The difficulties of rebuilding on the fly have been on display in Villa’s summer trip to America with the side losing two in a row and shipping six. Should we be worried?

First off, most everyone will say it’s meaningless and that the games are just to get minutes in the legs. While both are somewhat true, you actually do want to play ‘well’ in context. And Villa haven’t really so far in America. Emery has emphasized that the games are are about drilling the system, and what we’ve seen are combinations of a number of players not very familiar with each other, never mind how they’re supposed to operate in relation to each other.

Standard stuff, given the turnover, even if it hasn’t been fun to watch. There’ve been moments of fluidity and some good balls, but the timing and end product haven’t been there. Leipzig looked miles ahead of Villa in terms of cohesion and pressure. And pressure is what really exposes a lack of familiarity. Playing out involves a lot of repetition, patterns, and decisions. If you’re just a little off, it can look pretty bad. The FBs have to know the CB’s preferences and strengths and vice versa. The midfielders naturally, it’s the same thing: when do they come, when do they drag players away, who is it that comes and why. And the scenarios differ depending on the play before, meaning who’s available and where are they? If I rush in to challenge, have I just left a big gap?

So that’s a lot of what we’re seeing. Naturally that breeds some hesitancy and confusion. Makes it harder to connect and keep the ball. Makes for turnovers that set up moves. Again, all standard stuff, but this is where the bulk of the emphasis lies in analysis and coaching. In short, doesn’t say a whole lot about the players themselves at the moment. With a number of players just making their returns and some still out, we’ve seen some interesting combinations.

Probably the biggest concern I’m seeing is about the defending. First we have CBs and the depth there, then the usual FB debates, and finally who’s playing in front of them. We aren’t deep at CB, currently, and it shows. Konsa and Torres reuniting will help. Remains to be seen how the 6-8 combo will settle until Kamara’s return. Emery looked at Onana and Barkley together there Wednesday night, and while Barkley had a hard time getting free and involved, Onana was a beneficiary and looked good. He’ll obviously be important. I’ve seen good signs from Nedeljkovic, while I haven’t seen enough from Maatsen to really say much. Of all the new faces, I’d say Iling-Jr seems to be struggling the most. But he’s only 20.

And of course Carlos going and getting himself sent off totally undermined the second half of the Leipzig outing. Villa ended up drilling being a man down and not much else. The goals were poor, Barkley may well have been fouled. Teams are going to keep trying to launch it over and through the high line. With no VAR, and precious few replays, it can be hard to tell exactly what’s happened.

The other big concern, of course, is the perennial “what would we do without Ollie?”

The other thing I’m seeing, and maybe I’m just imagining it, is that I think the players want to get through the summer unscathed. With Buendia and Ramsey finally getting back out there, Mings about to resume full training, and Kamara still out for a while, I’m guessing the grind ahead is in more than one mind as is the prospect of injury and not overdoing things.

Anyway, no big insights…everyone’s seeing pretty much the same things. I’m assuming we’ll see a starting XI coalesce as we progress through Club America, Bilbao, and Dortmund, and initially it might not look that different than what we’d have seen at the end of last season (minus Luiz). Right now, I’m betting Onana is in there, but I’m sure we’ll still see match-to-match variations and a fair amount of rotation.

Over to you.

Comments 82

  1. Yep, I too have not been overly impressed with what I’ve seen so far. Part of me says there’s many new players that need to integrate into Unai’s system. Kosta for instance only speaks Serbian, makes getting the info into him more difficult. But part of me also remains sceptical.

    As already mentioned and it’s my main concern too, centres around our defence. Or lack of it. We play a high line which does need a greyhound in the line to cover the break in behind. Where’s the pace? Can only say Kosta looks pretty quick. Others? Don’t see a lot.

    It seemed very innocuous when Ramsey got injured last summer on U-21 duty but it effectively wrote off his season. And he’s behind his team mates in fitness right now. His foot injury was obviously more serious than we were told so I hope the club received adequate compensation from England for it.

    We are going to need to see significant improvements in the remaining games if we’re going to be ready for the Hammers. Time is getting short.

