Aston Villa (A) 6/3/21 Build-Up & Match Thread

[Dire Wolf]

Is anyone genuinely confident we can win this? And I'd bet if we feel that way the players do too.

 

[Premier Quality]

I am, we were on a good winning run before we lost to city, and everyone thought we would lose to city anyway.

if we drop a couple of the underperforming players and the incomings take their chance there’s no reason we can’t win. Villa aren’t that good.

 

[YoungWolf]

I don't consider it 'experimenting' to play the only striker we own for 45 mins. RAN and Vitinha have hardly had any minutes lately and Jonny's comeback needs managing IMO.

The idea that Jose and Mout are some kind of indispensable matchwinners who have to play 90 mins each is a more dubious assertion than anything I've suggested

I didn't say anything about Jose to be fair. I think he will start, but I'm less fussed which one of them starts at the moment. Jonny and Moutinho have been important recently (the latter is playing much better since his goal against Arsenal IMO).

 

[Del Woppio]

I don't see any reason why we couldn't have RAN, Vitinha and Fabio on the pitch at the same time tbh. Not for 90 minutes week in week out between now and the end of the season, but at the end of the day we've got to decide whether to spend £40m on the first too, and we need to manage Joao and Jonny's minutes, and certainly in Joao's case, we know what he can do, and to a large degree it doesn't matter whether he does it or not between now and the end of the season. Fabio is a better footballer than Jose so he should be starting and learning, while there's no crowd in the stadium.

There's no reason whatsoever not to give RAN and Vitinha c400 minutes each between now and the end of the season. It'd arguably be a dereliction of duty not to do so, given the sums involved. They're both of the profile to be top players in their positions in the mid-future, we need to give them game time to see they're worth pursuing with, or if it's unfounded hype.

 

[slink]

Again like Punts it's pretty much all about mentality for me although i do think we're tactically short at the moment too. You have to lose in sport but if you approach the game in the right way i think that counts for a lot. I'd love for us to win every game but you know that's impossible so performances make a big difference and i would say since last season re started you can count the amount of halves we've played well in on 2 hands probably.

I'd rather we didn't do an Everton and give up now, i'd rather see us use the rest of this season to reset the mentality, give Vitinha, RAN, Fabio, MGW more minutes and try to finish the season positively. I understand if that doesn't happen but then i just want to see whatever team we pick play on the front foot and get the best out of players we have.

 

[YoungWolf]

I don't see any reason why we couldn't have RAN, Vitinha and Fabio on the pitch at the same time tbh. Not for 90 minutes week in week out between now and the end of the season, but at the end of the day we've got to decide whether to spend £40m on the first too, and we need to manage Joao and Jonny's minutes, and certainly in Joao's case, we know what he can do, and to a large degree it doesn't matter whether he does it or not between now and the end of the season. Fabio is a better footballer than Jose so he should be starting and learning, while there's no crowd in the stadium.

There's no reason whatsoever not to give RAN and Vitinha c400 minutes each between now and the end of the season. It'd arguably be a dereliction of duty not to do so, given the sums involved. They're both of the profile to be top players in their positions in the mid-future, we need to give them game time to see they're worth pursuing with, or if it's unfounded hype.

It depends what formation we play, and I'm not saying we absolutely shouldn't. If we do it at Villa this Saturday though people shouldn't get upset if they aren't quite up to it and we lose, because that could easily happen as they are young.

I know we could easily lose anyway because we've been crap, but Nuno will always want to play his best team and give what he thinks is the best chance of winning.

 

[YoungWolf]

I'd rather we didn't do an Everton and give up now, i'd rather see us use the rest of this season to reset the mentality, give Vitinha, RAN, Fabio, MGW more minutes and try to finish the season positively. I understand if that doesn't happen but then i just want to see whatever team we pick play on the front foot and get the best out of players we have.

This is what I don't get from people though.

Ancelotti started playing Anthony Gordon last year for example, and Jarrad Branthwaite because they had nothing to play for. Neither of those two get anywhere near the team now. So playing our young players would be doing a fairly similar thing, IMO.

 

[PuntsWolf]

We’ve done it to death but I don’t want to sign RAN.

Jonny is going to play 30+ games next season. I don’t want to spend £20m on someone who is going to probably make less than 5 starts when we already own another raw FB.

I honestly don’t see any difference between RAN and Hoever. Both quick, both defensively naive, neither offer a huge amount in the final 1/3. I’d say Hoever looks a more polished player in possession though, more physical, slight younger and half the price.

If we are going to stick with a 5 then there is probably some merit in it (Hoever is definitely no WB though, so Jonny/Semedo/RAN for the WBs is probably right and Boly/Coady/Saiss/Hoever/NewCB is probably right there too).

 

[AndyWolves]

343 with the usual suspects but use subs to give some players more time.

 

[AndyWolves]

We're not talking about throwing Matheson or Terry Taylor in, the young players we're talking about were the bulk of our pre-season transfers!

Does that make a difference?

If we voluntarily want to make our team weaker we shouldn't be surprised or upset if we lose.

Obviously, we could go full strength and still lose.

 

[Tony Towner]

This is what I don't get from people though.

Ancelotti started playing Anthony Gordon last year for example, and Jarrad Branthwaite because they had nothing to play for. Neither of those two get anywhere near the team now. So playing our young players would be doing a fairly similar thing, IMO.

