The Times - UK (2022-01-03)

6 1GGV2 Monday January 3 2022 | the times

thegame

Gregor Robertson

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TONY

CASCARINO

Weekend talking points

Liverpool have become the

Harlem Globetrotters of the

Premier League. They are the side

you most want to watch, the great

entertainers. It is fun at both ends

of the pitch, and therefore great for

neutral viewers, but a worry for

Liverpool fans.

I fear some of it comes down to

Virgil van Dijk, who is nothing like

as imperious as he used to be. At his

best he is majestic. He can cruise

through games, barely breaking a

sweat. But, at the moment, his

performances are average. I’ve

watched him this season and often

thought that Joël Matip has been

better, so I was worried for Liverpool

when Matip was ruled out with

Covid-19 before the Chelsea game.

You could blame it on Van Dijk’s

long-term injury, which ruled him out

of most of last season, but we are now

20 games into this season, so I’m not

sure that’s an excuse. He is getting

caught, and is not as concentrated as

he should be for a centre half. He

needs to get back into gear.

MY TEAM OF THE WEEK

4-3-3 Lloris

(Tottenham)

Dallas

(Leeds)

Firpo

(Leeds)

Burn

(Brighton)

White

(Arsenal)

Wissa

(Brentford)

Partey

(Arsenal)

Lanzini

(West Ham)

Antonio

(West Ham)

Kovacic

(Chelsea)

Mac Allister

(Brighton)

Burnley look like

a relegation side

Van Dijk is not at his imperious

best and it is hurting Liverpool

Since they came back into the

Premier League in 2016, I’ve

never really worried about Burnley

— they never look like a team who

are going to go down. Sean Dyche,

and his style of play, always ensures

good consistency, but it looks like

they may be coming to the end of

the road. They have a lot of players

out of contract in the summer,

including James Tarkowski. It no

longer looks a settled place.

Benrahma profits

from Moyes magic

I’ve been really impressed with

Said Benrahma and how he

has settled in at West Ham United.

Usually when a player comes from

the Championship into the Premier

League you are looking at them

scoring a maximum of about half

the goals they were getting. Take

Ivan Toney, who, like Benrahma

and Ollie Watkins, was at Brentford

in the Championship. Toney was

getting 30-plus goals, so you’d

expect him to get perhaps 13 goals

in a Premier League season.

But now Benrahma has settled in,

he looks like he can be just as good

in the Premier League — he scored

17 goals in his last Championship

campaign (2019-20), and he looks

like he could equal that in the top

flight, with eight this season already,

in all competitions. It is very rare

that happens with a player coming

up a division, so it is a big credit to

the management of David Moyes,

who did the same thing with Jarrod

Bowen, signed from Hull City, too.

Most players just do

not know the rules

When there are VAR disputes,

you hear people say that there

ought to be an ex-player at Stockley

Park, where the video assistants are

based, looking at it. Nonsense. Players

don’t know the laws — they talk as

though they do, but 99 per cent, at

least, don’t. And even if you do learn

them, they keep changing — it’s a

full-time job to keep up. The job of

the VAR is to apply the law, not just

to offer a sense of what seems right.

Yet for their dominance,

they could not hold the lead

until half-time. Roerslev,

playing a neat one-two with

Christian Norgaard, put in a

sudden kick down the right,

bursting forward and holding

off Matt Targett long enough

to dig out a cross. That ball

found its way to Wissa,

whose first touch and curling

20-yard finish past Emiliano

Martínez matched the skill

of Villa’s opener.

The game seemed destined

to be remembered for its

flashes of brilliance. Early in

the second half Buendía

attempted to outdo his

This was an old-fashioned, ungainly
tussle that will be remembered for the
artistry of its goals. Aston Villa will
wonder how they came away with
nothing, but Brentford, who had been
second best, did what they have done
before at home on their Premier
League adventure: dug in, held on
and fought back.
It was another late winner, clipped
in, for his first Premier League goal,
by the excellent Mads Roerslev, that
turned a hard-fought draw into a
joyous victory and handed Brentford
a third home win in four games. That
came after the teams had exchanged
stunning first-half goals, Danny Ings
firing in for Villa after a sensational
assist from Emiliano Buendía, then a
lovely finish from Yoane Wissa to
undo the visiting side’s largely
dominant display.
“It was a bit of a head-scratcher at
half-time, to be level,” Steven Gerrard,
the Villa head coach, said. “The
second half we had a lot of
possession, we created enough to
score more goals, but we haven’t
executed in our situations.
“I’m really disappointed how we
conceded the second goal because we
were passive, and it’s a catalogue of
errors from our point of view. That’s
the reason we haven’t taken anything
from the game. We go away
disappointed and frustrated, but
we’ve got ourselves to blame.”
The opening goal came early and
was a thing to marvel at. Buendía,

