I don’t know how long it will be up, but there’s 14 minutes of highlights from the Carling Cup 4th round victory over Burnley in the video at the foot of this post.
Downing’s extra time goal was a worthy winner (it certainly made up for his atrocious earlier effort), a stinging effort from the edge of the box, and Heskey’s opener was an example to Reo-Coker on how to put those square balls away, but question marks remain.
With
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It took an extra time winner from Stewart Downing to settle this one after Clarke Carlisle cancelled out Emile Heskey’s late opener, but it was a costly game for Marc Albrighton who will be suspended for the Birmingham derby game after being sent off during extra time.
Not a game I saw or even heard, but clearly another game where we struggled to find the net. Maybe not surprising when you start without any recognised strikers, but Ashley Young, Stephen
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Aston Villa
1
Brad Friedel
30
Eric Lichaj
24
Carlos Cuellar
21
Ciaran Clark
23
Habib Beye
4
Steve Sidwell
20
Nigel Reo-Coker
12
Marc Albrighton
25
Barry Bannan
7
Ashley Young
9
Stephen Ireland
Subs
6
Stewart Downing
35
Daniel Johnson
14
Nathan Delfouneso
18
Emile Heskey
22
Brad Guzan
29
James Collins
50
Jonathan Hogg
Burnley
1
Lee Grant
2
Graham Alexander
3
Daniel Fox
4
Michael Duff
5
Clarke Carlisle
18
Leon Cort
8
Dean Marney
10
Martin Paterson
14
Tyrone Mears
19
Jay Rodriguez
22
Ross Wallace
Subs
9
Chris Iwelumo
11
Wade Elliott
12
Brian Jensen
15
David Edgar
21
Andre Bikey
24
Brian Easton
30
Steven Thompson
In a late change, John Carew pulled out during the warm-up, Stephen Ireland replaced him in the starting XI and Daniel Johnson (academy player) will sit on the bench.
I’m getting a little irked with a lot of the reporting around Villa in recent times. Let me be clear; I couldn’t be happier that Nigel Reo-Coker is going to be wearing the armband and will also be negotiating a new contract at the club, regular readers will know I’m a fan. However, you’d think from the way it’s being portrayed that NRC had been exiled to Siberia and was literally coming in from the cold.
Obviously Reo-Coker isn’t
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Burnley came up from the Championship last season via the play-offs and rightly didn’t go crazy bringing in new players before predictably heading back down to the Championship without too many heading for the exit. They were soundly beaten 4-0 at home by Reading last weekend, two of the starting line-up – Brian Jensen and Tyrone Mears – started every Premiership game the season before and five others had at least a dozen Premiership starts under their belts.
They may
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Sky Sports were at Villa Park as part of another successful open training day, the third time the club have done this I think off the top of my head, and there’s a nice, relaxed interview with Gérard Houllier here. The gaffer confirms that Warnock will be suspended for Burnley, that Petrov will be out for at least a couple of months, Luke Young should be back in training in a week and Gabby is a week or two
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Stephen Warnock will be writing a cheque out to The FA this week for £1,500 after his 87th minute booking at the Stadium of Light, making a total of £7,500 he’s contributed to the Soho Square coffers so far this season. It’s not Warnock’s bank account I’m concerned about though, I’m sure he can take that hit – you may have already done the math yourself – yes, Warnock picked up his 5th booking of the season against Sunderland
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It’s not so much a cliché as a truism: goals change games. Sometimes not scoring does too. Had Downing’s early woodwork striking effort gone in and/or had we been awarded a penalty for the challenge on Reo-Coker shortly after, it might have been a different game.
The goal we conceded, when we conceded it and in the manner it was given away clearly took some of the wind out of our sails in a much more traditional sense.
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A Richard Dunne own goal (an unwelcome record 8th in the Premiership) proved the only difference between the teams at the final whistle, but Gérard Houllier will be left scratching his head wondering why the side he sent out struggled to get a foot into this game until the 2nd half.
Perhaps team selection had a lot to do with it; Stephen Ireland far from settled, Richard Dunne far from fitness, but the XI that took to the field ought to
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