I think the difference is those 2 players weren't going to potentially cost £38m in the Summer. I know you think they are done deals no matter what and the club already think they know what they have, but even if that is the case and we are invested in them surely that's as much reason to give RAN and Vitinha the experience?

That said the Villa and the Albion games are the 2 I wouldn't experiment in. As although they don't register any higher with the players, they do with the fans, it's not worth the bad PR, loss in faith potentially losing either of those without your strongest side would bring

 

[YoungWolf]

We’ve done it to death but I don’t want to sign RAN.

Jonny is going to play 30+ games next season. I don’t want to spend £20m on someone who is going to probably make less than 5 starts when we already own another raw FB.

I honestly don’t see any difference between RAN and Hoever. Both quick, both defensively naive, neither offer a huge amount in the final 1/3. I’d say Hoever looks a more polished player in possession though, more physical, slight younger and half the price.

If we are going to stick with a 5 then there is probably some merit in it (Hoever is definitely no WB though, so Jonny/Semedo/RAN for the WBs is probably right and Boly/Coady/Saiss/Hoever/NewCB is probably right there too).

RAN is a lot more ready than Hoever, for me, but that may be just because he's had more senior football at this point. technically a lot better, although Hoever maybe passes forwards a bit more often (equally loses it more). Rayan is very, very talented. A bit like Fabio probably benefits from having a bit of time out of the team for now.

I'd sign RAN personally, but understand why people might see him as not getting the chances behind Jonny and not seeing the point of spending that much.

 

[slink]

This is what I don't get from people though.

Ancelotti started playing Anthony Gordon last year for example, and Jarrad Branthwaite because they had nothing to play for. Neither of those two get anywhere near the team now. So playing our young players would be doing a fairly similar thing, IMO.

Playing young players doesn't mean you have nothing to play for. The whole Everton squad had given up and that was their mentality. I don't expect that of Wolves and giving the players above more minutes is far from giving up imo. Vitinha, RAN, MGW and Fabio are no way comparable in ability to the 2 Everton lads for me either. I don't expect us to throw them all in and just go ahh fuck it but it would be nice to see Vitinha for 50-60 minutes instead of Joao who while being the best player i've seen for Wolves to date shouldn't be first choice next year.

Obviously Nuno thinks they aren't quite ready yet or never will be but personally i'd still like to see it for myself. As i said i understand if this doesn't happen but i'd rather see that happen than what we're currently doing.

 

[prawnking]

Does that make a difference?

If we voluntarily want to make our team weaker we shouldn't be surprised or upset if we lose.

Obviously, we could go full strength and still lose.

I don't know why everything has to be repeated three times in here... But I'm not saying play them all at the same time (you could just start Vitinha and bring the other two on for instance) and I'm not saying play them for 90 mins.

I don't think Mout and Jose have earned the right to be considered parts of a definitive 'full strength' side in the same way Boly, Neves and Neto have, and I've already explained why I'd only give Jonny one half.

In reality you probably can't plan to make three of these kind of subs anyway, it's just an aspiration to see these players and see a glimpse of how we may play next season, and no I won't give a shit if we lose trying both of those things

 

[YoungWolf]

I think the difference is those 2 players weren't going to potentially cost £38m in the Summer. I know you think they are done deals no matter what and the club already think they know what they have, but even if that is the case and we are invested in them surely that's as much reason to give RAN and Vitinha the experience?

That said the Villa and the Albion games are the 2 I wouldn't experiment in. As although they don't register any higher with the players, they do with the fans, it's not worth the bad PR, loss in faith potentially losing either of those without your strongest side would bring

I'm not saying we shouldn't play them though. Just that there are some saying we shouldn't 'give up' like Everton did but also want us to blood the youngsters in. I don't think the two quite marry. If we gave Vitinha a run of games now I'd be perfectly happy with that, same with RAN, Fabio, MGW, I just wouldn't expect it to go all swimmingly!

 

[northfield wolf]

Will Boly be back for this one ? Hope so, if Grealish is out i fancy at least a draw, and living in Birmingham i just couldnt stomach losing to this lot. I think the loss of the crowd here could be a massive help for us, heres hoping.

 

[sycophantia]

Is anyone genuinely confident we can win this? And I'd bet if we feel that way the players do too.

if we play a more attack minded game and Boly is fit, I absolutely think we can beat them. We played well in patches up till the Newcastle first half. Villa have done really well this season but are nothing special, Grealish is their only stand out playet, Barclay started off ok but has done his usual 'going off the boil', Ollie Watkins is ok. Overall we have a better first 11, its just about how we approach the game.
In the home game we were the better team imo and very unlucky to lose.
DW talked about a reset at the start of next season, it should start Saturday as far as I'm concerned.
If we play a less negative style and end up losing 3-2 it wouldn't be the end of the world......but I really do believe we can win it.

 

[The Bear]

Unfortunately only Nuno and his staff know just how many minutes the usual suspects can play in each game, or how the younger lads have looked in training or whether he thinks they are ready for any particular game from day to day interactions.

Guessing who if any are going to be involved is a lottery. How many thought Hoever would start last night, or that we'd okay 5-4-1? No-one.

 

[The Bear]

Having said that, my personal team based on my guesses on fitness/form is:

Rui

Boly - Coady - Saiss

Semedo - Moutinho - Neves - RAN

Traore - Neto

Silva

​

 

[Tredman]

My preference (which won't happen):

Rui
Boly - Coady - Saiss
Semedo - Otasowie - RAN
Neves - Vitinha/Moutinho
Traore - Neto​