Re: Aston Villa v Arsenal all in one thread

[Guest]

29% possession at home - not pretty to watch once arsenal went ahead - still at least we have made a better start than most expected .

[CTVillan]

Sanchez off-the-pace and then lost all his confidence.

Clark awful, quite what is up with Okore I don't know, surely he should be ahead of the Chuckle Bros, Baker and Clark.

Where's Benteke - he could have had a gentle reintroduction for the last 20-30 mins.

I was disappointed with Gabby too - first half he was trying hard, but 2nd half I saw his head go down so many times when the final ball in to him was poor. As the captain it is his responsibility to motivate the players not further diminish their eroding confidence.

Frankly I don't think anyone came out of that with much credit, except perhaps the fans for holding back the jeers.

We go again.

[Guest]

Sanchez off-the-pace and then lost all his confidence.

Clark awful, quite what is up with Okore I don't know, surely he should be ahead of the Chuckle Bros, Baker and Clark.

Where's Benteke - he could have had a gentle reintroduction for the last 20-30 mins.

I was disappointed with Gabby too - first half he was trying hard, but 2nd half I saw his head go down so many times when the final ball in to him was poor. As the captain it is his responsibility to motivate the players not further diminish their eroding confidence.

Frankly I don't think anyone came out of that with much credit, except perhaps the fans for holding back the jeers.

We go again.

No way can you put Benteke in at any stage today when he has only returned to training this week after months away - would be madness to bring him in with no competitive football under his belt .
Give him at least another couple of weeks , sanchez was shockingly poor today , looked well out of his depth - he will need time to adapt to this league.
Top 3 after 5 games is something we would all have taken .
Was impressed by cleverleys delivery and some superb passes from him too.

[USVillan]

Thanks a lot to Roy Keane for what must have been a truly inspirational half-time speech. Really great set-up he advised Lambert on.

Honestly think everyone knew we were fucked when Clark was named in the starting lineup. Truly and awful, awful player. Completely clueless on the pitch.

Sanchez was terrible, Richardson has the first-touch of a rapist (honestly don't see what more he offers to KEA), and Cissokho was really brutal.

Whole team looked flat after Clark's ridiculously bad header was kept out. Don't know if that was down to illness sapping their strength or what, but they all looked utterly gassed after the hour mark.

[Olof Mellberg]

Ciaran Clark utter dross, its time we just gave up with him and moved on.

Sanchez, despite the good feeling and hope that signing gave the fans was very abject today, but he isnt the first and wont be last South American to struggle to adapt to the English League, Will take time for him.

Shame as Arsenal were there to be had I thought, if your going to lose 3-0, at least have a good go at them...instead, a cake walk for Arsenal.

Hope the lads dont shrivel back into their shells and become very weak mentally like the back end of last year.

Chelsea Next.

[Trotters]

And your last sentence is exactly why Lambert should have sent out an attacking side and had a proper go. Keep the confidence up, make his intent known. Be aggressive, be fast, be tricky.

Don't set out the team to defend for 70 minutes of a game. Don't make substitutions with 5 minutes to go that you should have made in the first half hour. And for fuck's sake don't ever ever EVER use Clark again.

[Villa_Dan]

We were the better team until the goal. After Arsenal scored I looked at Senderos and he had his had in his hands having a go at himself, which summed them up as their heads were gone when Arsenal scored and Clark couldn't stop anything. Whatever the virus was it clearly had an affect but we were undone by a crazy 5 mins in which Senderos' head had gone down when we needed it up. Just think with Vlaar or even Okore next to him we'd have gone in 1-0 down with the match still on.

Sanchez clearly is miles off the pace

[CTVillan]

No way can you put Benteke in at any stage today when he has only returned to training this week after months away - would be madness to bring him in with no competitive football under his belt .
Give him at least another couple of weeks

I was going off press reports that had him training with the squad a while back - but you're right, it is still probably a little early for him, don't need to risk him.

[USVillan]

We were the better team until the goal. After Arsenal scored I looked at Senderos and he had his had in his hands having a go at himself, which summed them up as their heads were gone when Arsenal scored and Clark couldn't stop anything. Whatever the virus was it clearly had an affect but we were undone by a crazy 5 mins in which Senderos' head had gone down when we needed it up. Just think with Vlaar or even Okore next to him we'd have gone in 1-0 down with the match still on.

