Poor Villa fall from grace

Chelsea is some 110 miles from Villa Park. Yet the Villa we saw against Manchester City yesterday seemed like a million miles from their display against Jose Mourinho’s side two weeks earlier, writes Tim Nash.

Rarely can a team have fallen so far so quickly. Villa departed for international duty the toast of the Premier League.

Captain Gareth Barry became the talk of the nation for his back to back performances for England, John Carew made it three goals in two games for Norway, Thomas Sorensen and Martin Laursen kept two clean sheets for Denmark and Shaun Maloney was in the squad that clinched one of Scotland’s most famous results of recent times in France.

Confidence was overflowing in the camp.

Throwing all these things into the mix and Villa surely had all the ingredients to continue their solid start to the season? Right? Wrong.Sometimes one player’s performance can sum up his team’s display.

At Eastlands yesterday, Nigel Reo-Coker, the man who has quickly become the beating heart of this emerging Villa team, emerged as a depressing symbol of his team’s miserable afternoon.

It wasn’t that nothing he tried came off. In truth, he just couldn’t impose himself in the way he has done ever since his £7.5m move from West Ham.

He wasn’t alone as Villa produced their worst showing of the season.

You could label the phrase ‘below par’ at virtually every member of Martin O’Neill’s side.

Carew, who O’Neill revealed afterwards was battling a groin injury, was again a shadow of the giant who terrorised defences at the end of last season.

And on a day when he wanted to ram Sven Goran Eriksson’s five-year England snub down his throat, Barry was again Villa’s best player.

But he was only the best of a bad bunch and even his form dipped several notches below his imperious best for England four days earlier.

Devoid of their ’snap’, unchanged Villa were starved of all the dashing verve, pace and energy which has underpinned their embryonic season.

The quality stamp of approval hammered so liberally all over the Chelsea performance simply vanished in the space of 90 minutes at soggy Eastlands.

Incisive midfield and wing play that had sliced open Fulham and Chelsea was mysteriously absent.

In truth, City weren’t much better. But in a drab game, Eriksson’s fledgling outfit enjoyed more possession as well as the two main chances.

The key moment came three minutes after the break when Michael Johnson neatly tucked away after carving open Villa’s flimsy defence via a one-two with Elano and the going-to-ground of Martin Laursen.

Earlier, Johnson had served notice of his intentions when keeper Scott Carson smothered his clean-through shot with the outside of his foot when Martin Petrov split the defence.

Other than that, highlights were as common as sunshine on a grey Manchester day.

Gabriel Agbonlahor’s tight-angled shot blocked near the line and Carew’s header wide from point-blank range as Micah Richards did his best to put him off was the best Villa could offer.

Replays showed Luke Moore’s own version of Maradona’s ‘Hand of God’ goal was rightly disallowed as he stooped to head Barry’s free kick into the net.

Villa competed reasonably well in the first half but were less convincing and increasingly desperate as the game wore on.

So thin was the quality of the game and indeed the patchiness of City’s performance that Villa could have snatched an equaliser late on.

But Moore’s effort apart, there was precious little to dine out on as the gloss of the glorious win over Chelsea turned to rust in the Manchester rain.

O’Neill tried to freshen things up by bringing on Maloney for the subdued Carew in the 66th minute, a move forcing Ashley Young to swap flanks to the right, and Agbonlahor to go up front.

Personnel may have changed, but little altered in the penetration of Villa’s attack.