Dean Smith Is Learning
Dean Smith is learning. A theme of many of my posts over the last few months was about Smith’s ability to learn. I have repeatedly questioned some of Smith’s decision making. In particular, I have questioned Smith in relation to substitutions and team selection. So much so I asked if Dean Smith is holding Aston villa back. This is still a concern for me but against Arsenal, I saw some signs which give me hope.
Villa fans could not be in a much better place now. We are playing nice football and we are in the top half of the table. Our defense is excellent having 11 clean sheets from 21 games. We also have attacking players that have scored 36 goals, the 5th highest in the Premier League. So is it really fair to criticize Dean Smith? In a word, yes! I love Dean Smith, he has done brilliantly at Aston Villa but we are on the way to greatness and we need to continually ensure we have the right people to take us there. That is regardless of whether that person is a player, a coach, or part of the Villa management team.
Pep Guardiola
Pep Guardiola is probably the best manager in the Premier League, if not in world football. He is a serial winner. I don’t buy into the argument that his success is a result of spending money or simply ‘having’ the best players. I actually find that view extremely limited in its thinking. If it was that simple then why do football clubs pay managers such high salaries, why do clubs sack managers? Why did the same people that think Pep isn’t any good also want Bruce out of Villa? Surely it was just a matter of chucking more money at him?
Yesterday afternoon, at halftime against Liverpool, Pep demonstrated why he is the best. At nil-all Pep sent out his team for the second half to play in a different formation. Man City switched to 4-4-2 and they ripped Liverpool apart (I know what JCV is thinking now!). Yes, Alisson helped but Man City showed their dominance regardless of Alisson’s contributions. Pep read the game perfectly. He came up with a plan to overcome Liverpool’s resistance. At halftime, he explained his plan to the players and they executed it. The result, a 4-1 win for City and I think, the 3 points which give City the PL title this season.
Dean Smith v West Ham
Last week Aston Villa had a very disappointing loss to West Ham. It is a game I think we deserved to lose. I hate saying we deserved to lose a game and it is only the 3rd game this season I think we deserved to lose. The other two were the losses against Leeds and Southampton. Without trying to overanalyze the game, The Hammers were the better team and in fairness to Smith, he did try something I did not expect. He replaced Traore with El Ghazi for the second half. However, our players looked absolutely knackered, particularly Barkley and Luiz. Barkley was replaced on 69 mins and Luiz made way for Sanson’s debut on 80 mins. I maintain the Barkley and Luiz substitutions were too little too late but at least he made them.
Dean Smith v Arsenal
A few short days after losing to The Hammers we hosted Arsenal. We won and completed our first league double over The Gunners in 28 years. It was also our 3rd league win over them in about 6 months. Is Arsenal becoming our new Birmingham City where we can bank 6 points every season😀?. Again Dean Smith caught me by surprise and dropped Luiz for Nakamba in the starting 11. For the record, I think Luiz is a far better player and has a huge future at Villa. But I think dropping Luiz or put another way, resting Luiz was the right thing to do. Nakamba had a great game against Newcastle and fresh legs at DM really helped against Arsenal. Is it that Dean Smith learning? It is certtainly looking that way.
I really enjoyed the Arsenal game. It’s lovely to get an early goal, it puts a different perspective on the remainder of the game. We had 8 shots on target and can consider ourselves unlucky not to score more. Emi Martinez was back to his brilliant best after a hiccup against The Hammers. He has now 2 clean sheets against Arsenal since we paid a paltry 18m for his services. The Villa backline was immense with Mings leading by example with another MOTM performance. He is without question an essential part of the Villa team. In the second part of the second half both SJM and Nakamba worked great as a DM pairing. They sat a little deeper and helped to protect our back 4. Dean Smith had his game management spot on.
Brighton Next
We have a week off following Arsenal and have a day at the seaside when we meet Brighton at 8pm on Saturday night. Lots of time for recovery and lots of time for work on the training ground. Brighton will be a very tough game. They are on the back of wins against Liverpool and Spurs and a draw with Burnley. Anyone that thinks 3 points on Saturday is a given needs to reassess their thoughts. Yes, I believe we will get 3 points but we will need to be at our best and Deam Smith needs to manage the game correctly.
