It has been a couple of days now since we scored to draw late on up at Villa Park and it gets more and more impressive each day I think about it. To come away from Villa Park being disappointed with a point certainly tells us something about the way the lads performed on Wednesday night. I thought we were incredible the second half and quite frankly I was shocked at how bad Villa were. This team only seems to be going one way at the moment.
We went one goal behind to admittedly what was a fantastic strike by Villa`s new £15m signing Jonathan Kodjia in a first half that never really seemed to get going in my opinion. Villa started the game with 4 strikers but didn`t actually have that much attacking threat or flare in my opinion. As well as this, the Bees seemed potentially a little bit in awe of the occasion in the first half. However, just before the interval saw us come to life a bit and this was a sign of what was to come in the second half.
The second half saw us dominate possession and we looked firmly the better team. Dean Smith was quoted in West London Sport as saying “We changed it a little bit and went 4-4-1-1, put Romaine in behind and I thought we dominated the second half.” The tactical change did exactly that and we controlled every aspect of the game.
It came late on but John Egan`s equaliser was fully deserved and after that second half performance we easily could have got all 3 points. Dan Bentley was once again superb I thought and despite the first half goal, he could handle everything that was thrown at him. Our defence looked excellent as well, with both Dean and Egan having a lot of success in the air and being composed on the ball.
After two tough away games at Brighton and Villa, to come away with 4 points is a brilliant effort and looking towards Saturday against Preston, we should be happy with no less than all 3 points.
