Eight Games – Inch by Inch – Be The 12th Man
YouTube Video
If you would like, you can download a ‘Be The 12th Man’ wallpaper for your desktop, iPhone or iPad.
Video: Ashley Young and Darren Bent speak to FATV and England’s 4-3-3
Another FATV interview with Ashley Young, this time post-match with what looks like Kyle Walker stuffing his face in the background. As you’ll no doubt be aware, the Villa lads were once again instrumental in England’s 2-0 win over Wales in their Euro 2012 qualifier with Ash winning the penalty for the first goal thanks to a clumsy challenge from our own James Collins.
Ash was the provider for the second, squaring Glen Johnson’s superb long ball for Darren Bent to
Video: Ashley Young interview with FATV, plus Kyle Walker’s screamer
Ashley Young talking to FATV ahead of England’s Euro 2012 qualifier against Wales on Saturday.
YouTube Video
James Collins gets a mention in the video, he was in the frame to captain the Welsh side on Saturday, but contrary to silly rumours circulating earlier this week, he’s only playing after passing a fitness test and was not fit for last Saturday’s game against Wolves.
Screamer
You’ve probably already seen Kyle Walker’s “screamer” in a small pitch training game with the Under-21s I Tweeted yesterday.
What’s the difference between Houllier’s and O’Neill’s first 25 league games?
There’s a lot of emotion, anger and fear floating around the Villasphere at the moment so I’m going to tread carefully here. I’m not looking to make any particular point, but I do want to correct one or two claims I’m seeing which are factually inaccurate.
Facts are what I do, I’ll leave the opinion to you the reader.
The question in the headline might draw a multitude of answers, and possibly some less than savoury language, but I’m talking in terms
Aston Villa 0 Wolves 1: Where do you even begin?
I won’t be alone in feeling completely numb right now. I can’t even think where to begin explaining that one. There’s zero point talking tactics and team selection, the starting XI wasn’t vastly different from expectations, they just didn’t play with any real intent about them.
I hoped someone might pass a note around the changing room at half time, perhaps a snapshot of the table, wake them up a little, something to bring our situation into focus. They’d come out
Teamsheets: Aston Villa vs Wolves
The teams are almost exactly as expected from yesterday’s preview, just Marc Albrighton instead of Gabby – nothing shocking about that – but Chris Herd starts, presumably at left back, rather than Fabian Delph.
Aston Villa
Wolves
1
Brad Friedel
13
Wayne Hennessey
36
Kyle Walker
32
Kevin Foley
24
Carlos Cuellar
5
Richard Stearman
32
Nathan Baker
16
Christophe Berra
31
Chris Herd
3
George Elokobi
6
Stewart Downing
19
Adam Hammill
20
Nigel Reo-Coker
8
Karl Henry
17
Jean II Makoun
20
Nenad Milijas
12
Marc Albrighton
17
Matthew Jarvis
7
Ashley Young
24
Jamie O’Hara
39
Darren Bent
29
Kevin Doyle
Subs
Subs
33
Andy Marshall
1
Marcus Hahnemann
8
Robert Pires
6
Jody Craddock
11
Gabriel Agbonlahor
7
Michael Kightly
13
Michael Bradley
9
Sylvan Ebanks-Blake
16
Fabian Delph
10
Steven Fletcher
18
Emile Heskey
11
Stephen Ward
19
Stiliyan Petrov
14
David Jones
Wolves preview: Cuellar and Makoun return
I don’t really know what happened at Champneys spa resort, I’ll leave the speculation to others. Sufficed to say that the incident was dealt with swiftly, both James Collins and Richard Dunne have been punished and it turns out neither player is fit for this game in any case.
We’ve got more important things to worry about right now, like winning some football games. Starting with Wolves at what could well be a sold out Villa Park tomorrow.
At first glance, Wolves
Video: The penalty technique Ashley Young could have used at Bolton
One of the worst things any player can do when tasked with taking a penalty is to try something clever and fail spectacularly. Brilliant when it comes off, infuriating for the fans and embarrassing for the player when it doesn’t.
With the pressure on the pitch, even taking a text book penalty isn’t as easy as it looks, but here, working with Adidas, Ashley Young shows us how easy it can be on the training pitch.
YouTube Video
I don’t think he’ll be
First they’re reserves, then they’re valuable assets. Ever feel like you can’t win?
You won’t need me to tell you, you’ll no doubt recognise this team right away, but if not, it’s the starting eleven from the FA Cup 5th round at Eastlands that caused so much anger:
Brad Friedel
Chris Herd
Richard Dunne
Ciaran Clark
Fabian Delph
Michael Bradley
Stiliyan Petrov
Barry Bannan
Nathan Delfouneso
Gabby Agbonlahor
Emile Heskey
Look at it again. They’ve been called “kids”, “reserves”, “B-Team” and much more. Aside from Chris Herd – who had been named in 12 of the 35 match squads before that game by the way