Aston Villa 3-0 Newcastle United (15/04/2023)

[samptime29]

37 minutes ago, huss9 said:

the villa fans we spoke to today after the game were all really canny - i think they were a little shell shocked to be honest. 

 

Same here. Spoke to quite a few and they were all sound. Friendly atmosphere.

[Pancrate1892]

1 hour ago, The Prophet said:

Thought we missed Longstaff today. We missed his evergy and ability to drop in when Bruno moves up the pitch.

Massively. Our midfield seemed non existent especially when helping out the defence. Against arsenal we seemed to have 2 banks of 4 or 4-5-1 if you like, which couldn't be penetrated, today there seemed like an ocean where villas outstanding runners thrived. 

 

Without doubt the hardest game this season we've played and I don't think we went on the pitch thinking that way 

[Kanj]

Not even bothered about this one at all. I’m ready for spurs. We won 5 in a row. We won the last 2 coming from behind and we had a chance or two at one down to do that today and we didn’t. We got played off the park by a top side and manager and our team was awful at everything - but in reality the performances were so far off what we’ve seen from our players that you just need to move on. 

[Miercoles]

Am I crazy or was it offside before the throw in on their second goal? Like they didn't bother with the flag because it ended up in touch, but then Villa scored from the throw in.

 

I might just be crazy though.

[LFEE]

Was expecting a tough game. We got humped. Ref didn’t help buying any contact and fall from them but the tone was set first minute when Trippier was indecisive and they went on to hit the post. Unlike West Ham they grew from that encouragement. 
 

Tactically reminded me when we were on a great run and Wigan humped us. We were chasing shadows constantly.

[GWN]

We got handed our arses yesterday, take it and move on .

This will go to the wire 

[Lotus]

Villa played around us, they played through us. At times they just did what they wanted. We had a complete lack of defensive presence in midfield and our back 4 was exposed so often it was tragicomic. We lack pace at the back and or/at CDM. It’s been obvious for a while. 
A better player here and there may not have changed the result today (Villa were that good) but it might have mitigated it somewhat.

[The Butcher]

 

[Cronky]

I think we were already aware that our squad is nowhere near as good as our league position suggests. How we've conceded so few goals is one of Eddie's great achievements. Yesterday we came up against a team that was able to expose that.

 

I'd agree with the view that Longstaff would have added more defensive solidity and that might have kept us in the game for longer, so maybe Eddie underestimated the Villa threat. He's made so few errors in his time here that it feels odd to say that.

 

But this is our first bad result for such a long time. A good result next week will see us right back on track.

[SUPERTOON]

4 minutes ago, Cronky said:

I think we were already aware that our squad is nowhere near as good as our league position suggests. How we've conceded so few goals is one of Eddie's great achievements. Yesterday we came up against a team that was able to expose that.

 

I'd agree with the view that Longstaff would have added more defensive solidity and that might have kept us in the game for longer, so maybe Eddie underestimated the Villa threat. He's made so few errors in his time here that it feels odd to say that.

 

But this is our first bad result for such a long time. A good result next week will see us right back on track.

Longstaff missed out due to being ill all week, think he would have started if not.

[Cronky]

58 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Longstaff missed out due to being ill all week, think he would have started if not.

 

Ah, now that's worth knowing. I thought it may have been something to do with how he performed against Brentford.

[SUPERTOON]

13 minutes ago, Cronky said:

 

Ah, now that's worth knowing. I thought it may have been something to do with how he performed against Brentford.

Yeah had tonsillitis through the week.

[nufc4eva]

3 away games off the trot probably didn't help yesterday. Hopefully we can turn Spurs over next week and we will nearly be there. We have a pretty decent run left and I could see Arsenal not wanting to come and play us at home at all.

 

I never thought we would be here with 8 games left in 3rd having lost only 4 games. Apart from today we look better than Man U and Spurs and I don't think the other teams will catch us.

[Guest]

Even without his illness I don't think resting him would have been so bad in isolation. Sure the commentator said he'd started 28 games in a row or something like that? Bruno & Joelinton have had time out with suspension, Willock the occasional knock and on paper that midfield should have still been able to compete with Luiz, McGinn & Dendoncker. 

