What a strange game that was.
I don’t know what Reading came as, but it wasn’t a football team with any intent on winning, was it?
I don’t know what their plan was, but if it was to try and contain Villa, it failed miserably even before they had Dave Edwards sent off for two clumsy challenges.
It was almost like watching an “A” team playing a “B” team, with the latter being instructed to not really try and the result was the most one-sided game I can recall in years.
It comes to something when their goalkeeper was probably their hardest working player.
Still, Reading’s lack of effort made it look like we were in a training game, where we literally had the run of the park, with plenty of crossing practice thrown in. Which is just as well, as it looked like we needed it.
With the poor crossing matched only by some equally poor shooting and heading, it made for somewhat frustrating viewing and that was the quietest I can recall Villa park being, for a 3-0 win, ever.
Never mind. After us having about fifteen attempts on goal and nearly 75% possession, Bjarnason opened the scoring with a nicely taken strike not long after the restart.
I have to say I marked him as our MOTM, as he worked hard and had much more movement in the middle.
Grealish was a close second, as he pulled the strings.
Anyway, after some more good teamwork, Hourihane scored the second with a glanced header and that pretty much wrapped up the game, which led to Onomah and Kodjia coming on for Snodgrass and Adomah, followed by Whelan for Grealish.
These were good, common-sense changes aimed at resting the starting three, but the truth is I could probably have got on and looked a threat.
Even Whelan had a small dalliance near the penalty area in open play, such was Reading’s lack of intent.
Not that I’m taking anything away from the win, as you still have to get the goals.
Talking of which, Scott Hogan scored the third to make things more deserving of how the game went.
So it’s hard to judge if we played well or not really, as the opposition were so poor, but a 3-0 win is exactly that, which helps nicely with the goal difference and should see us safely into the play-offs.
More importantly, it’s a win, where we can hopefully go on another roll, leading to good momentum for when it really counts.
Happy days, eh?
well we fook it up again and we deserved nothing and we get nothing. we played so pedestrian lacking imagination, crosses or wide game is pathetic, so predictable. lofted in with head me defender on it.
fans will moan about subbing adomah and snodgrass but watch the game back they did fook all before they were subbed. we never played 3 strikers and no width kodjia was wide and grealish and grabban all rotated wide.
we fooked it up big time. norwich are unpredictable they can be hot and cold in the same game. but we gave them a lift by being so passive
roll on next season, this will end soon in tears
If we end up in playoffs and play like that we might as well forget promotion. Murphy made our defenders look like statues. I agreed with Lee Hendries comment that it wasn’t working with Adomah and Snodgrass so should have switched to a 4-4-2. Sticking 3 forwards on is pointless as we have already found out. We need a better plan B if plan A isn’t working.
give bruce a new 10 year contract
and a pay increase who are birmingham playing ltrs ?
Wow! Villa lose and JV’s back. What a coincidence!
no coincidence ,cant believe some stuff wrote here ,we are a joke under bruce yet some fans still behind him even after crap performance after crap performance,please do explain this great job bruce has done at villa
well as spokesperson for the bruce family. i would point out he has won more shit then you at any levels. as for doing at villa well he could still get promoted thou i would rather us not, we wasn’t in a great place before he joined but who cares we once won the european cup in 19 0 plonk we deserve to win every week whether we are good enough too or not. we are villa how dare norwich beat us, its all bruces fault and the guy before him and him and him and him and him hand on the list does go on
elmo thor grealish snodgrass adomah are all wingers. we had 3 three strikers on, but they were not all playing as strikers. make me wonder if ppl watch the game. even after the subs hogan was a lone striker. WHEN we had the ball YES the other strikers went inside the box. as other teams and managers do when chasing the game.
wished we were 10th and this was last chance saloon. we don’t deserve another chance. cardiff will have been suicidal last night and this morning but with the classic comedy of which is aston villa’s game. soon brightened their afternoon up. they will be licking their lips. at the prospects of facing villa. as they will just do what norwich did. that was leave no gaps and villa will just keep knocking at the door in the same old ways. side to side lets play rugby no forward passing.
We’ve got three ways to go –
– We get automatic promotion – I agree that we have no chance of that now
– We’re in the play offs and we win. It would be just like Villa to do it the hard way
-We’re in the play offs and we lose (possibly the most likely outcome as it stands)
At worst we’ll be in a much better position than we’ve been for years and at least near the right end of the table for once. We’ll also be in a better position to get a manager who might be able to take us back to the Prem.
Still hoping that we at least get our day at Wembley though.
Fulham being held to a 0-0 60 minute, Birmingham losing to Burton , oh them Russians..
Not good results for us today. We HAVE to get 4 points minimum from the next two conescutive home games to secure play offs.. at least it will be some excitement come the end of the season win or lose!
There it is, Fulham won Derby won., and we think we have a football team, sorry but its done me to see Bjarnason not playing forward balls and Hourihan running around like a spare dick at a wedding. We have only the play offs and that might not happen.
did fulham win ???? i scream out loud i don’t want to bother about other results especially as it dont concern us now. cardiff will turn us over tuesday because they want to put right the wolves game. as for villa we look lost. they play to passive at moment to win any battles of a game
millwall could snatch the last playoff spot. which might be ours which will be a crying shame lol birmingham failing to beat burton at home that is bad barnsley beating sheff utd
is there only 5 games left ? teams that win the playoffs are teams carrying form. its usually the teams finishing in 6th but they are usually the teams on fire not sinking like us, even thou the season is pretty much dead if they want to go up they have to find some form. the standards have slipped very low, i a, betting even a few on here would get a game if we turned up with boots
Was out last night with a Fulham fan and Cardiff fan. All very convivial and good natured. Great gig too.
