The goals, highlights and review – Aston Villa 2 Burnley 1 (AET) Carling Cup

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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Aston Villa 2 Burnley 1 – Villa through to quarters, but no Blues for Albrighton

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 vs Burnley – Teamsheets

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.

Opportunity knocks – Aston Villa vs Burnley

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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Statshack – Aston Villa 5 Burnley 2

One of the things that I enjoy about pulling the Statshacks together is that the statistics often don’t reflect my perception of the game, which really challenges what I think I know, and this one is no exception. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think that the scoreline flatters us much, but if you were to make a judgment based solely on the numbers below you might not agree.

You can see for yourself that the passing and possession

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Aston Villa 5 Burnley 2

Aston Villa opened what MON is describing as the most important week of his Villa tenure with a vital three points, thumping hapless Burnley 5-2 at Villa Park, but it didn’t look like it was heading that way at half time.

Burnley opened the scoring in a scrappy early period after carving the Premiership’s meanest defense wide open with some slide rule passing that culminated with Steven Fletcher receiving the ball with an unmissable chance at the back stick. That

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From The Desk Of Captain Obvious – It’s An Important Week

Martin O’Neil has been describing it as his most important week since joining Aston Villa and while I wouldn’t rush to disagree, with our season apparently continually hinging on our next game, which weeks aren’t important?

However, with a resurgent Everton now chasing on our heels, three points against Burnley tomorrow are, well, just as important as they were before Everton beat Man Utd today. It remains to be seen whether Everton can maintain their form should Landon Donovan return

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