Sanchez clearly is miles off the pace

If Vlaar (instead of Clark) gets his head to the Cleverley free kick, we'd have been 1-0 up...and then who knows what would've happened? Clark is just a horrific player. How he and Herd still have spots in the squad is a real mystery.

[My Old Man]

Well with a virus going around and losing Westwood, Baker and co just before KO this was always gonna be a grey day.. Fffing typical Villa that.. off to our best start in 16 years and a dodgy virus ruins everything!..

Sanchez looks very poor to me but early days obviously and someone said Weimann threw up when he went off is that true?... What a complete shambles..SACK THE CHEF!!

i'm pretty sure we can put that down to the virus. Delph looked nowhere near 100%, and during the second half they all looked physicly drained. Take out those three goals during the first half and it was beginning to look like another solid performance. First one we were caught out when overstretched, but was not a disaster because we could get that back, but the second?

Oh my, we just seemed to panic. Still,only two down and you could still sense it was not the end of the world if we could a quick goal back or one early in the second half, and then we find out just why they were once known as lucky Arsenal.

3-0 at half time really flattered them.

Second half we were devoid of any will to get back into the game or even compete. Basicly, we played to draw that second half and on one occasion i thought we were going to run the ball into their corner flag and hold it there!  Now, as i said above, i believe the viral thing is more than just another excuse, and keeping things tight with one or two unfit players is better than getting annihilated.

Lot of good can still be taken out of this game and as such, i am still confident we will not struggle this term.

[Villa_Dan]

Still got 10 points from our opening 5 and before Liverpool I was hoping for 2 points out of Pool, Arsenal, Chelsea and City so we're a point up on that at least!!!

[switters]

We looked fine first half hour, we were pressing them high up the pitch & that led to a couple of decent efforts, plus we carried a threat from set pieces. That pressing completely stopped after the goals - mixture of heads dropping and tiredness (whether due to some being ill, or just not being able to keep the intensity up, who knows). and yes the two enforced changes (Clark & Sanchez) were our two weakest links, though others like Cissokho also seemed to let heads drop once we conceded.

If Arsenal had been bothered to step it up a gear in the 2nd half they could've scored a few more, but it turned out to be a complete non-event as they could see we weren't going to cause them any trouble. I would've definitely have brought on Bacuna and N'Zogbia sooner for the fresh legs; Delph and the sub Grealish were the only midfielders running in the 2nd half

[heystally!]

Did anyone notice at what point in the first half we switched from playing 4-5-1 to a 4-4-2 narrow diamond?

I suddenly saw that Weimann was playing up alongside Gabby, and then Gibbs gets free to put the ball in for their third. Just wondering if it happened after the first goal, and maybe that caused our capitulation because the players didn't settle?

Either way, I totally blame Lambert for us giving up at half time. Spineless response.

[Guest]

Did anyone notice at what point in the first half we switched from playing 4-5-1 to a 4-4-2 narrow diamond?

I suddenly saw that Weimann was playing up alongside Gabby, and then Gibbs gets free to put the ball in for their third. Just wondering if it happened after the first goal, and maybe that caused our capitulation because the players didn't settle?

Either way, I totally blame Lambert for us giving up at half time. Spineless response.

Maybe but the game was lost by then and remember the 8-0 at chelsea when he went for it .
Today we must just put it behind us and look forward - it's been a decent start points wise.

[VTID85]

Aside from a spirited first thirty, Villa were tactically diabolical, looked a shadow of themselves after the first goal went in. The "sit back and prevent further damage" approach looked desperate and like a team who feel they're out of their depth, not the confidence that should've buoyed them after last week.

Why on Earth did Sanchez stay on until the 85th minute? He's made no impact being used as a sub and he was the worst player on the pitch today. So it was a last minute change to cover Westwood, I get that, but as the gaffer if it's not working you don't just sit on the fucking bench to see if the decision will come good eventually. I'd've had him off at 60mins. This, I think, is one of the big problems and many others on here have said it - Lambert doesn't make impact subs, he barely seems to give a shit about using subs at all with any great strategy.

Having said all that though, it's a good "grounding" game that we can face the next three games with a but more sense from, as long as they can get the confidence back and let's not forget the four games that preceeded today.