  2. Plug,

    Like I say, not sure our opening XI will be much different. Ollie, Bailey, Ramsey/Rogers, McGinn, Tielemans, Cash, Konsa, Torres, Digne/Moreno, Martinez. Throw in Onana, that’s a lot of continuity.

    They don’t all have to click immediately, and I’m getting the sense Emery really wants to see them all and give them as much time as possible out there before doing his usual ‘bring them along slowly’.

  3. Also think we may see Barrenechea work himself in relatively quickly.

    Don’t know much about Iling-Jr, but have seen that he’s a good wingback. Given we have three LBs, not sure I see that being his role, but interesting.

  4. West ‘Aaamm have agreed a fee of £27m with Dortmund for Fullkrug. Guess that leaves Big Jhon with egg on his face. Any reasonable advisor would tell him to rejoin his employers immediately, get his head down and do the hard work with his ears wide open to what his coach says. We might then see a top striker bloom.

  5. It might also end the speculation of us signing a new striker. But if there’s any truth in the rumour that Fulham are sniffing after Carlos, then we’ll need a replacement CB.

  6. So the American pre season ends. Played 3 lost 3. One goal scored, 7 goals shipped. Not good by any standards, but the losses got smaller as the tour progressed so maybe the fitness aims were met.

    But where are the goals coming from? And our defence could be stronger. Some big players returning next week and that hopefully will make a difference. COYVB.

  7. Plug…seems the Duran saga isn’t quite over yet. I guess all I can take from it is that Villa think he will go on and do things, so they’re not budging from a high valuation. But it’s really become tiresome, almost as much as the annual Felix to Villa dance.

    Not sure who’s out there, but if we get a decent fee for Carlos, I’d think we might be able to do better. For one, a little more height/aerial prowess. He’s not bad, but there are plenty of better CBs out there.

  8. Things did get better, Plug. I will say that physically, these are hard matches. The heat and humidity are really pretty brutal where they’ve been playing. I saw the Fulham game in last year’s tour (outside DC), and it was an absolute oven in the stadium. So for the fitness crowd, it is a lot of good minutes under the belt.

    Like I say, I’m guessing our opening day XI probably won’t be dramatically different from where we finished last season. So all of the effects of these combinations and wholesale changes won’t be nearly so apparent (I hope).

    I think once we settle back into that familiar group it’ll look better, then players get to come in within the more established structure. I’d guess Onana would be the one I see joining the XI because of Luiz and Kamara. Maybe Ross. But I can see Emery leaning on SJM, Ramsey/Rogers/Tielemans for a bit and easing Barkley, Barrenechea, Buendia, Iling-Jr, Maatsen, Nedeljkovic et al into things. Seems to be his way.

  9. When it comes to goals, I think the familiar patterns and positions will see more chances created.
    One thing that does have me a little puzzled is what happens to the Diaby-Bailey rotation.

    Agree that Pau and Konsa (flanked by Digne/Moreno, Cash) makes me a bit nervous. We have to cut down on goals against. Assume Onana will help here, and obvs Kamara coming back.

    One hopes Ty can still make an impact. We obviously miss his speed, physicality and aerial superiority. Not as silky on the ball as Pau, but overall the old Ty brought a little more to the table in terms of pure defensive strength, imo.

  10. America over and done with,more of a shirt selling act than training
    The main men plus Duran are back now,a bit of wheeling and dealing to do yet our squad is bloated
    Can see mainly usual suspects
    Martinez cash konsa pau matasen onana mcginn tielmens Rogers Watkins and Bailey starting, with ramsay beundi Carlos digne barclay barracheda jadenilling junior and Duran if he stays main replacements
    Mings is a worry ,how long before he is ready,is bogarde ready to step up
    Outgoings whether loan loan or permanent dendonker dobbin archer hause and plenty of youth

  11. Just watching end Olympics football semi final,var absolute shambles Egypt defender hands above his head ,big lad too ball hits his hand and after an age no penalty

  12. Another friendly played we won,not impressed with refs (what’s new),players
    Bogarde looks more than decent, up to all changes we looked reasonable without a striker ,ramsay is looking good, I am going to call Serbian lad NED,he is rapid should got a penalty, jaden scored a good goal,it took good save to deny illing junior,overall good run out,just a couple faults beundi didn’t get going either did cash