I think its going to be for us a bad year, the way we play every team know how to stop Villa, we have weaklings in our side, no determination what’s so ever, since we settled for our midfield being Bjarnason and Hourihan we have gone down hill, I’ve said it before, no determination , Grealish goes forward and create, the other two put us back defending. I’m watching Mans game you can see what it means for both teams, not us.
I’m fairly confident one more win will see us in the playoffs. We have 5 more games although I think we will get beat on Tuesday night. We really need to get our mojo back though because we don’t want to go into playoffs with confidence low. I don’t think the midfield was the biggest problem today. All our wide players were poor offensively and defensively, and no surprise when Adomah and Snodgrass went off. None of them have real pace like Murphy of Norwich. And along with Elmo and Taylor they all look incapable of playing 2 games in a week. Is that down to them all being 30 something’s? I said before our squad lacks youth and pace. Only Grealish looked decent today. I think Bjarnasson despite criticism on here won lots of tackles and interceptions, which is his job. Hourihane offered little today which was disappointing and offered little help for Grealish. Hogan made good runs early on but didn’t get picked out. Overall a real let down for the amazing fans who travelled all the way there. They deserve better.
Another poor result against a team playing for nothing. Its almost like we want to be in the playoffs. For me, our real problem areas are at full back and centre midfield.
We dont really have a quality full back, in fact Tuanzabe has probably been the best there, and he isnt even a full back. In midfield, Hourihane has really been hot and cold, just not shown up some days. Jedinak/Whelan are both too slow. And I dont know what happened to Lansbury, who was very good at Forest. Bjarnasson has done well in there, and would be first choice for me.
The other issue we have had is lack of options on the wing. Adomah has been off his game for a while, but we dont have many options to replace him. Real shame that Green has been out so long,as he is some player. Another option might be Grealish on the left with either 2 strikers, or O’Hare at number 10.
Bruce need to figure it out quickly though, as the play-offs are going to be really tough.
i agree with a few posts here. saying the wide boys and full backs. its not as much personnel, but how they shrink wearing villa colours. i don’t buy that bruce is instructing them to play so negative. its down to fear i believe. or lack of fight for the cause
watch villa today they passed it safely sideways and backwards. nobody drove forwards except grealish. its not normal. wingers pick up the ball and they should take more risks. they should take on their full backs, as soon as they can. you beat them early and then the rest of the game you torment them. not villa wingers they are so scared to run with the ball and drive past defenders.
crossing the ball depends on the forward in your team. in hogan you don’t want to hang high balls in you have to drive the ball in along the ground. or you slip him in between the centre and the full backs. they tried today for first 20 minutes to do this type of pass but they failed to complete one.
i seen fans slating hogan. its not his fault the team can not pass a simple ball. hogan is pointing all the time where he wants the ball. but is IGNORED. again with exception of grealish. unless the wingers improve we stand no chance of promotion. watch the players arm gestures, thor picked up the ball and he lifted both arms up. saying where is the movement. who bloody wants it.
i rarely bitch about a certain player but our left back is a walking disaster. i would drop him without a thought.
I sincerely hope the board are already in the process of lining up a new manager for next season – obviously the quality of that manager will depend on what league we’re in
Bruce was given the conditions for success – a small fortune at this level to sign whoever he wanted, the pre-season he banged on and on about last season, bringing in whatever coaching staff he wanted, etc. And he has failed. Yes, we might fluke the play offs but thats not acceptable when you’re paying 50k-60k wages and spending the money we are at this level.
Of course, I hope we go up as its financially crucial for the future but the thought of that dinosaur managing in the PL again is frightening.
Good luck to Fulham in getting second…. they deserve it.
the boards are always looking to other managers. but we at villa have a serious problem in blaming managers for players lack of abilities. the game yesterday we lacked any cutting edge. wingers which were snodgrass and adomah both were too passive. this wasnt managers fault. it was down to them to beat the full back. they couldn’t beat them. so they turned away and passed the ball backwards. villa worked the ball out to one side, only to then filter the ball to the opposite side. they also tried a few cross field balls. as when you do such thing, its best to do with speed to catch out defenders out of position. they couldnt manage to complete any cross field passes. defenders cut them all out. to compound this mistake further, they moved the ball too slow to left to right. defenders were always directly in front of them, left right or down the middle.
iam sorry but these are not manager mistakes, they are playing mistakes.players not working out problems themselves and not being brave enough to beat their direct opponent.
Nah. Bruce at fault all day long. If the players aren’t confident or motivated that’s down to him and his coaching staff. If they are the wrong players thats also down to him, as it’s his squad. If the tactics are wrong that’s down to him.
There is only one solution, but the problem is selecting the right manager. There I don’t have a clue.
i disagree dsvilla
i am sick of saying why, i must love confrontations or i am trying to add to a balanced debate. i understand your point of view. but as i keep saying their is stuff we are just not doing RIGHT. these are elementary basics stuff. wingers beating their opponents, happen in every game since the players played at school levels.
the movement stuff i said before i repeated over and over. these stuff are as much the players faults as coaching. lack of movements is lazy and its down to individuals, which in turns affects all the team.
yesterday i watched the game and i was as sad as all off the fans. but i watched the game and i saw players shrinking. players not taking responsibility for their own performances. football is a team game. but every game is one player up against their direct opponent. games are decided on these mini battles. against norwich we lost all the battles.
it wasnt down to tactics at all its down to the players wearing the shirts. if they had the balls to take on their opponents they would have the balls to speak out and say this to the fans that they let you down. but they will keep their gobs shut and the blame will go to the manager.