Aston Villa cruised to a very welcome three points at Craven Cottage today with a Gabby Agbonlahor brace just before half time, capping an impressive first half performance. Arsene Wenger would no doubt have appreciated the healthy mixture of short and long play.

The second half was perhaps more an effort in containment, but the danger of the counter attack was of course ever present from the Claret and Blues. Fulham huffed and puffed and did manage to score a nice goal that was rightly disallowed for being a mile offside, but never looked like being capable of mustering the necessary quality to beat this Aston Villa back four.

Solid performances all round the pitch, notably again from Ashley Young who may well have his mojo back. Stuart Downing also bounced back from his slightly below par showing against Arsenal last time out.

Milner and Petrov were rocks in the middle, at times linking up sublimely. I hate to mention Wenger again, but trust me, he would have lapped up some of the interplay today had they been wearing Arsenal shirts. That said, Milner was guilty on occasion of being a little careless in possession, giving the ball away cheaply. The good thing is that he’ll immediately run all day to get the ball back.

The back four were as reliable as ever. Dunne in particular was beast-like, but they all deserve credit, as does Brad Friedel who was alert and able when called upon.

Up front, the game obviously belongs to Gabby who was quite brilliant with both goals. The first, a header at the near post from a Petrov cross that he used his upper body strength to muscle his way into a position to win the ball he probably had no right to win.

The second had a touch of genius about it. Ashley Young cut in from the right and played a cheeky little back heel to Carlos Cuellar advancing up the touch line and the Spaniard knocked a lovely weighted pass with his second touch to Gabby just inside the area. The usually impressive Brede Hangeland was caught completely the wrong side and flat footed, so as Gabby smartly turned back towards goal he was on his own and he made no mistake with his left foot effort to the far top corner.

There was the feel of more goals about the second half, but in the end they never came, although I have to suspect that Villa had another gear or two if they were ever required. I suppose it could be described as an intelligent display after the break.

Elsewhere around the Premiership, it wasn’t such a bad day either as Tottenham failed to beat the blues back in Birmingham, although Liverpool did brush Bolton aside with a 2-0 win.

Still, we remain in the mix and after a very tough run of opponents put question marks over our ability to score goals. Today showed that we’re still very, very capable of turning on the style in front of goal. Statshack will be up later, but a very happy day to be enjoyed now.

Oh, what’s that? I didn’t mention Heskey you say? Yes, that was deliberate I’m afraid.