Aston Villa will be in the Carling Cup fourth round draw this Saturday after beating Cardiff City 1-0 at Villa Park tonight.

The news that Reo-Coker would not be included this evening proved to be accurate with MON electing to use a 4-4-2 system – Guzan, Beye, Cuellar, Collins, Shorey, Gardner, Milner, Delph, Petrov, Agbonlahor, Carew with Friedel, Sidwell, Dunne, Clark, Albrighton, Delfouneso and Warnock on the bench.

Gabby got the home side off to the best of starts scoring on 2 minutes with a cheeky near post flick. From there Villa looked comfortable and capable, but never found that extra gear in a mostly even affair.

The second half picked up where the first half left off. Petrov won a penalty just before the hour mark which could have killed the game off for Cardiff had Milner avoided thumping his hot against the post.

Villa arguably rode their luck late on when an injury time equaliser was ruled offside within seconds of the final whistle.

Overall, job very much done and we’ve got to be happy that we’ve avoided an embarrassing defeat at home at this stage of the competition, although few would be overly convinced by the performance.