The draw with Fulham means Villa are still unbeaten
Saturday, 21 October 06, 07:20 PM · Comments (2)
I wanted the win, not only because I predicted it but because I had already predicted the right results earlier in the day on my betting slip. I stood to win a nice few quid if Villa won but we can't always win.
The result isn't as disappointing as it could have turned out, Villa I think only had three shots on target and when you score one out of three you've got to be happy.
I've got to agree with Doc Bowles when he says Steven Davis needs a rest. He did well last year but I suspect the fame has gone to his head or Martin O'Neill doesn't know how to get the best out of him. I think we can all agree which one it probably is.
Davis was replaced by Isaiah Osbourne in the second half and is should have happened a lot earlier. I'd personally have Lee Hendrie before Davis the way he is playing at the moment. The thing is, these days, when they sign the four year contract they are made for life so what is his incentive?
It turns out that Martin O'Neill and Gareth Barry read the Aston Villa Blog because as we wrote last week about the Angel penalty miss, it turns out they've pretty much followed our suggestion to the letter. Gareth Barry is now the penalty taker and he took the first half penalty with confidence and style, smacking it into the back of the net.
The Hoff man scored for Fulham in the last few seconds of the first half which was pretty much the last action of the game. The second half was quite dull. Baros was replaced with Agathe at the start of the second half and the game changed.
Even the appearance of Chris Sutton, replacing Angel in the 74th minutes wasn't enough to stoke the fires that are burning at Villa Park even though I wanted him to score, despite his recent history.
Overall, I'm happy about the result. Villa looked confident. Barry should get an England chance after this performance in front of second choice Steve but it'll probably not happen despite the captain getting yet another man of the match award.
Let's see what Mr O'Neill has to say and an interesting rumour surfacing this afternoon which I'm taking with a pinch of salt but the talk is David O'Leary is going to be offered the Birmingham City job. I hope so, they deserve to go down further.
Don't forget, there is one more chance to win a signed copy of Back from the Brink by Paul McGrath.
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2 Comments · Add yours
we could have got all three points. you might be unbeaten but you'll get beat soon ..
I think everyone agrees that Villa were poor. But the most important factor in this is that O'Neill acknowleges Villa were really bad. Thinking back to the previous manager a year ago, we would have said "My lovely bunch of lads were lucky to get that draw, 'cos we should have been beaten today". It is not so much the fact that we are unbeaten, it's more the belief that Martin has instilled in this team that makes us feel they should have been winning games like this. Under the circumstances we'd probably have given our right arm for a draw last season just to get some points on the board, and it's good that O'Neill has acknowleged that the whole team was poor. We will be beaten sooner or later, but I have every confidence that O'Neill will sort things out!