Having had a week off suits Smith’s playbook. He likes to pick the same 11 and he likes them to stay on the pitch for 90 minutes. The players will be well-rested so I expect we will see our ‘normal’ first 11 start.
However, Dean Smith must show he is learning and make changes to the side at the right time. If / when Barkley and Traore are lookimg tired then change them. Don’t wait till we concede. If we need to protect a 1-0 lead then bring on Marvelous to play alongside either McGinn or Luiz. With a scoreline of 3-0 then get Sanson on the pitch for some much needed gametime. If we manage the game correctly we will wake up on Sunday morning with a slight hangover and 38 points on the table.
Midtable Mini League
Last time out I published a midtable mini league. This is the mini league between the 8 teams I believe are competing for positions 7th through 14th. Importantly, 7th place is likely to have a Europa league spot as a prize. I like this mini league as it gives us a clearer view of how we are doing against the teams that count. I have updated this table and have also included a new column. The new colum shows the points gained since I first published the table (last week). I intend to show this table a lot more as the season progresses.
We are looking good in third position but the bad news is that both Hammers and Everton extended their lead over us by a point. We have 2 games in hand over The Hammers which is great but we are level on games played with Everton. If we want to qualify for Europe then we must overtake Everton and losing points to them is not the way to do it. On a positive we have gained 3 points over Arsenal increasing the gap to 4 points and we have 2 games in hand. As I said in the last blog, the games against teams in this table are crucial to our end of year position and our win over Arsenal highlights just that.
What The Bookies Say
The bookies have this game very tight. Villa are slight favourites for the win at 6/4. Brighton is only 17/10 with the draw at 5/2. My gut says that 5/2 is the best bet but as Villa don’t do draws maybe it isn’t. You can get 15/1 on Villa to win 2-0 which is where I would put my money if I bet on football.
Oh, by the way, the reason there is a picture of Mings for this leader blog is because he was absolutely fantastic against Arsenal.
UTV
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You have to feel sorry for the scum now down to 23rd . 😂😂😂
And Baggies 19th. Two relegations this season. It would be funny if we went on a crazy good run and qualifies for Europe the same season they both get relegated
Looking at the mini league table above i can’t help thinking it could so easily be 13 wins for us. Knowing how to kill games and taking our chances to put teams to the sword is the difference between the top six and the rest though.
The problem with progress is just like a good single malt … i always want more 😎
The problem with progress is just like a good single malt … i always want more
Love that, but I would swap single malt for Guinness LOL
When I look at our fixtures I tend to only remember our games against Liverpool, Arsenal, Leicester, Newcastle etc, I forget about Burnley, Hammers, Leeds and Saints games 😂. This generally ends up with me seeing us qualifying for the Champions League.
Jacob Ramsey has signed a new four and a half year contract to tie him to Villa till 2025. Well done everyone at Villa, this is great news and Congrats Jacob!!
Your leader was a very enjoyable read Begley
well done sir.
I’ve Just updated prediction sheet for next round of fixtures.
Thank you!
As far as additions in the summer I’m not sure we need to tinker too much, becoming harder to sign upgrades, a good sign in my view.
All the core starters are performing and maybe more importantly, all improving. Coupled with the stable back 5, (Hause to come back), clean sheets every other week, it will be hard to improve the 1st 11, barr of course signing the Fodens & Lampteys of the league (unlikely & expensive).
I might change my view slightly on this if we don’t achieve a bit more consistantly now we’re back to playing once a week, but I think this will happen.
Upgrading the back up and strengthening the bench more likely.
Need a LB, RB if Guilbert doesn’t replace Elmo (unlikely as he can’t cross), CB possibly a speedier ball player to replace Engles & AM with energy if we don’t sign Barkley. If Wesley returns to the form he was in just before the injury we won’t need a striker either unless Davis goes on loan.
