Trip to Villa Park
The first trip of the weekend was to see Villa take on Wigan in the Premier League. Unfortunately nowadays a trip to Villa Park is a bit of a rare treat. We usually look for games to go to that Villa will probably win, however the season has been that disappointing even a game against a poor Wigan side could be a struggle.
It was a good day out, but the result was a draw, which didn't do Wigan any favours but more or less made Villa safe from the drop. It seems strange that it's still basically the nucleas of a aquad that finished sixth for 3 seasons in a row and this season has flirted with relegation. The problems seem to stem from poor tactics rather than poor players and the players that looked out of sorts seemed to have been given poor instructions.
Villa started off brightly enough, but went behind to a goal by Charles N'Zogbia after only 10 minutes. I don't think anybody expected it or expected that that would be the end of the scoring. It wasn's as 6 minutes later Ashley Young whipped in a beautfully placed free kick to level the scores. After this Villa dominated for long periods, but Heskey and Bent didn't seem to look able to move into space and Villa seemed short on ideas. Despite the domination Villa looked vulnerable and at one point managed to turn a well worked attack into a corner and a scoring possibility for Wigan. Also worringly Kyle Walker at right back seemed to always be too far forward and neglecting his defensive responsibilities. I'm also not sure why right back Luke Young is playing left back when Carlos Cuellar can play there and Stephen Warnock, who was in the England squad last year has just been frozen out.
There were a couple of moments of controversy in the first half with Emile Heskey losing his rag so much when he got fouled that he had to be substituted at half time and a foul on Ashley Young that looked like a clear cut penalty being turned down.
The second half was not the most exciting of affairs with Villa looking like the most likely to score but Young not fitting into his role in the centre and Albrighton who was on for Heskey looking inaffective. Petrov and Reo-Coker bossed the midfield, but the defence and forwards didn't deliver.
It was still a good day out but unfortunately didn't produce the home win that we had longed for.
It was a good day out, but the result was a draw, which didn't do Wigan any favours but more or less made Villa safe from the drop. It seems strange that it's still basically the nucleas of a aquad that finished sixth for 3 seasons in a row and this season has flirted with relegation. The problems seem to stem from poor tactics rather than poor players and the players that looked out of sorts seemed to have been given poor instructions.
Villa started off brightly enough, but went behind to a goal by Charles N'Zogbia after only 10 minutes. I don't think anybody expected it or expected that that would be the end of the scoring. It wasn's as 6 minutes later Ashley Young whipped in a beautfully placed free kick to level the scores. After this Villa dominated for long periods, but Heskey and Bent didn't seem to look able to move into space and Villa seemed short on ideas. Despite the domination Villa looked vulnerable and at one point managed to turn a well worked attack into a corner and a scoring possibility for Wigan. Also worringly Kyle Walker at right back seemed to always be too far forward and neglecting his defensive responsibilities. I'm also not sure why right back Luke Young is playing left back when Carlos Cuellar can play there and Stephen Warnock, who was in the England squad last year has just been frozen out.
There were a couple of moments of controversy in the first half with Emile Heskey losing his rag so much when he got fouled that he had to be substituted at half time and a foul on Ashley Young that looked like a clear cut penalty being turned down.
The second half was not the most exciting of affairs with Villa looking like the most likely to score but Young not fitting into his role in the centre and Albrighton who was on for Heskey looking inaffective. Petrov and Reo-Coker bossed the midfield, but the defence and forwards didn't deliver.
It was still a good day out but unfortunately didn't produce the home win that we had longed for.
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