A tale of two halves, or Jeckyll and Hyde as I sometimes like to think of performances so different either side of the break. That might be overstating things, but at half time Villa had 49% of possession, by full time that had shrunk to just 42%.
That might not seem like an enormous swing, and it’s an oversimplification, but if you assumed the ball was in the possession of one team or the other for all of the 90
Stewart Downing’s well taken opening goal was cancelled out by Matthew Jarvis’ 2nd half in-swinger that evaded everyone, including Brad Friedel, but cometh the hour, cometh, er, Emile Heskey to nod in a late winner in emphatic style, grabbing all three points and fifth place in the Premier League.
It was a game that started off brightly, a fairly even affair, Wolves clearly keen to press for an early advantage while the home support were still in good voice. Villa
Gérard Houllier has signed the contract he said he would. It’s a three year deal. Really pretty simple, not sure why it’s such huge news, but it seems to be lighting up the wires at the moment, so to speak.
Previously, Emile Heskey was dominating the headlines, for the right reasons for once, following the impact he made against Blackburn midweek. A welcome change, but not a sustainable one I suspect. Hopefully I’m way off the mark because
Emile Heskey came on around the hour mark with Villa a goal down to Blackburn and within a minute he had equalised, possibly with his first touch, and 18 minutes later Ashley Young was tapped in Heskey’s cross for the third goal to seal a comeback victory. Ashley had also headed in a second goal in between, crossed in by Nathan Delfouneso.
Quite the start for Gérard Houllier.
I didn’t see any of it, so I can’t give you any first
Blackburn return to Villa Park in the Carling Cup tonight, but if it’s to be a repeat of the 6-4 thriller back in January, it will likely be for different reasons. Sam Allardyce has stated explicitly that the Premier League is their priority at all costs and after a bruising encounter with Fulham last weekend, on top of a Lancashire derby against Blackpool next weekend, Sam’s unlikely to field his strongest possible XI.
But neither will Houllier, who’s hit the
I ran this as a regular feature last year and I don’t see any reason for it not to continue. I find it interesting at least. Same premise as before, which was explained in #01 if it’s not immediately obvious, the only change being the mapping of the three promoted and three relegated teams:-
Newcastle = Burnley
WBA = Hull
Portsmouth = Blackpool
That reflects their finishing positions in the respective leagues.
You’ll probably be aware that last season, after five games, we
I’ve talked about this many, many times: possession football is all well and good, but if you don’t move the ball into position to score goals often enough, you don’t win many games. Our home record was 13th best in the league last season as we consistently struggled to roll inferior opposition over and that was to be the key challenge to address this season.
If Gérard Houllier learned anything from his position in the stands, it’s that grinding out
Gérard Houllier and Gary McAllister watched their new charges labour to a disappointing draw from the stands today and will know that they have an awful lot of talent at their disposal, but also have their work cut out for them.
It started extremely brightly with Villa absolutely dominating the opening 30 minutes or so, much like the first game of the season against West Ham. Marc Albrighton was having a field day down the right flank and it seemed
I haven’t had chance to pull together a proper preview for Bolton’s visit to Villa Park, but this game is definitely more about various intertwining story arcs off the pitch than tactics and strategy on the pitch.
It is, of course, Kevin MacDonald’s final game in charge and it goes without saying that he and the players will want to both finish on a high note and attempt to atone for the slip-ups in the past few weeks. MacDonald’s grace