by Brum Royal »
28 Aug 2018 09:41
Bel8d back from the game from me. I thought this was a significant upgrade on the performance at Villa Park from Clement's second(?) game in charge at the back end of last season. In that game we had zero attacking threat, tried to simply defend and got battered 4-0. On Saturday, we created some excellent opportunities, and based on clear cut opportunities (3 a piece by my reckoning) came out with a deserved point. First half performance was encouraging, showing signs that this team is beginning to gel and get to grips with how Clement wants them to play, second half (after the substitution of a poor Grealish) Villa stepped it up and looked the better side for large chunks, but in choosing to shoot early from the edge/outside of the box only served to up their shot count without actually really troubling Mannone. Slightly concerning was the massive pace advantage Villa had on us, especially when countering on us second half.
So the 3 decent chances by my count were:
Villa
Bundled back pass from Moore/Blackett (I forget which) in the opening 10 minutes
Hitting the bar
The goal
v
Reading
Nearly bundling in a corner
The outrageous keeper double save
The penalty
Mannone - solid, no chance with the goal, mopped up all the fairly tame shots, one minor spill but gathered quickly.
Yiadom - Poorest game for him so far, but up against good quality wingers from Villa.
Blackett - Ok for the most part, Aluko continues to leave him hugely over exposed though.
Moore/Illori - Looks a far more solid pairing than either alongside McShane. Marshalled Villa's forwards very well, Kodjia was anonymous.
Aluko - Not hugely effective going forwards, looks better this season than last though at least.
Barrow - Not 100% fit, right decision to come off at half time. Certainly not terrible, just not up to speed.
Meyler - I really liked the look of him against Derby, hopefully will look better when paired with a more regular central partner, the continual chopping and changing of centre mids is doing nobody any favours currently.
Bacuna - did a good job in the centre mid, kept play ticking over, won a few tackles.
Bod - lots of energy and worked hard, had a tough afternoon up against Chester and Jedinak, the high balls up to him generally were won more by the centre backs than him, but he won't come up against many taller centre back pairings I wouldn't have thought.
Baldock - still trying to build the understanding with Bod, but certainly that looks to be improving. Certainly enjoyed his goal and hopefully this will kick him on.
Meite - looks a completely new player to last two seasons and could be a real impact player.
Sims - linked quite well down the right with Yiadom towards the end.
Fans - generally pretty supportive throughout, need to stop with the "we've got the ball/we've lost the ball" nonsense now though, this isn't Stamball any more.
Overall, fairly confident that things are improving, and that the first win is not far away now. There are some very winnable games in September, and I think once we get our first on the board, we'll begin to put a run together and start looking up rather than down again.