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ASTON VILLA AWAY 5-3-05
Final whistle: 1438 - Report online: 1440
Nash, Parnaby, Riggott, Southgate, Queudrue, Parlour, Doriva, Zenden, Downing, Hasselbaink, Nemeth
Knight, Graham, Cooper, McMahon, Job
DULL, DULL, DULL
The Villa fans dusted down the banners for their annual protest against chairman Doug Ellis in this televised lunchtime clash. Twenty thousand red cards had been given out to the fans and the plan was to wave them at Ellis in an attempt to get rid of him. I bet he was terrified.
The opening six minutes were very untidy and nothing resembling a chance materialised for either side.
Villa eventually started to string more than one pass together and Boro had their first half chance when Bolo Zenden finally came into the game. But the first shot came from Villa when Solana's neat lay on was blasted wide by Gareth Barry.
Solano was a menace and it wasn't long after that he panicked Franck Queudrue into giving away a corner. But Boro weathered the preceding storm, Nash being the only keeper to have played a part so far.
On fifteen minutes, Hasselbaink and Zenden combined well but the resulting corner was wasted. As was another one that The Lizard did well to win.
Conviction was lacking from both sides and when the ball did break out of a clogged up midfield, there was nobody available with enough cutting edge to make any sort of breakthrough.
Villa probed in the last seven minutes of the half but created little danger and Carlo Nash needed only to perform academic moves.
This was a half that contained little structure and even less entertainment. We could only hope for a better second half. It couldn't be much worse than the first...
Fan Reaction: "Not one shot on target from either side. What a waste of money."
"Bring on Danny Graham. It's the only way we'll score today..."
THE SECOND HALF...
No personnel or formation changes took place during the interval. Boro won an early corner with Jimmy and Bolo yet again linking up together to produce the shooting opportunity. It was a much brighter start to the second and Boro were now starting to shoot on target.
An offside flag and a linesman's handball signal snuffed out two further Boro chances of which Zenden was involved in both.
Boos rang around the stadium as Barry was penalised for pulling Parnaby back. The free kick was wasted and we ended up lucky to be still level after Vassell made a scorching run and found Solano who missed an open goal. Must be something about the West Midlands. Was he Kanu in disguise?
The game was speeding up now and Boro looked slightly the hungrier. But Vassell was replaced by Luke Moore and immediately, Villa looked the sharper side as Danny Graham warmed up for Boro.
Downing found himself with central space on 59 minutes but shot high over the bar. That was the catalyst for SMc but even though the rest of the bench were now warming up, no changes were made.
Gareth Southgate saved us with a fantastic sliding tackle on Lee Hendrie in the 65th minute but he wasn't around two minutes later to stop Laursen bundling the ball past Nash to give Villa the lead. Very disappointing but we had not really looked positive at all up to now.
The Lizard's day was over just before the restart as Danny Graham replaced him up front.
And he nearly levelled it within twe minutes as Jimmy played him through for a one-on-one chance against the keeper who was lucky to get a hand to the shot and tip it to safety.
And as a contest, the game seemed to die again after that. A near twenty-minute passage of play took place that was completely forgettable and produced no noteable incidents whatsoever.
But things got worse on 78 minutes when a debatable free kick was floated in and Lee Hendrie found the ball, foxed our messy defence and slotted home. Two down with 12 to play. It looked all over for us...
INTO THE RED ZONE...
Joseph Job made a cameo appearance with eight minutes to play and it was Stewey Downing who made way for him.
And a strong Villa attack left the home crowd gasping as Luke Moore's deflected shot went just wide for a corner. They were looking for a third and we were looking like we would be lucky to escape with nil.
It is to be hoped that Sporting Lisbon were watching this as it was not real Boro on the Villa Park pitch today. Hopefully, real Boro will be playing on Thursday night.
Fan Reaction: "I just hope this isn't the start of us crumbling."
"We played negative and got a negative result. We were absolute shite!"
"Steve Gibson should fine the lot of them two weeks wages for that..."
Packwolf's Aston Villa report. Pictures by Andy Craig
A Statement on Behalf of the Right Honorable...
Well I suppose it's best to start with this: it's probably lucky for everyone that I waited a day before I wrote this because outside the ground at 2.45pm on Saturday I was furious. No, in fact I was livid. And speaking to other Boro fans subsequent to the debacle that was the performance at Villa, I was reassured to think that at least I wasn't the only one.
Because I had every right to be annoyed. After seventy pounds spent, a seven hour round train journey and having to get up at quarter past six in the morning after a mere three hours sleep, the team decide, after I could be bothered to turn up, to stay in Middlesbrough and put their feet up.
