Has The Defence Turned A Corner?

After conceding just once in our last 3 games, has our defence finally sorted itself out?

There is no doubt that the injury to Richard Dunne has been a blessing in disguise due to the fact it has forced Mcleish to play King Carlos in his favoured position. Since he has been there he has been virtually MOTM every game. Lets just hope we offer him a new contract very soon!

Collins alongside him seems to have cut out the silly errors which were costing us vital points which is another bonus. Perhaps that is down to playing next to a calming influence for a change!

Also our full backs seem to be turning their form around. Warnock seems to have recovered after a horrendous couple of months and Alan Hutton has actually been looking pretty decent in the last few games. Both could be better going forward but seem to have at least cut out the mistakes at the back.

Im not going to go overboard and say we have a top defence but we certainly do not have a poor one at this moment in time. I still believe we need to replace Warnock in the summer, or perhaps try out Lichaj, but maybe we dont need the massive defensive overhaul we thought we did earlier in the season.

A Transfer Link With Substance!

We have had a few transfer links over the past month or so and it's fair to say, the chances of any of them happening is quite slim.  Here though I believe we have a link with some substance to it. 

Our scout in Holland, Arthur Numan, has been keeping a close eye on Simon Poulsen who plays for AZ Alkmaar.  He is a left back which would suggest that Mcleish has seen a weakness in Warnock, although he can also be played in midfield.

He is out of contract at the end of the season so a cut price deal may be on the cards in January. Watch this space!

Mcleish Angered By "Comedy Cuts" Defending

I talked about the point after the match that we gifted Man City at least 3 of their goals due to sloppy mistakes and we didn't force them out of 2nd or 3rd gear.  Alex Mcleish has replicated this as he talked about his great disappointment at the level of defending produced at the Etihad Stadium.

He said:

“It doesn’t matter if it’s Manchester City or an amateur team, you’ll still lose goals if you’re not organised at set-pieces,”

 “To lose goals the way we did was comedy cuts.

 “Every other team will look at the scoreline and think City must have cut Villa to ribbons but they didn’t.

 “When they see the goals they’ll just think – that was horrendous defending.

 “Needless to say, we will be on the training ground this week to put that right.

 “I don’t think it was a bad day at the office, but to lose we are extremely unhappy and disappointed, especially the way we started the game.

 “Kompany had a free run for his goal, that shouldn’t have happen because we had organised our players to pick up the important City targets and the ones we singled out for attention.

 “It’s a learning curve but I am disappointed not to come away from here with something. If we’d defended better from corner kicks I felt we would have.

 “Stevie Warnock, who has been excellent for us this season, had an uncharacteristic error and unfortunately Johnson capitalised on it.

 “Stevie slips up and it’s 2-0. How do you legislate for things like that happening?”

A Long Way To Go

I think a lot of Villa fans were expecting a scoreline similar to 4-1, perhaps not quite as bad, but it's the way in which we conceded the goals that annoyed me.  I said before the match that I thought  had learnt our lesson since last year and we wouldn't concede any cheap goals, but here we are, talking yet again about sloppy goals.

It seems as though Warnock is never going to learn how to be a 'solid' defender.  Yes he has his good days, Wigan being one of them, but I have voiced my concerns about hi in the past and he is doing nothing to change my mind.  He is an accident waiting to happen every single game, and against Man City he is starting to make a habit of having shockers.  Surely Ciaran Clark deserves a chance at left back against West Brom.  I know he isn't a left back, but he was more solid last season than Warnock has been recently so that change can't hurt.

Our other full back, Hutton, is another accident waiting to happen.  I know a lot of Villa fans have said that they feel Chris Herd should be given more of a chance and I have to say that I agree.  Hutton has looked dodgy since joining and Herd has only played one Premier League game and he got MOTM.  Surely it's a no brainer!

Moving on to midfield, and it pains me to say it, but Delph just doesn't seem up to it at this level.  I could see glimpses earlier in the season of a real quality player but his past few performances have been getting increasingly ropy and it must be time for him to be dropped.  I would like to see us revert back to the diamond midfield that we saw against Wigan as it made us attack with a bit more intent and it wasn't too 'structured' where everyone has a fixed position and is afraid to move out of it.

Up front Bent didn't really have a sniff once again.  It is more understandable against top quality opposition but he must be getting more and more frustrated by the game.  Reverting back to the diamond midfield I think will create a lot more chances for Bent, as long as Bannan is on the pitch as he looks like the only player in the team who is actually focused on trying to release him.

