Liverpool v Aston Villa Match Thread - Sat 10 April @ 3pm - Sky | Page 31 | Vital Football

Liverpool v Aston Villa Match Thread - Sat 10 April @ 3pm - Sky

Just watching MOTD, if only Mings had moved his body towards the line of the ball - you never know. It was coming at pace but he does move the other way slightly. Could’ve simply deflected into the goal anyway, could’ve just knocked it off line and onto the bar or towards Martinez. That’s where you create your own luck.

6’5, a body built of rock, and you move away from the ball :downer:
 
We simply cannot keep starting matches with 4/5 players who we KNOW will be poor. El Ghazi, Luiz, Traore, Trez fail in 4 out of every 5 games. McGinn not much better. This creates too much pressure at the back and the cracks are showing now, with more defensive errors. Midfield and wings needs a major revamp
 
danvilla2 said:
Just watching MOTD, if only Mings had moved his body towards the line of the ball - you never know. It was coming at pace but he does move the other way slightly. Could’ve simply deflected into the goal anyway, could’ve just knocked it off line and onto the bar or towards Martinez. That’s where you create your own luck.

6’5, a body built of rock, and you move away from the ball :downer:
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I'm glad you said that. I wouldn't blame him for that goal any more than I'd blame Barkley fucking about and losing it 80 yards away, it was coming anyway as we were allowing wave after wave of attacks and have been for some time.
We seem to want to get into a basketball game every week but we have fuck all to hurt anyone with.
They must quake in their boots at Bert and Trez and the lonely figure of Ollie, backed up by the prolific SJM, no wonder the ball keeps coming straight back
 
I just don’t understand what Dean, Craig and co do with the team in training. If you keep playing the same way you’ll keep getting the same results. This feeling must spread to the players. Thank goodness we’ve got Martinez in goal or the results would be even worse.
 
Villan57 said:
Above all else, we need to develop a winning mentality, the players are doing what some fans have done ie we've stayed up we have more points than last season etc etc.
I personally don't give a fuck where we were last season, I'm more concerned with where we could have been this season had we had the right attitude.
The players have regressed to plucky losers much to the delight of Carra and Co
The manager and players need to sit down and get back to clean sheets, far too many chances were given to Liverpool yesterday, I and suspect many others were waiting for the inevitable collapse,
1-0 up at HT the luck was with us, they were there for the taking. Where was the urgency of the last few games of last season, it wasn't there was it?
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Which is what I said in the Smith thread yesterday. It’s expectations.If we had got where we are now by being a bit scratchy instead of the night and day season we have had then I suspect more would be accepting of our current form and league position . As it is we have been floating around above expected league position for some time now and been higher so expectation is now we should be doing better and it’s looking like an opportunity missed.

However, many (like me) are not surprised because I said since the start of the season that the market we are shopping in will not take us top 8 , maybe not even top 10 . So I guess we are now going in the direction and levelling off where we should be buying players we are buying and keeping some (Anwar, Trez) that really are top end championship players in my humble . My hope is that this is the ‘journey’ (copyright X factor) we are on and the stabilising we now have in this league is the springboard to really making some eye catching and proven signings.

The biggest issue for me is that we are soooooo fcuking boring to watch again. In terms of last season we are bang on playing how we were before lockdown 1. And that’s down to Deano. He needs to come up with something different otherwise without SJ ( a whole other argument and cluster) we are sleep walking to the season end. Again, yesterday was a mystery as to what we were trying to achieve. If that was a counter attacking plan then it was appallingly executed. And in truth that is down to the extremely poor wingers and lack of creativity in front of the back 4. Felt so sorry for Ollie yesterday. Hung out to dry in front of Southgate . Sort it out Deano.
 
Villan57 said:
I'm glad you said that. I wouldn't blame him for that goal any more than I'd blame Barkley fucking about and losing it 80 yards away, it was coming anyway as we were allowing wave after wave of attacks and have been for some time.
We seem to want to get into a basketball game every week but we have fuck all to hurt anyone with.
They must quake in their boots at Bert and Trez and the lonely figure of Ollie, backed up by the prolific SJM, no wonder the ball keeps coming straight back
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For balance on the wining goal, Barkley should be doing something but he’s marking fresh air 20 yards up the pitch and Ramsey is too slow to close the shot and space down.
 
I think there will be some pretty substantial changes to the team. New wingers and central midfielders. It will be very different next season IMO.
 
Villan57 said:
My biggest worry is just as we carried last seasons end into the start of this season, we will do the same again, where losing is just an accepted sort of thing.
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I think there is maybe an element that they are are mentally on the beach, or shot. Whatever way we look at it the fight for survival after lockdown 1 and then going straight into this season and then really giving it the full bollox to survival ( we do need to bear in mind how quickly we got to that safety mark) is not too shabby given where we were.
Then we had the covid outbreak and interruption which didn’t help at all.