For this performance was shoddy, indeed it was unacceptable, and the worst display I have seen by a Boro side in my ten years of supporting them. Indeed I would question whether the players, like the club, actually CARE about the fans because as I said to Andy at the time, that display was 'abject, pathetic and impotent'. And that view hasn't shifted. Yet it's not the loss that bothers me.
Indeed I don't mind the Boro losing, hey it happens from time to time, we're far from infallible, but if we don't compete then surely it's short-changing the fans, particularly those who scrape a meagre wage and spend the little surplus cash they have on following the Boro. Nearly all of us can only dream of earning in a year what some of these players earn in a week and yet all McClaren can say is it was 'a poor day at the office'.
Fuck that! If you're paid forty thousand pounds a week to play at most two games in that time period then you shouldn't have any 'poor days at the office', let alone a multitude of them, as this appears to be McClaren's main excuse whenever we are crap. Because it appears to be happening time after time at the moment, the same performances and the same excuses being wheeled out. And it's not good enough, not from the players nor from McClaren who seems to be glossing over his own failings with tried and tested sound bites, which contradict what every rational fan has seen.
And to gloss over that performance with such an insipid phrase is quite positively insulting. Because the reason why we lost that was through a lack of effort and the same errors we have been making for the last two months. Yet no one at the club has the nous to sort it out.
So let me enlighten McClaren and all those who are responsible for the 'training' (or as I like to call it, bloodbath, judging by the number of injuries we get) and point out the deficiencies. And maybe then you can sort it out and we can retain 6th place.
But a start would be that none of the players take their wages this week. That they donate them to Comic Relief or perhaps even to our very own Penguin Jack's good cause, because the players simply haven't earned it after Saturday's performance. At least then they would be thinking about the fans. Because the club is increasingly becoming distant from them, through the poorly concealed propaganda that is being spouted and it's important to recognise that it is the fans that provide the main income for the club. Maybe the club should start considering their views a hell of a lot more...
Early Days, Deep Malaise
So a 6.15am zombified start to the journey to the city of Brum for what I hoped would be an interesting encounter against the most mid-table of mid-table sides and Villa. Or should that be the most mid-table of mid-table sides, Villa. Hmm. Amazing how Freudian slips can happen when typing isn't it? Added to this fun was that this would be my girlfriend's first ever football match and I was aiming to convince her that not only was football a good way to spend a Saturday afternoon (for she is on the periphery of the game) but that Boro were an attacking flowing side worthy of support.
The urgency in this was that her family are Villa supporters (hence her choosing this fixture I suppose) and it was important to convert her to the right side as soon as possible. Or something like that anyway. So setting off on another Virgin bane, another three hour journey and a load of engineering works that didn't surface (annoyingly as this was why I was up so early, I was told to add at least an hour to my journey) I was looking forward to maybe not the best encounter of the season but at least a good Boro performance with a comfortable victory at the end of it. That's what the form suggested and, despite our defensive frailties, what I expected.
So half dead on the train, I comforted myself in the knowledge that it would all be worth it, worth getting up for and worth the money I spent on it. I also reassured my girlfriend who, having spent said money on a match she wasn't overly interested in, it would be a good day. For I hoped the Boro would convince her of where her allegiances should lie, and that she would be converted to football at least, forever. Unfortunately the match was the biggest turn off ever.
Approaching Birmingham and not increasing above 30mph I decided to explain some of the rules of the game to her, particularly the offside rule because I thought she would need to know it as I expected Job to be playing. She got it commendably quickly (although I don't know what people's problem with the offside rule is- it's not that hard to explain or to understand) along with a few of the other rules and player information. Of course Southgate with his Villa connections was the player she was most interested in but Zenden and Hasselbaink also garnered her support, despite being anonymous pretty much all game.
Hmm, Birmingham Looks Nice Doesn't It?
So getting into Birmingham ridiculously early we decided to grab some breakfast at Wetherspoons, which is practically becoming a second home to me considering I always seem to visit it whenever I am in the Brum. The breakfast incidentally was average and no sausages. Sacrilege! Meeting Andy at the station soon followed, along with the obligatory introductions and we were soon on our way to Villa Park on the creatively named 'Football Special'. Meanwhile I was getting off on the word 'pendolino' which is such a fantastic word it should be adopted into common parlance at every available opportunity.
