Everton v Villa

Having lost the last three league games, we're now up against high flying Villa.

Injury news:
Dyche confirmed that Dwight McNeil's injury has "settled down really quickly" but he is unlikely to be ready. He also confirmed that Abdoulaye Doucoure has trained and "looks fine".

I thought we played OK against Palace, a bit of a settler after the three straight losses.

I'm optimistic we can nick a point in this one. Villa seem to struggle more against the lower clubs than they do the teams near the top.

Unsurprisingly I don't fancy this one. They have a bit too much up front for us. Could be a hammering if Keane plays. A point would be amazing. Villa available at 6-4, they are good odds!!!!

I’ll settle for any result so long as I don’t have the option of blaming Michael Keane. Don’t fancy it, though.

Everton women beat Villa women 3-0 today.

Armchair wrote:Everton women beat Villa women 3-0 today.

Let's have a repeat tomorrow then please!

FT 0-0. I didn't watch but sounds like a fair result. A good point against a top 4 side I think.

It was a good point against a team that would have gone joint top with a win, but we brought them down to our level and it was a scrappy, forgettable game.

Horrible game. I'm still thinking about the other productive things I could have done with those couple of hours, like delousing the cat or rearranging the food cupboard.

We scrapped and battled as we always do, but it was a game that smacks you in the face and reminds you how little quality we have. So I'm happy with the point.

Villa, like all teams managed by a Spaniard, are narks when things aren't going their way. When they were playing with some flow they were dangerous, but they did as much as we did to break that game up in the second half with their pedantry. It was like a La Liga game towards the end, with little pockets of football interspersing the constant handbags. Which suited us, like. Fuck Villa, don't like them.

DCL. Fucking hell.

Villa the team with more quality, but we managed to scrap enough to get a point. I quite like the handbags and wish that Dyche would have subbed on a Duncan type player at the end with the only instruction to deck David Luiz.

DCL is so low of confidence it's borderline laughable. If he just chips the ball 2-3 feet above ground, it's a goal. It's painful to watch how ineffective we are when we do create a chance.

I would have taken a point before the game, so all good I suppose.

Knight of Thorgothshire wrote:Villa the team with more quality, but we managed to scrap enough to get a point. I quite like the handbags and wish that Dyche would have subbed on a Duncan type player at the end with the only instruction to deck David Luiz.

DCL is so low of confidence it's borderline laughable. If he just chips the ball 2-3 feet above ground, it's a goal. It's painful to watch how ineffective we are when we do create a chance.

I would have taken a point before the game, so all good I suppose.

I can see Beto starting the next game.

Armchair wrote:

Knight of Thorgothshire wrote:Villa the team with more quality, but we managed to scrap enough to get a point. I quite like the handbags and wish that Dyche would have subbed on a Duncan type player at the end with the only instruction to deck David Luiz.

DCL is so low of confidence it's borderline laughable. If he just chips the ball 2-3 feet above ground, it's a goal. It's painful to watch how ineffective we are when we do create a chance.

I would have taken a point before the game, so all good I suppose.

I can see Beto starting the next game.

Possibly against Palace in the cup yes. But I don't think DCL is low in confidence, he's just not very good. I mean, I don't expect Harry Kane levels of good from him, but nor do I expect Maupay levels of uselessness. Clearly he's a great athlete, and a pretty decent footballer overall, but he's a fucking terrible striker. I was watching Richarlison today and he was constantly making runs into the right area - DCL never does that. The only thing I can come up with in mitigation, is that he's been told not to make those runs. But why would Dyche do that? I accept that we make very few good chances, but I also think DCL is never in the right place and, when he very occasionally is in the right place, he's fucking awful.


All we can hope is that we can sneak enough 1-0 wins with Doucoure getting a few goals.

I expected more from Villa. In the first half we went for the high press as often as I've seen us, and Villa's response was to tick tacky then hoof to Watkins/Diaby. We were close to ruining their tacky tacky a couple of times..
When the opposition start the handbags stuff, Seamus is in his element. I would love to have heard what he was yelling at McGinn after the the fracas neer the end. Probably it could only be herd by dogs.
As for DCL's chance, just have him watch Messi do it. It's easy. In your last strides you move to your right, the GK then puts all his weight on his left foot, you then chip to his right. He's done it hundreds of times. Same technique.
What is it that I find irritating about Danjuma?

Yankthattoffee wrote:
What is it that I find irritating about Danjuma?

No end product?

Armchair wrote:

Yankthattoffee wrote:
What is it that I find irritating about Danjuma?

No end product?

Maybe he seems to be on a different wavelength to the rest of the team. Like he's not quite part of the set up?

Yankthattoffee wrote:

Armchair wrote:

Yankthattoffee wrote:
What is it that I find irritating about Danjuma?

No end product?

Maybe he seems to be on a different wavelength to the rest of the team. Like he's not quite part of the set up?

He's also rather selfish. There were a few times he had the ball getting towards the Villa box and I just sighed out loud "no need to run lads, he's going for the glory himself".

Just read an interesting paragraph in the largest Swedish newspaper about the disallowed goal that Villa had. Freddie Ljungberg made the point that the Villa player that pulled down Danjuma did so intentionally to prevent the offside because Danjuma would have played the Villa player onside. I thought when I first saw the "goal" that a) the Villa player was offside, and b) if he's not offside there must be a foul on Danjuma.

Reading BBC's live text updates it sounded like we had gotten away with murder based on the text messages sent in by Villa fans. Unreal.

Knight of Thorgothshire wrote:Just read an interesting paragraph in the largest Swedish newspaper about the disallowed goal that Villa had. Freddie Ljungberg made the point that the Villa player that pulled down Danjuma did so intentionally to prevent the offside because Danjuma would have played the Villa player onside. I thought when I first saw the "goal" that a) the Villa player was offside, and b) if he's not offside there must be a foul on Danjuma.

Reading BBC's live text updates it sounded like we had gotten away with murder based on the text messages sent in by Villa fans. Unreal.

Thor, I wnet to match and I was in direct line wit it and that is what I saw that there was a clear foul on Danjuma. Villa were a shithouse side to be honest.

Da Judge wrote:

Knight of Thorgothshire wrote:Just read an interesting paragraph in the largest Swedish newspaper about the disallowed goal that Villa had. Freddie Ljungberg made the point that the Villa player that pulled down Danjuma did so intentionally to prevent the offside because Danjuma would have played the Villa player onside. I thought when I first saw the "goal" that a) the Villa player was offside, and b) if he's not offside there must be a foul on Danjuma.

Reading BBC's live text updates it sounded like we had gotten away with murder based on the text messages sent in by Villa fans. Unreal.

Thor, I wnet to match and I was in direct line wit it and that is what I saw that there was a clear foul on Danjuma. Villa were a shithouse side to be honest.

Jamie Redknapp called this at half time, can't remember his exact words but he was basically saying that this would have been rehearsed as part of a set-piece routine.