  13. Transfer rumours still going mad,
    It’s hard to believe when we signed tielmens matasen and onana they were just announced, no journalists having scoop
    If Duran stays which I hope he does I would be happy enough yes felix would be a major statement, but we tried it with coutinho and it didn’t work,but then I remembered merson and carbone ,2 on there day world beaters
    defence is still a mystery when is mings back,whats happening with carlos,is bogarde good enough what are we doing with 3 left backs,donks hause etc

  14. James, I too hope Big Jhon stays. He gives us options up front. He knows where the goal is. He’s a big unit to shift off the ball. But he does need his head feeling. Sort that problem and he could be immense for us. The pointers appear to suggest he’s staying.

    If Carlos is released, we need a replacement for him. It would be unfair to rely on Bogarde since we still don’t know for sure how Tyro will look on his return. Hopefully the same as before. And yep, Donks, House and maybe Moreno will be released if possible.

  15. Another friendly defeat, don’t really know what to take from preseason, we have played without a centre forward
    New players young NED looks decent, onana will take few weeks to get up to speed with what emery wants,rest of them it’s hard to tell
    More rumours on Carlos to fulham this morning, if he goes we definitely need a replacement, and then felix still rumours sooner deadline passes the better, roll on Saturday evening and hammers

  16. Every day for past couple of weeks or so we’ve had a photo of Felix as the lead story. FFS local rag, he ain’t coming. Vidagany explains the reasons why.

    https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/transfer-news/damian-vidagany-slams-situation-killing-29735795#comments-wrapper

    Squad cost ratio in Europe (SCR) and Profit and sustainability rules (PSR) in EPL are different but have to be complied with. They are causing complex problems. It’s one big mess. Piss ups and breweries come to mind.

  17. Plug
    Some cock up,only good thing unlike Lerner and the Chinese quack we have great people in charge all round club,we could have been another Everton under purslow and slippy
    Thank god it all starts back this weekend and then a fortnight later champions league draw is going to be made in which we are certain to get a German Italian and Spanish side in our group

  18. James, yep, it’s about to kick off again. Where will we finish at season’s end? How far will we get in the Champions League? What will be the score on Saturday evening? So many questions.

    What I do believe is we should be targeting 5th place. With the extra Champions League places claimed by Germany and Italy, the extra team for each of those countries should in turn weaken their UEFA coefficients in the same way it did to us last season. Hence Spain and England must surely be favourites to claim the extra CL spots for next season. Time will tell. Roll on Sat evening.

  19. Plug
    Where will we finish,
    Arsenal and City aren’t weaker or better than last season
    Pool without klopp ,new manager nor new signings they are definitely weaker
    Us missing Luis diaby but added onana and matasen and return of ramsay beundi and hopefully shortly mings think we should be OK
    Spurs stronger with solanke but also have European football, which won’t suit their style so again weaker
    Chelsea shambles again,another new manager system and Enzo fiasco so would say weaker
    Man utd or ajax reserves, manager out of his depth to many individuals, but anything can happen
    Newcastle, no Europe players returned from injuries so would say ,good outside bet for top 5
    Hammers new manager new players not sure
    So bar Newcastle think we should get top 5

  20. Sky Sports have got an offer (expires Monday 19 August) of £19.99 for 12 months. Did a quick check and I can see at least 33 Villa league games on the list. I hate Sky with a vengeance for what they have done to football.

    Can I still be a real man if I give up the skillful manipulation of FREE pirate streams and give the DEVIL his £19.99 a month for an easy life and an uninterupted full HD stream. Is it time to pause the pirate life and see how the easy life feels?

  21. Oh 656……..sell your soul to the devil. Football did many years ago. If you can’t beat them, join them. You will have the added bonus of being able to listen to the drivel spouted by their “experts” assessments of the games. Gerald Ratner’s “total crap” has nothing on these bone heads.

    On a separate issue, best wishes to Cam Archer after his £15 million move to the Saints. This is another one of Monchi’s manoeuvres working our way legally around PSR regs.