Around the Ground, Around the Bend
Ten minutes later and Villa Park loomed into view. And what can you say about this 'impressive structure' (as I kept reminding everyone all afternoon)- assumedly they built it after they built Birmingham city centre when there was still a job lot of corrugated iron and concrete going spare. Andy's comment that the away end looked like 'a hotel he had stayed in Slovakia' summed it all up really, grey, uninspiring and dour. Pretty much like the team in that respect then, along with Doug Ellis come to think of it.
Walking up to the ground I was in somewhat of a tired malaise, caught in the feeling that I was actually at the ground of the most forgettable team in the league- and it wasn't too impressive. Yet this was soon broken when we walked past a burger van next to the ground and noticed you could purchase not only a motherfucker burger but also a daddyfucker as well. As Andy said, 'it says a lot about familial relations in Birmingham'. Assumedly in Cornwall you could also get a sisterfucker.
And I still am amused thinking of children pulling on their father's coats saying 'daddy, can I have a motherfucker please', with the response that 'well I'm here aren't I?' or some other equally witless comment.
We decided to walk around the ground because it was bloody freezing and seemed the logical thing to do. And again it wasn't that impressive (although the Trinity Stand that forms a tunnel over the road looks quite cool from a distance) so, after putting in more exercise than the Boro lads would do combined, we decided after one circuit to go into the stadium. This was, of course, after our obligatory chat to Rob Nicholls of Fly Me to the Moon, who was selling copies of the excellent fanzine and badges dedicated to Cloughie outside the ground. Indeed I strongly urge you get a badge because not only is it a fitting memory to Old Big 'Ead but the monies raised are also donated to charity- a bit like the way victory was donated to Villa later that afternoon.
In the Ground
No beer for away fans pisses me off. It smacks of discrimination and even worse, nannying. Why should the home fans get alcoholic refreshment whilst the away fans not? The only reason I can think of is that if there is a fight between the two sets of fans then the home fans have a mitigating excuse for the aggro whilst the away fans actions would be premeditated.
By the by, at a 12.45pm kick-off, another Sky fan friendly game - they're great to watch when you're going to a 3pm kick-off but a bugger to watch when it is your game they are showing early - a drink would be appreciated, particularly as the pubs had only been open for 45 minutes or so and most of us were dangerously sober. A good few pints and noise ensues. As it turns out, noise would ensue anyway from those who had not drank whilst those that had were strangely mute. If I had to watch the crap that Villa served week in week out then I would be too in all honesty.
The oh-so Exciting First Half aka Cry Me a Villa
So the game kicked off and after about ten minutes I was bored. Indeed I felt like I wanted to cry it was so bad. Fuck the notion of getting my girlfriend interested in football. By half time I felt as if the final whistle had gone, the first half had felt so long, whilst I consoled myself that the second half couldn't be worse than that. How wrong I was.
I think it was Parlour hitting a pass that went out for a throw-in that set the tone for this match. By the time he had done it four times it was almost tradition. And Villa weren't much better.
Indeed they were probably only second to Norwich in the worst teams I have seen all season stakes, a view which added to my anger as the full time whistle approached- we were beaten by mediocre shite, shite that played only slightly less shite than we did. I bet Sky were delighted in choosing this game for their Pay Per View punters.
If I'd spent six pounds on that I'd want my money back, never mind the seventy that I did end up paying for the day. So in a game that was notable for both sides doing their best to pass to the opposition and doing bugger all with the ball outside of midfield, the only thing we could do was sing. And sing loudly, trying to encourage our team on to greater things. All it did do was cause us to concede throw-in after throw-in after another pass went astray- indeed it was the first time I have ever felt sympathy for an assistant referee. All that flapping of his flag must have given him painful cramp. It was as if Job had been playing and constantly falling foul of the offside trap.
As usual the stewards were extremely over zealous, with a handful of fans being ejected for no discernable reason. They had been fighting although I don't know why. The game was so torpid that it would have sent the most hardened narcoleptic to sleep so God knows where they got the energy to fight.
The chants of 'Teesside aggro' therefore may have been accurate and if they were, in a way I admire them- at least they found something to do that was more interesting than watching the match. Meanwhile we were repeatedly told to sit down despite not causing any problems whatsoever. Indeed we started singing 'we won't sit 'til the Villa sing', which became futile in the end because after three minutes we got bored and sat down anyway.
This trend continued throughout the match, the Villa fans being the worst fans I have encountered on my Premier League travels. As stated, if I watched that shite week in week out then maybe I would feel like that too but the job of the fans is to RAISE their side, maybe they get the performances and team they deserve. Indeed showing red cards to Ellis as a sign of solidarity and support was undermined by their languid vocalising which on their behalf was embarrassing.
