Thoughts On The Aston Villa v Arsenal Match

Aston Villa v Arsenal was a frustrating game. In general, the performance was good enough to get at least a point, if not all three. But we weren’t good enough when it counted.

I haven’t watched Villa this season a lot, but i thought they weren’t amazing by any means. I suspect their game against Manchester City was still affecting them and that shouldn’t be any wonder really. We had a taxing game as well, but also got an extra day to prepare.

Our defending for their goal was not good. Good work from Bailey initially, but that cutback should never have reached McGinn given the amount of our players in the box. It really was the only dangerous pass available to Bailey and we let him execute it.

After that, we did manage to create the chances to turn this game around. Odegaard had two great ones, but his finishing was off. Credit to Martinez for the first one, he anticipated Ode’s shot well to make it look easy. I just think, given Odegaard’s ability and composure on his day, he would put that into the top corner to remove any chance of the goalkeeper saving it. Then there’s the other chance later on, which he puts wide.

I don’t mean to blame Odegaard though, because this can happen to anyone. I’m not worried either given that he has recently scored two absolutely sublime goals. I’m just frustrated because i know that in 90% of the time he would put at least one of those two chances away.

Then there’s the disallowed Havertz goal. To me, that’s just bad luck. The handball rule regarding goal scoring action seems a bit rubbish to me, but it’s the same for everyone and this time it worked against us.

To me, this is an interesting title race because at the moment we have several teams within the chance of winning it and all of them have a flaw of some kind. Our attack hasn’t quite clicked as it did last season. City lose all of their games without Rodri. Liverpool are probably a little bit of a work in progress still. Villa are dropping too many points away from home. The one who manages to improve (the most) will win it.

In terms of our flaws, i’m optimistic we will improve. We have been in the process of replacing Xhaka and it has taken some time. Havertz is the replacement, but he is not a like for like fit, so the players around him have needed time to adjust as well, mostly Odegaard. But now, at least to my eye, the team looks to be functioning better and roles do look a bit more defined. Havertz’s growing confidence should help as well.

I’m confident…