Aston Villa 1, Tottenham 2: Mat Kendrick's big match verdict
Dec 27 2010 by Mat Kendrick, Birmingham Mail
“WE only had ten men” and “You’re not very good”.
As the frozen and frustrated Villa Park faithful trudged home last night, it didn’t need the gloating Tottenham taunts to state the obvious. But it’s true.
Spurs did only have ten men and Villa were not very good – and that pretty much tells the entire story.
The two managers might as well have cancelled their post-match press conferences because little further comment was needed.
When Harry Redknapp inflicted the first defeat of Gerard Houllier’s claret and blue reign with a 2-1 win after a Rafael Van Der Vaart double and a Marc Albrighton consolation in October, Villa could take pride in defeat.
But, when they were undone by the same scoreline with the same scorers last night, ‘deja vu’ was not the French phrase Houllier needed. It was ‘sacre bleu’.
In fairness, Villa did eventually bombard Heurelho Gomes with shots – but there was an inevitability they would still lose.
It was Tottenham’s possession football which prevailed – despite referee Martin Atkinson’s attempts to even things up with dodgy decisions against both sides.
Jermain Defoe’s controversial sending off midway through the first half changed the game – bizarrely, in Tottenham’s favour.
Rather than putting them at a disadvantage, Defoe’s dismissal for a 27th-minute elbow on James Collins seemed to inspire Spurs and handicap Houllier’s hosts.
Tottenham stroked the ball around calmly, even to chants of olé from the travelling fans, before patiently picking their moments to hit Villa on the break. In contrast, the home side lacked movement and a late pitch invader produced their best timed run of the match.
While Spurs celebrated the space-finding, goalscoring return of Van Der Vaart, Villa welcomed back Fabian Delph for his first action since early April after cruciate ligament surgery.
Houllier chose to include Delph ahead of fit-again Nigel Reo-Coker and Stiliyan Petrov, who were on the bench, alongside Jonathan Hogg in a new-look central midfield. Villa missed injured Ashley Young and without playmaker Barry Bannan, who was also among the subs, were devoid of inspiration in the centre.
As for John Carew, Stephen Ireland, Richard Dunne and Habib Beye, as the Boxing Day sales began the out-of-favour four were again out of sight rather than on display in the shop window.