A Sky TV audience and their team and their fans couldn't be bothered - along with our team in all honesty. Maybe the red cards should be sold to themselves. Maybe they have the chairman they deserve. Either way we tried to teach them how to sing but alas they didn't sing at all, not until they were two nil up, by which time it was arguably pointless. So fickle. So pathetic.
It wasn't as if we were a threat, the only threat we were was to the poor assistant as previously mentioned. By the by, when the half time whistle finally blew and believe me it didn't come soon enough - Andy and I were sat there counting the minutes down so we wouldn't have to watch it anymore - there was a smattering of booing coming from both ends of the ground, particularly ours and to be honest I couldn't blame them.
Personally I did not boo, largely because I didn't think it would be that constructive, and under most circumstances I would not condone it. However the one exception to this, I believe, is when the team put in a lack of effort. As I have said I don't mind us being shite when we give it a go but to be lethargic due to the lack of passion is simply unforgivable, particularly when you consider the money they get paid compared to us fans.
So although I don't necessarily support the actions of our fans in this respect, I certainly understand them, and thus I don't blame them. But for any other reason, particularly if singling out a particular player then it is unacceptable. In this case, it certainly wasn't.
Half-time Respite.
Half time came and with it, the highlight of the day. Being within one foot of Hercules the Lion, Villa's 'cuddly' mascot. And I must admit, Villa may have beaten us on the pitch but on the mascot stakes Roary is a far superior lion. In terms of stitching and fur quality Roary wins hands down and his head is a far more sensible shape - as far as sensible can work for mascots. Furthermore his dance routine is better. He doesn't sport an inane grin like Joe Pascquale on heat and doesn't sport claret and blue undergarments. But fair play, he was meeting then Boro lads and not one of us managed to land a punch. Mightily impressive if you ask me. But if Roary were playing him he'd win hands down. Far greater roar. Like the fans in that respect.
The Second Half- Where did it all go wrong?
The prospect of good football had all but dried up so we decided to make things interesting by gifting two goals to the opposition who only slightly picked up in the first twenty minutes of the second half. Ourselves meanwhile, well God knows what McClaren said but it might as well have been 'that first half performance was great, with a bit of luck you deserved to be in front. Keep playing like that'... because there was no change in how we played.
Still awful. Indeed you have to question McClaren's own motivation skills and the confidence the players have in him when you look at the dire display that was served up on the pitch. Two set piece goals conceded, both from the right and the same problem that has been apparent for the last two months forced the tie in Villa's favour. And it was no less than what I expected. Maybe I don't have confidence in the managerial team, maybe the absence of Boateng is demonstrating a lot more on how we need him than we initially thought but every set piece we concede I fear a goal concession will follow.
No surprise there was little defensive leadership. No surprise there was no marking. No surprise we conceded. But this is OBVIOUS!! We conceded against Everton back in mid-January due to a set-piece goal, coupled with a lack of marking. Against Norwich, not learning our lesson, we decided to concede FOUR set-piece goals to arguably the worst team in the league, THREE of which in the last TEN minutes. Surely lessons have to be learnt.
But no, of course not. Graz, concede in a similar manner, Villa ditto and suddenly the solid defence that we had when Boateng was there has all but disappeared. But don't people at the club SEE this?! Shouldn't they be working on basic marking, on basic defending? We can't rely on Boateng all the time, as has been painfully evident and indeed if we do, WE DO NOT DESERVE TO BE TOP SIX. Simple as that. I know he's a key player but reliance is fatal.
And if this reliance was so bad why didn't McClaren buy a defensive midfielder in January when the problem became apparent? Why did he let that month slide and not do anything? Interesting that. But hey, we're still 6th. The teams around us got poor results too - the only saving grace of Saturday - but if we had played as well as we know we can, then we could have been sitting in 4th, easily.
But maybe we're not good enough, for I'm sure many other teams could say the same thing. Indeed part of me WANTS us to drop down the table. Maybe this will buck McClaren and the team up and MAKE them perform, because a lack of effort along with the same mistakes being repeated for nigh on two months is fundamentally frustrating. And makes me question the training methods, training methods that have also jeopardised our UEFA Cup ambitions by injuring so many of our players.
Suffice to say that UEFA Cup qualification is VITAL or it will be a retrograde step. Even 7th or 8th is NOT an achievement. So we need to buck our ideas up quickly and this can be done first and foremost by displaying some EFFORT and working on our evident errors. Am I the only one who sees this?
The Second Half- Do you want pies with that?