I agree that it is a good sign that we do not have to do too much in the summer but I think there is a fair bit of work to be done. A lot will depend on strategy though and there is the off chance that we may be competing in Europe which would stretch the strength in depth of our squad. We have spent a lot of money over the last couple of years and we will need to be conscious of FFP and may need to take a break from spending to allow ourselves to catch up. The club may also want to try and consolidate a third year in the PL with another top-half finish with the majority of the existing squad. The more I think about it the more I think that next year should be a year to take a breath, consolidate and not make the push for Europe. If we do this we would be in a stronger position the following year.
If we do go on a little spending spree in the summer my wish list would be:
GK: Happy
RB: Elmo leave, Fred come back as backup to Cash or sell Fred and buy a LB
CB: Happy with what we have. I would like to see Engels get some game time
LB: Taylor to leave and a new LB to back up Targett
DM: Very Happy (Luiz, Nakamba and Sanson)
Wing: Sell both Trez & ElGhazi and replace with a good 1st team player. Promote an u23 to first team squad
AM: Buy Barkley, although I have some concerns with Barkley all of Watkins goals have come when Barkley has played. Sell CH to Swans and buy another AM to backup Barkley
ST: Davis must go out on loan. Promote an u23 to 1st team squad and have a fit Wes and Watkins
So not too much tinkering from my perspective. Only about 120m & 5 new players and a couple of promoted u23s 😂
I think were essentially agreeing here, I do like Guilbert but his crossing ability is no where near that of Cash, great defender though. As far as Trezeguet & El Ghazi they may not be world class, but assuming Traore is the first choice, at least both are prepared to be part of the squad and wait for an opportunity. Can’t help thinking who else would come to do the same and sit on the bench for large parts of the season, could do a lot worse then them two.
I would sell both and replace with one. Saint-Maximin, he and Traore battle it out for who starts. It would help with cover for Jack too. Saint-Maximin would be a huge improvement to our 1st team.
Saint-Maximin really ? he reminds me of Adama Traore, great speed & fair bit of skill but the footballing intelligence of a barn door 😆
I think you are wrong about him. Looks a very good player to me, and definately in a different class to Adama Traore.
Lol 120 mil !
Haaland and Lamptey it is then 😎
The transfer window when we were promoted there was obviously a lot of talk about transfers. We were heavily linked with a bid for Kalvin Philips and it was suggested by quite a few that we should have bought him rather than spending the same 25m on buying both Luiz and Nakamba. I think we made the right decision. I prefer Luiz to Philips and we also have Nakamba who is now proving his worth.
There was also talk that we should have spent the Konsa money on paying Cahill’s sign on fee and 100k+ a week salary. Again, the decision makers at Villa showing they made the right call
Cahill’s best days are well behind him, we don’t need any more dinosaur players or managers. They are a short term fix at best and thankfully those days are long gone for us.
Bale might be available on a loan deal next season. We could probably get him if we agree to about 400k a week and a few million sign of fee. He could teach Watkins a thing or two about work rate and explain to him how he is running far too much during each game 😂😂
Leeds 2-0 up.
The way they are playing I would not be surprised if they extend that lead. That said, 2-0 to Leeds would be very nice for my predictor league
Leeds now 2-0 up and Bamford scores. I still cant see him as a proper striker 😂😂😂
Leeds v Palace is all one way traffic in Leeds favour. I would like a draw in this game
Good write up begley, can’t really argue with much off it
Thx BFR
another great read above from Begley.
and i got another mention as well.MR 4-4-2 LOL.
reading across the blogs,it seems many still think we need another target man in case Watkins gets injured.
i think that Traore could play that role if needed.hes not bad in the air and can pull defenders around just like watkins.
any thoughts on that lads.
We do need another striker, I think the club made the decision not to get one as we can play Traore if Watkins is injured and we do have Davis. This is very mush not an ideal situation but given the amount of points we have already it was not a huge risk. With FFP we need to be careful how we spend our cash and when we spend it. We also have Wes coming back and we will want to see how he performs too.
An interesting point on Watkins is that in his entire professional career, and he is 25, he has never ever missed a game through injury. I am not saying we should bank on this continuing but it is nice to have one of those very fit players. We have had so many sick notes over the years we deserve a break 😀
Thx JCV