by Bulldog Drummond
When it comes to away form Aston Villa are one of two teams that have played two and lost two – the other is the other promoted team, Norwich. Arsenal at home have won one and drawn one.
The two highlights of Villa’s season thus far have been a home win over Everton 2-0, and a league cup victory over Crewe (1-6 away). Last time around they had a goalless draw with West Ham.
| Date | Game | Res |
Score | Competition |
| 10 Aug | Tottenham Hotspur v Aston Villa | L | 3-1 | Premier League |
| 17 Aug | Aston Villa v AFC Bournemouth | L | 1-2 | Premier League |
| 23 Aug | Aston Villa v Everton | W | 2-0 | Premier League |
| 27 Aug | Crewe Alexandra v Aston Villa | W | 1-6 | League Cup |
| 31 Aug | Crystal Palace v Aston Villa | L | 1-0 | Premier League |
| 03 Sep | Salford City v Aston Villa | L | 2-0 | Football League Trophy |
| 16 Sep | Aston Villa v West Ham United | D | 0-0 | Premier League |
Last season they achieved promotion by beating West Brom and Derby in the playoffs, having come fifth in the league, 13 points behind Sheffield United in the second promotion place. Indeed in their last nine games they never once scored more than two goals. But in the summer they were right at the top of the transfer spending tree having a net spend of around £146m.
Among the vast numbers of players coming and going we found
- Jota — from Birmingham City £4m
- Anwar El Ghazi — from Lille £8m
- Kortney Hause – from Wolverhampton Wanderers £3m
- Matt Targett — from Southampton £14m
- Frédéric Guilbert — from Caen £5m#
- Wesley Moraes — from Club Brugge £22m
- Tyrone Mings — from Bournemouth £26.5m
- Ezri Konsa — from Brentford £12m
- Björn Engels — from Reims £9m
- Trézéguet — from Kasimpasa £8.8m
- Douglas Luiz — from Manchester City £15m
- Tom Heaton — from Burnley £8m
- Marvelous Nakamba — from Club Brugge £11m
Prices and names come from the Guardian website. Meanwhile they also quote around 20 players as having left.
This incredible swap around of players has obviously resulted in some instability in the club – along with the adjustment up to Premier League standards, but a win, draw and defeat in the last three league games shows a certain settling down.
Last season despite getting promotion Villa were not an especially exciting away side performing some way below the top two who got the automatic promotion spots.
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Norwich City | 23 | 12 | 9 | 2 | 42 | 23 | 19 | 45 |
| 2 | Sheffield United | 23 | 11 | 7 | 5 | 36 | 24 | 12 | 40 |
| 3 | Bristol City | 23 | 11 | 5 | 7 | 31 | 27 | 4 | 38 |
| 4 | Leeds United | 23 | 11 | 4 | 8 | 35 | 29 | 6 | 37 |
| 5 | West Bromwich Albion | 23 | 11 | 4 | 8 | 34 | 31 | 3 | 37 |
| 6 | Middlesbrough | 23 | 10 | 7 | 6 | 26 | 24 | 2 | 37 |
| 7 | Aston Villa | 23 | 9 | 8 | 6 | 32 | 25 | 7 | 35 |
And it is noticeable that they have only scored one away goal in their two away games this season.
Looking at the bottom of the table showing both home and away form, now their aim will surely be to sneak a draw…
| Pos | Club | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD |
Pts |
| 15 | Sheffield United | 5 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 6 | -1 | 5 |
| 16 | Brighton and Hove Albion | 5 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 8 | -3 | 5 |
| 17 | Aston Villa | 5 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 6 | -2 | 4 |
| 18 | Newcastle United | 5 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 8 | -4 | 4 |
| 19 | Wolverhampton Wanderers | 5 | 0 | 3 | 2 | 6 | 10 | -4 | 3 |
| 20 | Watford | 5 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 10 | -6 | 2 |
… and they will of course be encouraged by the endless stream of negative publicity and reporting there is circulating about Arsenal, both in the national media and through allegedly Arsenal supporting websites.
Indeed if any motivation is needed all they will have to do is look at the media to be convinced Arsenal are utter rubbish with an incompetent manager.
Of course if this publicity is rubbing off on the Arsenal players then we are in trouble, but if it makes Villa attack a little more than they might otherwise do when playing a club suffused in positive publicity, then that could give us a few nice breaks in their defensive line. Once we have knocked in a goal they are going to have to attack even more and that could give us a chance to score more.
And besides we did quite well in the Europa game.
However this tactic also has to involve Arsenal players not getting suckered into the rampant negativity that emenates from the media morning noon and night – and that is a much harder job to arrange. I can only hope that the Arsenal psychologists are not demanding overtime payments.
And there is one little factor to note in the history of Villa’s three years in the championship… the increase in their goalscoring. In 2016/17 they scored 47. In 2017/18 they scored 83 (coming 5th) and last season 76. On the other hand last season they conceded 61 goals – quite high for a team coming up a division. Their top scorer was Tammy Abraham with 26.
I think we ought to be able to knock in one or two.
A reminder that our Ladies are also in action this afternoon with a group stage game in the Continental Tyres Cup against London City Lionesses (formerly known as Millwall Lionesses)).
The Continental Tyres Cup sees the 24 teams from the top two divisions of Women’s football playing round robin matches in four groups of 6 with half of the teams in each group coming from each of the divisions. Our group has us playing Brighton and Bristol from the WSL and Charlton, London Bees and the Lionesses from the Championship.
Whilst the Lionesses are in good league form with 3 wins from their 4 games seeing them in third place behind Aston Villa and Durham, this game may well give Joe Montemurro the opportunity to give game time and possibly starts to some of our younger players and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see Ruby Grant, Melissa Filis and Silvana Flores featuring significantly. As there is still a big difference between the standard in the two divisions, this is a game I would expect us to win fairly comfortably, albeit not by a fistful of goals. I would expect us to score more and concede fewer than the men later on.
The game is at Princes Park Stadium, the home of Dartford FC. The address is Darenth Road Dartford DA1 1RT. The ground was built in 2006 and has a capacity of 4,100 with 642 seated.
Im planning to get there early! I’ll have a report later (or perhaps tomorrow).
COYG
Someone I think forgot the length limit on twits. The beach for the women is: Zinsberger, Williamson, Beattie, Little, Grant, McCabe, Miedema.
Some of the starting 11 are: Peyraud-Magnin and @EmsMitch3 start @louise_quinn4 partners @vikschnaderbeck 😍 @LiaWaelti makes her return from injury. Who the other 6 are?
COYWG!
> A late change to the starting XI as @LeahcWilliamson replaces @louise_quinn4.
The game has started.
COYWG!
7 minutes in. Beth Mead started, as did Leonie Maier. So, that is 7, 4 to go.
COYWG!
33 minutes in. JillRoord was another starter.
COYWG!
Approaching half time, with 3 starters still unknown.
COYWG!
Second half started. No substitutions apparently.
COYWG!
JBeattie came on at half time for LiaWaelti. Andrew was commenting on the other thread today, and has another startr or two. Arsenal women scoring more than State Aid and ManU combined.
COYWG!
Mel Filis is the one name Andrew provided.
There has been more scoring, and it’s not in the ManU game.
COYWG!
> Our second change of the afternoon… ⬅️ @DanielleDonk ➡️ @Rubyjaynegrant Go get ’em, Ruby
So Danielle was another starter. One starter yet to discover I believe.
COYWG!