So second half and the only noise that could be heard was from a group of fifty or so children near us singing 'Villa' like the Chipmunks on heat. Indeed they got a little annoying after a while, part of me wanting them to vary the chanting a bit but at least they made the effort, which is more than can be said for anyone else around in the stadium - they had one more chant than the rest of them combined.
As for us, after about seventy minutes we gave up because there was nothing to chant for. It was evidently futile and the lack of effort just sucked the life out of us. Still fifty-one minutes in and we were treated to the first shot of the game, despite it being from twenty yards out and no trouble to the keeper. We played a few good cross-field balls too but that was about it really, as Villa increasingly pressed. A corner conceded, a goal subsequent, that was how it felt and indeed how it was as Nash adopted the 'Mark Schwarzer rule for flapping in the penalty area and not having authority in the box' to concede the first. Indeed apart from that, Nash played quite well. He was far more commanding in the area than Schwarzer has been of late.
The second, no one could do much about. Nash had to parry it and it just fell luckily to the Villa player who dispatched into an open goal. And after that, the final whistle couldn't come soon enough and I was reticent to applaud them at the end, not because of the defeat but because of the lack of effort. I apologised to my girlfriend for dragging her to such dirge, as I left the stadium dejected and destroyed, angry that so much money was spent on so much ineptitude.
Not one player played well- Southgate perhaps but beyond that we were awful. Parlour didn't make one pass all afternoon and Zenden and Hasselbaink were anonymous throughout. Nemeth and Parnaby were next to useless, what you'd expect for playing players out of position when you have perfectly good players on the bench in those exact positions (I'm thinking McMahon) and thus the whole side lacked fluidity, confidence and even competence.
Parlour embodied this perfectly. The one touch football we were playing in October all but evaporated as he kept giving the ball away or made futile attempts to go through the middle. It wasn't until the second half that we realised a football pitch has wings, a mistake also made against Charlton last week. And again we didn't learn. 4-5-1 again against a team with their first choice strikers out and with a defence that can't keep a clean sheet if it tried, what were we thinking?
Inviting pressure on to our crack defence in the hope we could weather it? Am I the only one to see the warped logic here? And the sad thing was that it was our practically full-strength defence, or at least the defense that played so well earlier in the season. And still it was poor. Attacking has been our strength in recent times, we're still scoring so why we didn't play to that is beyond me.
But Villa's defence was rarely troubled, nor even tested in all honesty and they looked comfortable throughout. If only we had got at them, then maybe we would have got something. But safety first is always the key I suppose, nevermind the fact that policy rarely works, particularly when there is a goal on the end of every set-piece. So on the way back, in desperate need for a pint and shocked to still find it was only three o'clock - for a variety of reasons, not least because the match felt it lasted for ever - I was spitting bile and everything over the abject performance punctuated by the same mistakes I had just seen.
Back to the Future? Or just plain backwards?
And on the way back home I was still spitting bile, a bile that was only increased by my Spurs supporting mate texting me saying 'come on Villa' after the match- a text that was responded to in bitterness and which met with a sweet come-uppance in their loss to Saints later that day. Tiredness soon swept in and as I sat on the train I meditated about how poor that performance was, between watching two blokes try and avoid buying a ticket - and ultimately failing - by hiding in the toilet together and being annoyed by a group of Derby supporters with a kid who kept saying inane things such as 'if we could see the wheels it would be worrying' and 'you saw us score a goal today didn't you?'. It put you off having kids for life I tell you. Plus the fact that this two year old could say 'vegetarian' really freaked me out in the terms of indoctrination I tell you. Surely two year olds shouldn't know words like that.
Still, I thought, at least he saw his team score today. I didn't even see a shot. And that is what is most disappointing because after all the talk of a revolution, on Saturday we reverted to type. Old Boro would typically go to Villa and lose in that manner but now our standards are such that we expect so much more. Maybe our expectations are too high but New Boro wouldn't have gone to Villa Park and lost, nevermind being so abject.
Maybe this is a move backwards then, maybe it is what the future holds. But I hope not. We're still in 6th after gaining only seven points out of the last available twenty seven. Maybe that says more about how poor the league is this season than anything else. Because on Saturday we did not play like the 6th best team in England at all, in fact we embarrassed ourselves.
I bet Lisbon are wetting themselves with fear. But we now need to get behind the lads and hope they can bounce back, and bounce back well because we can play better than that. So on Thursday get behind the lads and cheer them as well as we cheered them on Saturday because they need our support now more than ever. But a bit of effort from the players will certainly not go amiss. I'm sure we will see it mid-week. We bloody have to.
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