12th July 2020
By Adam Holt
Aston Villa 2 (Trezeguet 45+2', 59')
Crystal Palace 0
The line ups...
Aston Villa:
GK: Reina
RB: Elmohamady (Hause injured in warm up, Konsa moves to CB)
CB: Konsa
CB: Mings
LB: Taylor (Targett comes on for injured Taylor in the 37th minute)
CM: Luiz
CM: McGinn
CM: Hourihane
LW: Grealish (C)
RW: Trezeguet
ST: Samatta
SUBS:
Nyland (GK), Guilbert, Lansbury, Jota, Nakamba, Steer (GK), El Ghazi, Davis.
Crystal Palace:
GK: Guaita
RB: Ward
CB: Dann
CB: Sakho
LB: Van Aanholt
CM: Kouyate
CM: Milivojevic
CM: McArthur
RW: Zaha
LW: Ayew
ST: Benteke SUBS: Meyer, Townsend, Hennessey (GK), McCarthy, Kelly, Woods, Mitchell, Pierrick & Riedewald.
Wow! A win! eleven games and six months have passed since Aston Villa last won a Premier League football match, which was a 2-1 win over fellow strugglers Watford in a match against the Hornets at a full Villa Park back in January.
Trezeguet fired Villa to victory and a glimmer of hope for survival, with the Egyptian winger bagging a brace, with one goal coming in either half to secure, what was in the end, a comfortable victory for the Villans, with Crystal Palace coming off the back of five consecutive defeats in the Premier League. The game certainly did not escape VAR controversy, with Sakho' opening goal for Palace in the sixth minute of this crucial match from a corner (with absolutely horrendous defending on show for Villa). VAR ruled out the goal citing handball (which even I as a Villa fan thought should have been a goal, knowing that if this was Villa's goal being ruled out I would have been raging). MASSIVE let off for Aston Villa. 0-0.
With clear cut chances few and far between in this match, coming up to half time it looked as if Villa and Palace would be entering half time level at 0-0. But no, in the last minute and seconds of the first half, a Hourihane corner, unwillingly helped along by the Palace defence landing at the feet of Trezeguet, in miles of space, to sidefoot the ball into the back of the Palace net, to give Aston Villa a crucial 1-0 lead going into half time in a hotly contested match at Villa Park. 1-0 Villa.
Second half came and it was already tense. With Villa's reputation for letting leads slip away into defeats this season, many Villa fans, including me could barley watch the second half initially, despite relative dominance from the team in claret and blue without dominating possession. This feeling was compounded when a penalty call was ruled out by VAR against Villa and Grealish who was to adjudged to have trod on Van Aanholt's foot, rather than the other way around (Grealish did go down a bit theatrically, and I agreed both now and at the time of the incident that this was not a Villa penalty).
The nerves did not abate.
Alas, the nerves were abated significantly in the fifty-ninth minute, almost immediately after Villa's penalty was ruled out by VAR, with the aftermath of a Villa corner resulting in a ball being helped over the Palace defence, deflecting into the feet of Trezeguet, who put the ball past Guaita into the Palace net to extend Villa's lead over the Eagles to two goals to nil. 2-0 Villa.
There was a huge chance for either Davis or Trezeguet (on a hattrick) to give Villa a three nil lead late on in the contest after Matt Targett fizzed a wonderful ball into the Palace box, but alas, neither forward managed to get a touch and the score remained at 2-0 Aston Villa.
Very cautious optimism from the majority of Villa fans came with the final whistle, when Villa secured their eighth win of the season to reduce the gap to safety to four points, with West Ham and Watford set to play each other on Friday night with the clubs 16th and 17th respectively, which would give Villa hope with a win for either side, providing Villa kept up their side of the bargain and won their game at Goodison Park against Everton (A loss for Bournemouth against Manchester City would also be a very welcome result).
Is there a chance? Possibly, but let's not give our hopes up, and lets await what happens in the next game against the Toffees on Thursday night.
Trezeguet fired Villa to victory and a glimmer of hope for survival, with the Egyptian winger bagging a brace, with one goal coming in either half to secure, what was in the end, a comfortable victory for the Villans, with Crystal Palace coming off the back of five consecutive defeats in the Premier League. The game certainly did not escape VAR controversy, with Sakho' opening goal for Palace in the sixth minute of this crucial match from a corner (with absolutely horrendous defending on show for Villa). VAR ruled out the goal citing handball (which even I as a Villa fan thought should have been a goal, knowing that if this was Villa's goal being ruled out I would have been raging). MASSIVE let off for Aston Villa. 0-0.
With clear cut chances few and far between in this match, coming up to half time it looked as if Villa and Palace would be entering half time level at 0-0. But no, in the last minute and seconds of the first half, a Hourihane corner, unwillingly helped along by the Palace defence landing at the feet of Trezeguet, in miles of space, to sidefoot the ball into the back of the Palace net, to give Aston Villa a crucial 1-0 lead going into half time in a hotly contested match at Villa Park. 1-0 Villa.
Second half came and it was already tense. With Villa's reputation for letting leads slip away into defeats this season, many Villa fans, including me could barley watch the second half initially, despite relative dominance from the team in claret and blue without dominating possession. This feeling was compounded when a penalty call was ruled out by VAR against Villa and Grealish who was to adjudged to have trod on Van Aanholt's foot, rather than the other way around (Grealish did go down a bit theatrically, and I agreed both now and at the time of the incident that this was not a Villa penalty).
The nerves did not abate.
Alas, the nerves were abated significantly in the fifty-ninth minute, almost immediately after Villa's penalty was ruled out by VAR, with the aftermath of a Villa corner resulting in a ball being helped over the Palace defence, deflecting into the feet of Trezeguet, who put the ball past Guaita into the Palace net to extend Villa's lead over the Eagles to two goals to nil. 2-0 Villa.
There was a huge chance for either Davis or Trezeguet (on a hattrick) to give Villa a three nil lead late on in the contest after Matt Targett fizzed a wonderful ball into the Palace box, but alas, neither forward managed to get a touch and the score remained at 2-0 Aston Villa.
Very cautious optimism from the majority of Villa fans came with the final whistle, when Villa secured their eighth win of the season to reduce the gap to safety to four points, with West Ham and Watford set to play each other on Friday night with the clubs 16th and 17th respectively, which would give Villa hope with a win for either side, providing Villa kept up their side of the bargain and won their game at Goodison Park against Everton (A loss for Bournemouth against Manchester City would also be a very welcome result).
Is there a chance? Possibly, but let's not give our hopes up, and lets await what happens in the next game against the Toffees on Thursday night.
My Man Of The Match: Trezeguet (9) - The Egyptian winger scored the two crucial goals for Villa in this game to claim an all important three points in Villa's survival bid.
One last thing...
As I have already mentioned, this is a crucial victory for Villa, but we are nowhere near the top of the mountain as it were, with so much work still needing to be put in to give Villa a chance of survival. But there is a chance, and we have to take confidence from this result and use it to try and get the points to attempt to secure Premier League survival, which would be miraculous, given Villa's situation. I will leave you on a cool Villa statistic which you have most probably seen, but Aston Villa are now the first team in the Premier League this season to win a league game on every day of the week - which is quite an achievement given that Aston Villa have only won eight games all season long!