerned.
We’d taken such an early 2-0 lead, that the game seemed beyond Crewe and they never proved a real test.
For them, it was more a test of their defence and for us, it was more a test of the attacking side to our game.
Which is where we came out well, having proved very clinical, while Crewe wasted chances galore.
I’m not convinced we learned much from this game, but scoring six goals will surely add to the side’s confidence.
It was nice that Hourihane got two too, but I just get the impression that we have players who can easily cut it at the sort of level played tonight.
It’s whether they can demonstrate it in the Premier league.
Don’t get me wrong.
I’m not knocking tonight’s score in any way.
We whupped Crewe and that might have been a very tricky prospect, just a couple of seasons ago.
But we need to show even more if we’re to do well in the Prem.
Dean Smith will have seen plenty to moan about tonight.
Which is exactly how a Premier league side should be thinking.
We’ll have learned from this and will improve even more.
I’m quite confident of that.
According to 5 Live we were robbed of a good goal. What the fuck is the point of VAR if it isn’t used?
Disgraceful refereeing.
what a cock of shit đ robbed and its still daylight,
villa challenges for the ball were harshly given yellows but palace did similar fouls and never received a yellow until mid second half. if i was manager of villa i would lodge a complaint.
we might have been below par today, but we wasnt helped like palace where. if this is the standards of refereeing in premiership god help us.
of the villa goal ruled out it looked like grealish was knocked first outside the box as he stumbled he was clicked again but he seemed to slide the ball to lansbury who finished with a cracking shot and referee stopped the game to book grealish for a dive. it wasnt a dive he never claimed it he completed the pass falling after being knocked. my take i saw it once very harsh indeed
To be honest we didnât deserve anything from the game but when you are up against 12 players then itâs always going to be tough.
Absolutely shocking decision to call a foul on Grealish. He went over but never appealed for it. Referee couldnât wait to stop us scoring. It was always likely that Ayew would score against us.
We now live in an era where if you do not like something take it to court!
Due to the amounts of money involved in the Premiership perhaps legal action against incompetent refereeing should be considered. I say this now that VAR has been introduced. Why did the referee not call on VAR? It would have cleared up the matter.
I hope the powers that be ensure Friend never referees a Villa match again. There is no excuse for not consulting VAR.
Sid, I was thinking the same. Villa officials should write to the PL and threaten to sue if it becomes clear that officials are biased against Villa. It cannot be tolerated. For those who say we didn’t deserve anything, did Spurs deserve a point against City the other week? Football history is littered with what used to be called ‘smash n grab’ wins. Away from home at the highest level, that’s what it’s about. Today, we’ve gone one down, been straightjacketed by the referee booking our players and not theirs, gone down to ten men, but still fought back to legitimately equalise away from home in the PL. We might have played shit, but quite simply, that means we deserve a point.
I recall a ref named Alf Buksh being hounded out of the game after losing control of the North London derby in 1993. George Graham even wrote to the FA asking for him not to officiate Arsenal games again. This was long before the disease that is social media engulfed society. The problem is referees want to make a name for themselves. In this day and age, where self promotion is what most live for, these nobodies have the stage of the PL to glorify themselves. In my opinion, the best referees are those you never remember. There’s no such thing as a famous referee, only infamous ones. These little pricks need to understand the difference.
I also felt that Davis made us a threat in the final third. Trezeguet doesnât offer much and Wesley improved with Davis to take pressure off him.
Trezeguet is the front runner for transfer flop. Smith was wrong to start him. He was poor against Everton. Should have started with Jota and El Ghazi. Surely, that was the point of the squad. You were shit. He was good. So you’re out and he’s in. Simple. But Smith didn’t do it.
I was hoping that we were saying goodbye to shite refereeing when we got promoted but boy was I wrong. Has VAR made them all incompetent?
We may have been shit today, but watching MOTD, the biggest pile of shit is VAR. Absolute fucking shite. Full stop. Complete shit. It doesn’t work. Get rid. Shite.
Match of the Day host Gary Lineker tweeted that the decision “had to be seen to be believed”, adding “Why VAR didn’t correct what appeared to be an awful refereeing error is beyond me.”
Me too….
MOTD should be on our side tonight then regarding that decision? Thatâs if we can stay awake for the last game!