receiving the ball to feet from

Douglas Luiz and with his back to

goal, controlled and spun majestically

to find space, sufficient to pick out the

run of Ings, who took a touch and

fired low past Álvaro Fernández. It

was a fine finish, but the deftness of

touch and canny assist from Buendía

— who has not always delivered on a

£30 million investment — were a

metric of the creativity shown by

Gerrard’s team in the first half.

It gave Villa, already on top after

the first 20 minutes, an added lift.

Minutes later John McGinn shot

narrowly over Fernández’s crossbar

from 20 yards, and Villa soon had

Brentford chasing the coattails of

their increasingly lively front three.

Brentford edge art and graft show

previous contributions with a goal all

of his own, lining the ball up and

curling an audacious 25-yard effort

narrowly past the post. It did not take

long for the game to settle back into

the pattern of the first half, with Villa

passing their way through a Brentford

midfield that could not keep pace.

Neither of the two names that have

linked these clubs in recent years

were present. Villa were missing Ollie

Watkins, absent for reasons Gerrard

would not divulge, and miss him they

did, particularly when the fine

creative work of Buendía and

Bertrand Traoré found itself in need

of a clearer target. Dean Smith’s

legacy, meanwhile, continues to be

felt by both clubs, even if great strides

have been made since he said a final

goodbye to both these sets of fans.

Villa’s improvement since Gerrard

took over has been palpable, and

though it showed here in their

performance, Brentford remained a

threat. On 75 minutes Frank Onyeka

danced through the defence from

midfield and opened up his body for a

low shot, which was superbly turned

on to a post by Martínez. It was the

kind of surprise they have shown

themselves capable of springing all

season. Could Villa hold their nerve?

Not for long. With seven minutes

left Roerslev appeared in space inside

the box on the right, and, taking aim,

fired a fizzing drive that Martínez

could only beat back into the path of

the 22-year-old Dane, who won the

game with only his second senior goal.

“It’s a fantastic Brentford story, and

a great story in general,”

Thomas Frank, the Brentford

head coach, said. “It’s classic

us, buying a young player

who hadn’t played a full

season in his career. Now

he’s made nine starts in the

Premier League and is

growing. A great assist and

an even better goal today.”

Ings had a chance in the

final knockings to level from

close range, but a strong hand

from Fernández clawed the

ball to safety, before the

substitute Trézéguet sought to

trick his way to a penalty with

a laughable dive in stoppage

time. Brentford hung on. Villa

will wonder how this got away.

2

Wissa 42

Roerslev 83

RATINGS

Brentford (3-5-2): A Fernández 7 — E Pinnock 7,

P Jansson 7, M Bech Sorensen 7 — M Roerslev 8,

F Onyeka 7 (V Janelt 80min), C Norgaard 6, M

Jensen 8 (S Baptiste 60, 7), S Canos 7 (Ghoddos 54,

7) — Y Wissa 8, I Toney 8. Booked Onyeka, Toney.

Aston Villa (4-3-3): E Martínez 8 — M Cash 7, E Konsa

6, K Hause 6, M Targett 5 — J McGinn 6, Douglas

Luiz 7, J Ramsey 6 (M Sanson 69, 6) — B Traoré 8

(Trézéguet 77), D Ings 7, E Buendía 8.

Booked Ramsey, McGinn.

Referee C Pawson.

Brentford Aston Villa

1

Ings 16

ROBERT O’CONNOR

NIGEL KEENE/PROSPORTS/SHUTTERSTOCK

T h u w s h P g a

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Roerslev fires in Brentford’s winner, having also set up their equaliser, to leave Gerrard, the Villa head coach, frustrated

that his side had let their early lead slip. Below, Trézéguet makes a theatrical attempt to win a penalty late on for Villa

9

Points won from

losing positions

by Brentford

this season

8

Times Villa have lost

since the start of

last season after

scoring the first goal