UTV.

[heystally!]

Did anyone notice at what point in the first half we switched from playing 4-5-1 to a 4-4-2 narrow diamond?

I suddenly saw that Weimann was playing up alongside Gabby, and then Gibbs gets free to put the ball in for their third. Just wondering if it happened after the first goal, and maybe that caused our capitulation because the players didn't settle?

Either way, I totally blame Lambert for us giving up at half time. Spineless response.

Maybe but the game was lost by then and remember the 8-0 at chelsea when he went for it .
Today we must just put it behind us and look forward - it's been a decent start points wise.

I very much remember the 8-0 at Chelsea, having paid about £60 a ticket and getting now refund!

I think today though, I'd have been happy to concede a couple more of it resulted in a fight. We just gave up and accepted that we'd been beaten.

[Trotters]

"Ladies and gentlemen, Captain Lambert up on the flight deck. Alongside me today is my co-pilot, Roy Keane. This will be a short flight of a little over 90 minutes. At the half hour mark we will be turning the entertainment system off as we are due to hit a nasty bit of turbulence at this time and I will do absolutely fuck all to alleviate the situation and it's likely that 3 of the engines will fall off. However, the autopilot system will ensure that we have a very uneventful last half of the flight and we will consider turning the in-flight entertainment system back on for the last 4 or 5 minutes. Thank you for flying Aston Villa airlines and we are sorry for the disappointment but we know you will continue to fly with us again and again and again"

[pcfbavfcoman]

As we now know the virus was a lot more widespread than thought, but Clarke is never a prem player while I have a hole up my arse, Sanchez may need a complete season to get up to speed in this division.
Cleverly was not that impressed with and it does worry me that we pin our hopes on Grealish, maybe a prem player in the making, but he is no superstar at that age, aka Rooney, Sterling, just think our expectations of him are alot higher than what he will manage.

[Trotters]

Grealish is a funny one. Once Benteke returns and is firing, if Vlaar signs a new contract as well as Delph, Gabby puts in the kind of shift we know he's capable of, it'll take the pressure and focus off our Jack. And that's how he'll learn and improve.

But when Lambert throws him on with a few minutes to go at 3-0 down, what's he saying? That's no kind of experience against an arsenal side that's not required to get out of 2nd gear. That's no kind of experience being thrown into a Villa side whose heads have dropped and have given up. That's no experience in front of a pissed off crowd.

That's the exact kind of experience he DOESN'T need at this stage.

Lambert is a fool. And what he's saying to Villa fans by putting Grealish on at that stage is "LOOK! A Squirrel!!" And that's not fooling anyone.

[VillaBill]

I hope Sanchez had the "virus" because he was truly shocking , only Hutton for me looked anything like what we should expect !
The goals killed the game stone dead , our style of play (if you can call it that) demands we score first, the second half was a complete non event , at least we an easier fixture next week

[Trotters]

Aston Villa head chef sacked!

[VillaBill]

I thought Sylla had gone out on loan ?
Or has he grown his hair & donned the no 24 shirt ?

[Sensitive Sid]

Grealish is a funny one. Once Benteke returns and is firing, if Vlaar signs a new contract as well as Delph, Gabby puts in the kind of shift we know he's capable of, it'll take the pressure and focus off our Jack. And that's how he'll learn and improve.

But when Lambert throws him on with a few minutes to go at 3-0 down, what's he saying? That's no kind of experience against an arsenal side that's not required to get out of 2nd gear. That's no kind of experience being thrown into a Villa side whose heads have dropped and have given up. That's no experience in front of a pissed off crowd.

That's the exact kind of experience he DOESN'T need at this stage.

Lambert is a fool. And what he's saying to Villa fans by putting Grealish on at that stage is "LOOK! A Squirrel!!" And that's not fooling anyone.

What game were you watching? He came on at half time, not with a few minutes to go.

[Guest]

I thought cleverleys set piece delivery was excellent and he put a couple of superb long passes in the first half - I think he will be class for us .
Sanchez will need time to adjust to the pace .

[Dek of Villa]

As soon as I saw that Clark was included in the first eleven I said we will lose by 2 or 3 goals.

Sorry, but the guy is diabolical at this level and has at least 2 mistakes in him during a game whenever he's picked.

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