Ratings & Reactions: Leicester v Villa

[romavillan]

6 minutes ago, TRO said:

The problem for me Sheepy, is it shouldn’t be that nervy.

some of our football was predictably laboured and untidy.

I'll bet my wife that today's game will not be the last scrappy, physical game that Leicester play this season.

[allani]

7 minutes ago, TRO said:

The problem for me Sheepy, is it shouldn’t be that nervy.

some of our football was predictably laboured and untidy.

Some of it was silky smooth too.

[TDR V2]

It was scrappy sure but we won, 6 points from two tricky away games is good.

We have a lot of balancing to do this season with the champions league, so I think we will see plenty more scrappy games.

United used to do it all the time under Fergie.

No panic

[StefanAVFC]

5 minutes ago, TRO said:

I thought we was supposed to be a possession based team?

We haven’t been a possession based team under Emery, ever 

[StefanAVFC]

Spurs drew there. They’re our rivals and we’re already 2 points up there. We won’t blow teams away every game, sometimes you’ve got to scrap, which we did. Excellent 3 points. 

[Pez1974]

Positives:

• A win and 3 points
• Duran is a goal scorer, and is improving rapidly
• Tielemans is the Luiz replacement (I've said this loads of times this summer); MOTM
• Ramsey is getting back to his best
• Onana is a beast - and a very well rounded player
• Exactly the sort of game for 30 mins of Barkley - an asute signing on today's evidence, allowing us to rotate players
• McPhee has been busy this summer
• Bogarde got some game time - this will stand him in good stead
• The players really can play to a plan - look at the average positions first half; they clearly supported Bogarde to settle in
• We've a few out injured - and the bench still looks very good and the subs made a huge difference

[Leeroy]

2 minutes ago, allani said:

Away from home and to be fair we let Leicester dick around with the ball in the middle of their own half for long spells because we were in the lead and they were creating nothing.  Let them have the ball and do nothing with it.  It's not a problem.

But if we had the ball and made them chase it we would be more in control of the game. A better team than Leicester will be more ruthless in that situation at 2-1 and it will cost us. I thought Unai liked keeping the ball tbh.

[TRO]

11 minutes ago, sheepyvillian said:

The only time "Clean Sheets" are a real problem, is when you lose. It's never easy keeping goals out in this league, especially when you focus more on being offensive. Hopefully, those costly errors will iron themselves out over the season.

Clean sheets are hard to come by, but they are a hallmark of a very good side….reason why the top 3 teams are markedly better at keeping them, despite claiming the best offensive stats too.

We need to pick up players better in our area, and keep closer contact….it’s all about defending better.

We kept out the 2 best teams last season at home, so we can do it.

We have games where we are just not focused enough mentally, and don’ t close down with assertion….much of it, is being committed to the challenge, and not ball watching.

Clean sheets for me is a barometer, to so much in the status of a team.

Edited August 31 by TRO

[romavillan]

flashes of very good football, mostly good football, some too long spells of looking disjointed and making basic mistakes. we will get better and we're already good. 2 points a game from the first three. so we're on track. Watkins will come good, he had some off days last season too, he'll find is scoring boots soon enough. Bailey injury is concerning, hope that's not serious but I thought JJ and Rogers showed signs of what could become a beautiful thing for us.

[Herman22]

I’ve just seen on my Fantasy Football that the assist for the first goal has gone to Watkins. That’s a shocker! 

[Pez1974]

Just now, Herman22 said:

I’ve just seen on my Fantasy Football that the assist for the first goal has gone to Watkins. That’s a shocker! 

Shhhh 

[imavillan]

a hard fought victory but deserved…we had a lot more quality than them

I think a few teams will go there this season and find it hard work as Leicester will do what they do, work hard and disrupt teams

 

[bannedfromHandV]

Certainly not a classic, we only really controlled the game in small phases I thought, for 15-20 mins in the second half the entire team just seemed to have a collective brain fade, everyone was struggling to make simple passes and control the ball properly.

Bogarde struggled as the game went on, perhaps to be expected but definitely would have liked to see a little more, the aforementioned second half woes seemed to begin with him wasting the ball when in a good position near their box.

Rogers got progressively worse too, surprisingly, Watkins’ woes in front of goal continue, should again have come away with a goal. Hoping Bailey and Onana injuries nothing too serious and thankfully an international break coming up to allow time for recovery.

Great start though, two away wins and both fixtures we’ve tended to struggle in historically.

[Mantis]

7 minutes ago, StefanAVFC said:

Spurs drew there. They’re our rivals and we’re already 2 points up there. We won’t blow teams away every game, sometimes you’ve got to scrap, which we did. Excellent 3 points. 

Yes. The key thing is that under Emery, we very often win scrappy games like this. Before him we usually lost them.

[TRO]

12 minutes ago, sheepyvillian said:

Possession for possession sake, means absolutely nothing. 

That’s true.

but it also follows without the ball, you can’t hurt anybody.

[Marka Ragnos]

39 minutes ago, TRO said:

I still get nervous watching us.

I hear you, but how many successful high-line, "juego de posición"-style clubs anywhere can boast keeping their fans comfortable in the seats for 90 minutes? We need time to keep practising together. I think we need to be patient and buckle in.

It's the nature of the beast when the opposition brings the press on and we're playing out of the back and then suddenly foisting a series of decisional crises upon the opposition because we attack them with so many channels at once --- with fast-passing triangles and rhomboids basically making our opposition crazy and sometimes foul-prone.

Both Pau and Martinez had some moments of glassy imperturbability you may have enjoyed, but with Martinez at least, it borderlined irresponsible. I think it's hard to have our cake and eat it, too: We play high out of the back but much faster this year, and the cost is going to be sloppy fatigue; but if we slow it down, we give the opposition defense chances to reorganise.

This is a more physical, fitness- and clinical-skills oriented approach from Emery -- and played briskly. I think he's aware of how when we slow things down too much, we tend also to stop creating the chances. But again, this approach inspires pushback, a la Newton's Third Law, etc., and that can make us look awkward until we get more practice.

Edited August 31 by Marka Ragnos

[Villa87]

Take the three points and move on. Hopefully Bailey and Onana are good in two weeks time. 

[Zero7]

22 minutes ago, TRO said:

The problem for me Sheepy, is it shouldn’t be that nervy.

some of our football was predictably laboured and untidy.

I just think it’s going to take us 5-6 to really get going, we have changed our approach a bit and will take a little bit of time to settle. I’m super confident this season 

[smg]

12 minutes ago, Pez1974 said:

Positives:

• A win and 3 points
• Duran is a goal scorer, and is improving rapidly
• Tielemans is the Luiz replacement (I've said this loads of times this summer); MOTM
• Ramsey is getting back to his best
• Onana is a beast - and a very well rounded player
• Exactly the sort of game for 30 mins of Barkley - an asute signing on today's evidence, allowing us to rotate players
• McPhee has been busy this summer
• Bogarde got some game time - this will stand him in good stead
• The players really can play to a plan - look at the average positions first half; they clearly supported Bogarde to settle in
• We've a few out injured - and the bench still looks very good and the subs made a huge difference

Nice to see a positive comment about Bogarde others would have done a positive list and then Negative 

Bogarde not good enough.

[Steero113]

Cooper has actually come out and publicly criticized the Tielemans challenge decision at the end saying it was a stonewall pen for Vardy. 

This guy's a PL manager!