[nufc4eva]

They moved the ball well yesterday and we're at us. Longstaff needs a rest but does the things Joelinton and Willock don't with the cover he provides and he helps out Trips and Murphy on the right. I think he's very underrated because he doesn't do the sexy stuff. He's pretty consistent as well.

[Armchair Pundit]

So, just watched the highlights on MOTD, yeah we had an off day, it happens. Our defence looked slow to react and the Villa attack looked like they were playing out of their skins, Watkins in particular had a stormer. That said, it probably helps highlight areas that need improvement in the next transfer window (not that I think Eddie or the owners really need much help there). Hopefully it'll act as a refocusing for the team, to be honest though Villa deserved it, just a shame they have some right knob-ends in their fanbase who seem to have this weird idea of some sort of rivalry between us and them - as far as I'm concerned, as a Newcastle fan, they're nothing to me other than having some small-time style fans.

[54]

When Gerrard was sacked Villa had 9 points from 11 games, 20 games later, and with Emery at the helm, an actual good football manager, and with the only addition of a solitary left back, Villa are now on 50 points from 31.

 

Bet the media still rim the ass of Gerrard though, and Emery doesn't get the respect he deserves.

[Rich]

I was pissy that he turned us down, but he’s some boy. And his good morning/good afternoon/good ebening crack is five star.

[samptime29]

1 hour ago, nufc4eva said:

They moved the ball well yesterday and we're at us. Longstaff needs a rest but does the things Joelinton and Willock don't with the cover he provides and he helps out Trips and Murphy on the right. I think he's very underrated because he doesn't do the sexy stuff. He's pretty consistent as well.

 

Noticed this massively yesterday 

[Shays Given Tim Flowers]

1 hour ago, Rich said:

I was pissy that he turned us down, but he’s some boy. And his good morning/good afternoon/good ebening crack is five star.

What do you think his actual level is? I don’t know much about his career other than the EL. Being a cup winner suggests tactician but why haven’t Madrid or Barca gone for him? Arsenal wrong club wrong time? 

[TRon]

I think a few England careers will have suffered from yesterday's defeat mind. Southgate was there, and maybe Pope was the only one who didn't come out badly, although he looked very second best to Martinez on the day, which is no suprise.

 

Same goes for Wilson who didn't really do all that much wrong, but Watkins scoring a hatrick should see him leapfrog above Callum into the squad I reckon. Especially given how hard a time he gave our back four.

 

Which brings me on to Trippier. He's still a class player but he got owned yesterday. And the calls for Dan Burn to be called up should probably be quietly rested now. No harm done.

[Gallowgate Toon]

43 minutes ago, Shays Given Tim Flowers said:

What do you think his actual level is? I don’t know much about his career other than the EL. Being a cup winner suggests tactician but why haven’t Madrid or Barca gone for him? Arsenal wrong club wrong time? 

Main criticisms over the last decade of him are being overly pragmatic in league campaigns (but that's part of why he's been the king of the Europa), lacking a consistent philosophy, and he struggled with man management of the 'bigger clubs' and players. 

 

They whooped us yesterday but I'm still not worried about them going after CL next season, weirdly. 

[Shays Given Tim Flowers]

A sort of heir to Benitez then? 

[Gallowgate Toon]

https://twitter.com/martics97/status/1647541578305552385?t=jf24eiF5zkQ58N2NiEXGQw&s=19

 

Bruno getting some stick in this thread, some of it looks justified, but some of the shots really look like other mids should be doing better in terms of tracking, like.

 

 

Edited April 16, 2023 by Gallowgate Toon

[Kanj]

IMHO Unai is a top class manager; world class tactician and again imho he’s a more front foot version of Rafa. This was probably a match he targeted and of course, as you can see in the thread above + watching the match, we were just slow and awful with no adjustments made. 
 

Weirdly we didn’t do any of those game management things once down and under it; no lay downs, no adjustments, and we fell for them toppling to the ground every single time for 90 mins. One of those days, I guess. 
 

We just had 5 unbeaten with 5 W in a row. They just did the same, let’s see how long that will last.