  22. The penalty decision stank. Cash kicks the ball and that’s a penalty now. Other end, they can kick our man in area for fun. The ref is so poor. A complete homer. The home team are leaving their boots in every time and getting away with it.

    Nice start for Onana though,

  23. Watching in a Dublin pub where I reckon we’re the only ones interested in the football, but at least the beer is good.
    Hope it’s not one of those where we end up regretting missed chances, but on the positive side, we ‘have’ created chances and have looked sharp and cohesive for much of the game so far.

  24. Thought Tielemans was doing a very good Dougie type job till we went off in the last 15 minutes. Very noticeable that we don’t look like a team of tiny tots alongside the spam giants. Liking Rogers more and more – think he could replace Ollie in the not too distant future. Ollie looking blunt, time for the written script to play out i.e. Duran comes on and duffs spam over for not forking out the price for him and making him make a tit of himself.

  25. Jbd. . . Nothing I’d like more than for Duran to come on and score. Emery has been going out of his way to talk him up, but emphasising that kids say silly things sometimes. Would be great to see Emery turn him into the player (and person) he ‘could’ be

  26. What happened to the ‘can’t stop during your penalty run up’ rule?
    . . . . and don’t tell me that silly little running on the spot steps count.

  27. Wish we had Kudus
    Cash coming in for some stick, but he’s done OK this half. . . He’s up against a very very good player though

  28. BIG JHON has made my weekend. Top marks Monchi. It makes such a difference having strength on the bench. The win was well deserved.

  29. Onana had a great game. In charge for the 90 minutes. Things are looking very promising indeed. My word, this bottle of red tastes good. I’ll need to open another one.

  30. The winner….Pau forward, Maatsen first times it to Ramsey who fed a beauty to Big Jhon. Who then reminded Sullivan and Brady how tight they are. Get in. I’m delighted.

  31. Quite pleased, overall. Tough opening fixture on the road and really should’ve been out of sight in the first if Bailey and McGinn convert. Nice periods of sustained control.

    Onana, yeah, huge impact, and I like Rogers in the Diaby spot. I can see now that was probably the plan all along instead of him and Ramsey fighting for the left-side spot. Every bit as much impact as Diaby, but also bigger and stronger, great ball carrier.

    The play for the second was really easy on the eye. All one-touch, very good move.

  32. That feels really good,
    Emery unbelievable
    No criticism of any player ,some look rusty but that’s natural
    Tielmens superb for me linked defence and attack
    As for subs my god we have one he’ll of a squad

  33. Just realised, I can’t remember us catching spam offside. Are we moving on from over reliance on the offside trap? Think the other teams were getting wise to it at the end of last season.

    Obviously it was an excellent start to the season and we looked mostly impressive. Mustn’t get carried away though. We are clearly top six material but we definately won’t finish top – WILL WE!!!!

  34. JG, agree about Tielemans. Was surprised he wasn’t given a break but he did play very well and i guess it was seen as being important to keep some experience in the middle of the park with other substitutions being made

  35. It won’t be long til Dougie is a memory. Did he want to go? Or was his best before date was looming money wise? I think he had reached his limit as far as improvement goes. No doubt he would have been a main cog this year but replacements and younger mid fielders with more upside will give Villa a better mid field. Did anyone want Duran gone? He’s Watkins future replacement and I’ve a sneaky feeling that will come sooner than later.
    The team’s style of play looked different than last year. It seemed they used much more of the pitch than before and retook possession further up the field. I’m looking forward to Arsenal next week.

    .r0bb0, did your brother go see the whitecaps play Wrexham?

  36. Hi Ian, I’m one of 4 sons, and we became progressively less sporty. . . my youngest brother (the one in Vancouver), shows no interest in sport whatsoever, so if it turns out he went to watch a football match, i’ll give up today’s visit to the Guinness experience!

  37. Anyone else slightly nervous that we’re getting a bit carried away after one game? After all, a year ago, we lost our first game 5-1, and ended up in the Champion’s league!
    We genuinely did look good yesterday and do seem to have a stronger bench, but is it just my superstitious nature that is holding me back from getting too excited?

  38. I’m still glowing from yesterday R0bbO. Any win down the smoke is to be celebrated. Not getting carried away, just delighted with the 3 points.