This is the team I would like to see line up against the Baggies:

                  Given

Herd  Collins  Dunne  Clark

                  Petrov

      Bannan           Jenas

                 Ireland

           Bent  Agbonlahor

I know the odds of Mcleish making all these changes is next to nothing, but that is the team I would personally like to see.  If Jenas still hasn't recovered then I would like to see Gary Gardner given a start alongside Bannan.  People keep on giving him rave reviews so it's about time we saw if he has what it takes.  He can't be any worse than Delph has been recently.

Players Must Live Close

Alex Mcleish has imposed a new rule at Villa that every player must live within a 30 mile radius of Bodymoor Heath. He hopes that this rule will help to reduce the number of injuries within the squad.

Now it was much publicised last year when Gerard Houllier tried to do something similar. His attempts failed though as players such as Stephen Ireland refused to move closer to the training ground because they felt it wasn't worth it if they knew that no matter what they did, they would be training with the reserves. Good news for Mcleish however as both Ireland and Warnock have both recently relocated closer to Bodymoor. Obviously that is down to the fact that they are being given game time so they actually have a good enough reason to move.

Gabby Steals The Show

Such a nice feeling to be relaxing on a Saturday evening on the back of 3 points for the Villa!  And I think it's fair to say that we owe pretty much all of it to Gabby Agbonlahor.  I actually thought he started the game poorly, giving the ball away a bit too easily and not making the most of promising positions.  However as soon as he scored his goal he seemed to turn into a man possessed.

First things first I think that goal deserves a mention.  Bannan, who had a very impressive game before fading late on, sending an inch perfect ball down the left for Gabby to run on to.  He then ran at his marker, cut inside and rifled an unstoppable shot into the roof of the net.  It was a taster of what Gabby has to offer this season if he can keep up his level of performances.  He has the speed to terrorise any defence in the league and now he is starting to develop some skill to go with it which can make him unplayable at times.  He is also starting to improve his level of finishing which makes him even more dangerous as now he doesn't need 3 or 4 chances before he will take one.

For the second goal he went on a magnificent run down the left, leaving Emmerson Boyce for dead before delivering a perfectly placed cross for Bent to volley home his first goal in front of the Holte End so a special congratulations to him.  As for Gabby's role in the goal, there is nobody else in our squad who has the ability to do that, his pace being the key factor but now he is finally starting to use his pace more effectively.

Other than Gabby, I felt there were plenty of other positives to take from the game.  As mentioned earlier, I felt that Barry Bannan looked very creative and created pretty much all of our chances in the first half before almost scoring a cracking 25 yarder in the second half.  Stephen Ireland is far from the finished article but I saw moments of promise and I feel that given a lengthy run of games in the first team he could become a key figure this season for us.  As ever the defence looked solid, and I was especially pleased with Warnock's display.  I thought he was terrific today.  Last but not least another mention to Shay Given, who after being so quiet for most of the game came up with a couple of quality stops to preserve a clean sheet which will go down well in the camp.

Player Profile - 3. Stephen Warnock

Some rate him, some think he's hopeless.  But one thing is for sure, nobody can question his work rate on the pitch.  Every game I see him in he is racing up and down the left wing, getting forward whenever possible whilst also tracking back whenever the opposition comes forward.  He puts in some crunching tackles, admittedly a lot of them result in a yellow card, but he never backs out of a 50-50.  But for me there are 2 major problems with his game.

The first problem is his distribution/execution of passes.  Over the past couple of seasons I have seen far too many loose passes from him which puts us right on the backfoot or wastes good opportunities coming forward.  The other problem I have with him is his constant misjudgements of the ball when it's in flight.  A few times already this season I've seen a simple hoof upfield end up in a chance for the opposition as a result of Warnock charge at it to try and cut it out and the ball ends up going straight over his head.  At this standard of football that is simply unacceptable.  I think it was these traits which caused Gerard Houllier to banish him from his attempts to create "total football".

Despite these flaws I believe we have a pretty good left back and we shouldn't be in a hurry to replace him.  There are clearly better left backs availible but we have much more important positions to find replacements for in the short term.  I suppose he could be described as a marmite kind of character, you can love him or hate him.  Therefore I'm going to play it safe and sit on the fence and open up the floor to other people's opinions!

Rating 7/10