An extremely interesting, and in some cases surprising, opening weekend to the new 2010/11 Premiership season. From Mancini’s millionaires leaving London with a point thanks to a quite amazing performance from the young Joe Hart, through caretaker manager Kevin MacDonald overseeing a scintillating display from his temporary charges at Villa Park, to Pepe Reina gifting Arsenal a share of the spoils at Anfield with a comedy own goal.

Hart Saves The Day

The curtain opener took place at White Hart Lane, an intriguing encounter between Tottenham and Man City. Redknapp set his side out in a standard 4-4-2 and for most of the first half they completely battered City, who were playing a strange 4-5-1 with three holding players in the middle; Barry, de Jong and Yaya Toure, two wide men in David Silva and Wright-Phillips, and Carlos Tevez alone up front.

Eyebrows were raised by Shay Given – currently rumoured to be close to switching to Arsenal – being left on the bench watching Joe Hart in goal, but with the scoreline remaining 0-0 by the break, when it could easily have been 6-0, and probably should have been at least 3-0, that selection proved entirely justified. City were better in the second period, but they will not have impressed anyone so far.

Quite where James Milner fits in remains to be seen, but I can’t help feeling there’s a fair degree of irony in Gareth Barry’s apparent welcome mat as he may well be the player to make way.

The KMac Daddy

I’ve covered Villa’s 3-0 victory in some detail, no need to go over it again. Of course, I’m thrilled by the display and over the moon for Kevin MacDonald, I felt there was a massive sense of relief at the result. However, from some of the reaction I’ve read from some fans, you’d think Villa played nothing but route one football for four years, Villa Park was under some kind of poisonous cloud, polluting everything, and KMac has somehow waved it all away with some wizardry and instilled total football on what was previously a bunch of cloggers.

If he did all that in five days, think what he can achieve in five weeks!

I stress, I don’t want to detract from the achievement, but let’s all just take a few deep breaths and calm down a little. I’m pleased to learn that Randy is perfectly willing to consider MacDonald for the post permanently, but he rightly points out that the first step is for Kevin to actually want to be considered. We don’t know whether that’s the case at this stage and he strikes me as a man who might very well prefer operating in the background, out of the lime light. I certainly wouldn’t blame him if that’s how he feels.

Not A Candidate: Bob Bradley

I once again witnessed a rumour mushrooming from what was a perfectly innocent inception on this occasion to major news thanks to Talksport sourcing their “exclusives” from fans’ blogs.

I began writing an article on the subject that became more scathing in tone than I intended, but 2,000 words later, Bradley’s people had killed the rumour that he had quit his post and Villa Park had quashed any notion that they were interested anyway. In the end, I decided it was a little too incendiary in nature to publish and, though I’m not that interested in the other side of the river, I’ll save burning some bridges for another day.

Not A Candidate: Diego Maradona

I have to admit, this one cracked me up. Just for fun, I decided to add a little claret and blue flavour to a wallpaper I had knocked up during the World Cup. I also made Diego’s big face my avatar on Twitter and it was mostly taken in the spirit it was intended, but someone did contact me to let me know the picture was “offensive to all Englishmen”. I also read some choice opinions on Facebook which escalated into some quite astonishing arguments.

Of course, few people bothered to check the actual story, which was clearly nothing more than Maradona’s agent trying to keep him relevant. I’d be a little sad if I’m right, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Diego barely knew of Aston Villa’s existence, let alone that there’s a management position open.

I was fond of his agent, Walter Soriano, stating that Diego “loves the English countryside and your respect for privacy, so he would be very happy there, especially at a big club like Aston Villa.” Yeah, this seem legit.

Around The League

Back in the real world, Blackpool got off to a dream start (I think MotD have shot their bolt a little early with the “Tangerine Dream” caption they used for this game), assisted in no small part by Marlon Harewood, if you can believe it, who bagged a brace in the new recruit’s 4-0 drubbing of Wigan on their own patch. I saw a lot of Roberto Martinez over the summer as a member of ESPN’s team of World Cup pundits and he was quite excellent, so if the day job doesn’t pan out…

In less dramatic matches; Blackburn beat Everton 1-0 at Ewood Park and Mark Hughes’ first game in charge of Fulham ended goalless at Bolton. Liam Ridgewell bundled in a late equaliser at the Stadium of Light to split the points with Sunderland in a 2-2 draw, while Wolves kicked off their new season with a 2-1 home win against Stoke.

Nicky Shorey had a ringside seat for the day’s most dramatic game, watching from the bench as his new team, West Brom, were taken to the cleaners by Chelsea in a 6-0 thrashing at the Bridge. It’s going to be a long season I think Nicky, at least you’ll get to play though.

Bad Start For Cole

Joe Cole’s debut for Liverpool wasn’t quite what he had in mind after being sent off just before half-time, possibly a little harshly, after a rather silly tackle that he shouldn’t be surprised resulted in red, even if it wasn’t particularly malicious. Somehow though, despite being reduced to 10 men, David N’Gog managed to find an unlikely goal, breaking an innocuous stalemate right before half time.

Arsenal, with Manuel Almunia bizarrely installed as captain, never seemed to find top gear and couldn’t make the extra man pay as Liverpool retreated deeper into their shell to protect their slender lead. In the final analysis, Wenger might feel grateful to have left Anfield with a point thanks to Pepe Reina’s hilarious own goal.

Beaten in the air, Reina stumbled to chase after Chamakh’s header, which struck the foot of the post. The ball ricocheted right into his hands, but his momentum took the Spanish keeper, complete with the ball more or less in his gloves, over the line and into his own net. Right into the corner too. A text book goalkeeping howler.

So, with Man Utd and Newcastle meeting later tonight, Villa sit in third place behind Blackpool and Chelsea. One will be there or thereabouts at the end of the season, the other will not. The question is where we will be, but even with the new found optimism, I don’t think too many Villa fans will be predicting third.

Oh Vienna

And so we look ahead to our next game, the Europa League re-match against Rapid Vienna on Thursday, a chance for redemption. We didn’t play so badly in Vienna last time, the early goal the result of Curtis Davies’ unfortunate slip at the worst of moments. If we repeat Saturday’s performance against West Ham, there will be no problem. None.

However, I expect somewhat stiffer opposition from Rapid than we received from West Ham.  It will be interesting to see whether the scorer of that goal in Vienna last time will play. Nikica Jelavic has been the subject of a protracted move to Rangers, which just days ago was off because of wage demands and a Stephen Ireland style pay off from Rapid, but Rangers are now said to be renewing their interests again after the player softened his position.

Villa’s team selection will be even more interesting of course. I’m definitely looking forward to it.