VAR was supposed to intervene if they saw a clear wrong decision by referee. this mistake was a goal so it should have been spotted by the var. this shows you var is not up to the job hammers and city both robbed, villa were robbed all day and at the end clear goal was never even looked at or if it was it was friends blind misses doing the looking
the memories of premiership creeping back. you don’t just have to be good enough in this league. you need a the referees to just ref the games without any prejudice or favouritism.
headlines tomorrow villans were robbed by friendly turpin. (no mask needed for this highway robbery. 2week to recovery from this shocker
another point before i get my medicine from the local
had that villa goal been scored by anybody but us it would have stood. i have no doubts about that, we need to be so much better than our opponents. especially away. because referees will make it a very difficult for us. its because we are black lol or sumat
smith and the club officials need to make a big deal about this. ok we lost and accept that but that referee needs to be banned or fined or even sacked and made to go see opticians, or for a blood test to see if their are any blue nose blood there
Kevin No-friend-of-Villa. He now joins a short list – the only other name on it is Elleray – who I will never pay money to watch officiate again.
Don’t forget the fat shit, Phil Dowd.
We can complain about VAR all day but the fact is we were awful and deserved to be soundly beaten, we have to control our own destiny and outplay the opposition, we looked like a Championship side today and the tactics were awfully negative.
If a ref gets ÂŁ1000 for a game I say stick that twat into division 3 at ÂŁ200 a game. I’m going to say it again , we need to get refs from abroad, we have London against the rest of the country refs.
arsenal away are our next travels bill. that is so true london against the rest. even little teams that are established in premiership will get the decisions above us. familiarity i think we are the new boys to most these refs they have built up relationships with players and our players are not well know names. so we will get nothing all season from the officials.
we have to make a song and dance about this. so next time this happens the referee will think twice before they try to do us over again. this guy was shit all day, he was booking us and palace were dealt with very leniently.
zaha late on taylors foot nothing happened,taylor late on zara yellow, grealish was barged off the ball a few times got no freekick. yet any palace bent over to do his lace got a free kick. it was blatant cheating and should be stopped
Agreed Guest.
It’s why I’m holding onto/considering my thoughts and my post might not appear until tomorrow.
We deserved nothing from the game, but whatever, if that goal should have stood, it might make the difference between survival and relegation or medicrity and Europa, whichever way you’re inclined to think.
we don’t deserve to get anything from game, so it is ok to do us over. goal lansbury scored we good, but we don’t deserve a point. so we should insist its disallowed, don’t understand the thinking behind that.
all game we struggled, but palace were not much better, they had a strong helping hand by referee. intent on giving them every chance to claim three points and he succeeded.
if we bend over and take it were it hurts, then other referees will only do the same, knowing we won’t make a song and dance about it, so its ok to do us
i was sure first time i saw it no replays. i just seen a few replays now and its worst than i first thought and i just cant believe it was not allowed by var. its a clear mistake by referee, so why wasnt var talking to referee to give the goal.
also grealish is up before his arse is on the floor, so if he is diving for a pen or freekick where does he appeal. referee sees the ball heading to lansabury then blows up,as he realises the balls heading into the corner of net.
if we were anybody else but villa, the referee would have waited for the ball to hit the net and go to var to ask for help. because he missed what happened like he missed everything else from 1 minute to this incident
replays are all over the web now so everybody can see us getting done over properly
“we donât deserve to get anything from game, so it is ok to do us over”
Nobody said that, wind your neck in.
Nath, the decision looked wrong.
But the debate is about one point for us against 3 for them.
Did we justify a draw overall?
I don’t think so, although, of course, a good goal should be a goal, simple.
If it cost us a win where we were 0-0, I’d be fuming, don’t get me wrong.
Swings and roundabouts over a season, springs to mind.
Another reason why we struggled to get a foothold in the game was the fact we had 4 players on yellow cards before half time. This meant our players were nervy to make challenges knowing the shite referee was hoping to get our entire team sent off.
True Holte.
Nath, I agree , I’m awaiting tonight’s panel over should or shouldn’t , I hate to loose but if its fair yes ok , I don’t think that game was fair in many incidents. Am I a bad loser? No
bill you are fair,all we ask for is no biased stuff. in the first half alone the referee made us look like a bully team. every foul committed doesnt warrant a yellow card, palace madesame types of foouls but they never recieved the same harshness. 4 yellows we got three were defenders who jobs it was to tackle and their jobs were made impossible second half.
this referee was itching to send off a villa player i saw this and many more said this about ht this ref has to be hung drawn and quartered or i am complaining. thats fair
i really am going to the pub now i was ready 20 minutes ago but i was so furious
Via Birmingham Live there is a link to a live petition to have todayâs ref removed from premier.
Please find the link below and sign up- so far nearly 600 have. Join the protest!
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/aston-villa-kevin-friend-petition-16846453