But that doesn’t really excuse lack of effort and poor control and passing from supposed elite footballers.
 
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danvilla2 said:
For balance on the wining goal, Barkley should be doing something but he’s marking fresh air 20 yards up the pitch and Ramsey is too slow to close the shot and space down.
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I agree mate but the whole set up isn't working, the two goals were always going to happen.
Martinez aside nobody had a good game, they gave the ball away time after time, I'm sure the opposition press deliberately forces the ball to Mings knowing he has a fuck up in him or eventually he will launch it left channel and off we go again.
We can't play through the middle, actually we never even try, everything goes out wide or long.
It's a mess
 
Melon Donkey said:
But that doesn’t really excuse lack of effort and poor control and passing from supposed elite footballers.
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If only we had Booby Firmino, he trapped a football with nobody within 20 yards of him and got some freak wow out of Carra.

Seriously Trez starting says it all, he shouldn't even be making the squad, shuffling a pack with 3 jokers in isn't going to work.
I just despaired when I saw that starting line up because deep down every single one of us could see how the game would pan out before a ball was kicked.
I like Dean but he doesn't seem to see what we see and if he doesn't come up with something he will lose his job.
He has enough advisers or probably too many
 
Villan57 said:
I'm still adamant that if Dean is trying to copy Klopp we don't need wingers.
Nobody will convince me Salah Mane or Jota is a winger they are goal machines not suppliers of crosses
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I actually doubt Smith has a massive say in signings, given the resources we have put into the recruitment team. It will be interesting to see who comes in and what Smith does with them.

One things for sure is that Smith will be under a lot more pressure next season.
 
Pangloss said:
One things for sure is that Smith will be under a lot more pressure next season.
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perhaps that's the plan, finish higher than last season but not top 10 then he can say look we've made progress but I think he's a victim of his early-season success and the owners will be thinking as we do or like I do rather, it was there for the taking and we didn't take it.

We under performed last season and we are slipping back to that gain now
 
Just buying more wingers isn’t the answer yet that’s probably what will happen. We play like a bunch of individuals, miles apart, trying to get on the end of long hopeful punts up the pitch. One of the worst possession/passing sides in the league. We’ve gone from being one of the best teams to watch to one of the worst. And that’s what we’re taking into next season and why some of us are worried. Dean’s had a relegation fear-free season to develop a style that can perform with or without Jack and this is where we are. We even bolstered in January when others couldn’t. Those early matches no longer matter because they cannot be recreated. We have to try something else but the cupboard is bare.
 
Villan57 said:
I agree mate but the whole set up isn't working, the two goals were always going to happen.
Martinez aside nobody had a good game, they gave the ball away time after time, I'm sure the opposition press deliberately forces the ball to Mings knowing he has a fuck up in him or eventually he will launch it left channel and off we go again.
We can't play through the middle, actually we never even try, everything goes out wide or long.
It's a mess
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As Luiz was getting a few pelters recently I watched him quite closely yesterday to see if I was drastically wrong in defending him.

He had a decent game tbh. Pick of the midfield, possibly best of our 11. Of course not near the high standards he has set. But looked like he was getting some form back.
And of course , he was prepared to battle on when the bench were saying come off which is the sort of character I want in a villa side.
 
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danvilla2 said:
For balance on the wining goal, Barkley should be doing something but he’s marking fresh air 20 yards up the pitch and Ramsey is too slow to close the shot and space down.
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Wasn't just Ross either I was screaming to get Bert off such was his lack of tracking back. I was actually mid post saying how we were getting done down our right side when we ....got done down our right side for the first goal.
:arrghh:.

Deano needs to tear a few players a new one. Or even better start dropping a few of them. Bert is top if that list. Try something different. I mean is Cash in front of Elmo on the right really going to be worse than Bert , trez or el ghazi ?. Would certainly solidify that right side .
 
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Melon Donkey said:
As Luiz was getting a few pelters recently I watched him quite closely yesterday to see if I was drastically wrong in defending him.

He had a decent game tbh. Pick of the midfield, possibly best of our 11. Of course not near the high standards he has set. But looked like he was getting some form back.
And of course , he was prepared to battle on when the bench were saying come off which is the sort of character I want in a villa side.
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Dougie isn't the problem he one of the few good enough to take us forwards, along with Martinez Jack, Konsa possibly Cash Watkins, kids I have no idea but this team will be unrecognisable in two years time or we will become Brighton or palace
 
Wicked Messenger said:
I just don’t understand what Dean, Craig and co do with the team in training. If you keep playing the same way you’ll keep getting the same results. This feeling must spread to the players. Thank goodness we’ve got Martinez in goal or the results would be even worse.
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Yes thinking about it without Emi we'd be down with the dead men 14 clean sheets and we are still getting beat in nearly 50% of the games
 
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