    Ian mentions he noticed an adjusted style of play. There are younger players in the engine room now and that helps further up the field. I also thought that once Emi released the ball at the back, the ball was played out much faster to beat the press. Last season, I thought Dougie and Kamara dawdled with the ball after receiving it and got caught several times. Not so with Onana and Tielemans.

    There was plenty of one touch passing too. Just look at the winner. A thing of beauty which is very difficult to defend against.

  39. Great feeling on a lazy Sunday morning, almost perfect performance only our finishing needing polishing
    New lads onana dream start really our main weakness last season was our lack of physicality onana certainly has it,matasen going forward better than digne but way emery wants left back to play plenty of mins for 2 of them,bidace really like youth player coming back from loan,won’t need time to settle,ned another one that adds height and especially speed in defence will need time to settle
    Then the news kamara is on way back
    All I need now is my Sunday fry to round of a great weekend

  40. Unai’s substitutions on Sat were 2 subs on 62 minutes, another 2 on 74 minutes and the final one on 82 minutes. With 7 minutes added time it meant we finished the last 15 minutes of the game with Maatsen (22), Kosta (18), Onana (22), Ramsey (23), Rogers (22), Bidace (22) and Big Jhon (20) on the pitch.

    That’s an average age of 21 for those 7 players. The future is looking rosy. Unai is building a quality squad. Dare we dream?

  41. Well that’s the end of felix,he is joining circus which is chelsea
    Plug
    We also signed Colombian under 20 captain, highly rated scandavian lad,a young lad back from city,plus Sunderland u17 England International
    Monchi has been busy

  42. Definitely don’t feel like I’m getting carried away. What I felt was relief mainly, after the preseason, and that my belief Emery would play the settled squad came true and paid off. (Not that is was much of a gamble, prediction wise.)

    That’s the sign (the way they picked up again and played) of good foundations. People know where they’re supposed to be, where others are supposed to be. They’re talking to each other, scanning round. Rogers and Onana took responsibility and showed eagerness to progress the ball, which also makes more room for Torres to carry.

    Agreed, I thought the ball was played quicker a number of times when playing out. Perhaps Onana is helping confidence. There’s height and strength, but also pace and reach. So much was just beyond Dougie in terms of reach and pace. Not a knock on him as a footballer, but along with McGinn and Tielemans, you don’t have a particularly fast midfield with him, and none of them have much reach. He should help break things up quite a bit.

  43. Agreed John (about the predicted selection). Unai was always going to keep his back 4 in place until the new FB’s get comfortable with his tee-square straight line across the pitch. Having said that, I didn’t notice our high line as much since we seemed to play a little deeper than in the past. Maybe a subtle change in our play. But yep, playing out from Emi looked very assured and I avoided soiled underwear.

    Looks like Moreno is off to Forest on a season long loan. And I can’t get my head round the circus acts at Chelsea. Any player joining them must be empty in the head. Bet Chuk ain’t happy with matters except perhaps with his wages which for now are still intact. Kellyman will be far better off getting a loan move.

    All our focus now will be on the Arse for Saturday which can go one of two ways. They will either be a little wary of us or they will be smarting from losing the title because of us and go all out for revenge. Looking forward to the joust.

  44. What brilliant news,martinez extends contract to 29
    What a guy,what a keeper What a legend
    Even with out financial problems and its not short of money,the last 18months have been sensational players coming in contracts extended
    And if any of youse have a spare 90mins watch the aston villa movie on tube,what a train wreck we were

  45. Plug,

    I’m guessing it’s the second of your two scenarios (Arsenal).

    Yeah, we did seem a little deeper, would be interested to see heat maps. WH’s front line may have had something to do with that. Kudus is real handful. Would’ve hated being in Cash’s shoes. Fortunately there wasn’t a ton of end product on the day.

  46. There are reports this evening that we’ve opened discussions with Chelsea for Sterling. Hope it’s all click bait as I think his performances are on the wane.

  47. Heading down to VP shortly. Carrying the usual nervous twitches with me as I always do. Expecting a tough game but hopeful we can get something out of it. COYVB.

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