Time to map out a plan for Villa's future
- Says blogger Matthew Turvey
West Brom 1 Portsmouth 1
Sunday 7th December 2008, 8:26PM GMT.
Albion were unable to gain revenge for last season’s FA Cup semi-final defeat despite taking a first half lead.
Peter Crouch’s second-half equaliser denied West Brom their first win in nine games and keeps Tony Mowbray’s side rooted to the bottom of the Barclays Premier League.
The England striker smashed home his ninth goal of the campaign to earn a 1-1 draw for Pompey.
Jonathan Greening had given the Baggies a deserved half-time lead as the visitors looked to be suffering a hangover from their mid-week UEFA Cup exit.
But, as against Wigan last weekend, Albion failed to make their superiority count and an improved showing after the break from the visitors earned a deserved share of the spoils.
Albion are a point adrift of Blackburn at the foot of the table, and to make matters worse striker Ishmael Miller was carried off late in the second half with a serious looking leg injury after an accidental clash with Portsmouth keeper David James.
Most of the early pressing was being done by the home side with Greening prominent against a Pompey side who did not look at their best.
Sol Campbell conceded a free-kick in a dangerous position 20 yards out after fouling Miller – and it led to the Baggies taking the lead after 39 minutes.
Chris Brunt crashed a powerful shot against the bar with James well beaten but Greening reacted first to the rebound and tucked away his first goal of the season.
There was a bit more urgency about Portsmouth’s play in the second half and after 58 minutes they drew level through Crouch’s ninth goal of the campaign – and seventh in the top flight.
Crouch’s fierce 20-yard drive took a slight deflection before flying past Scott Carson for the equaliser.
Sponsored Links
Business Awards
Read the full story here
Full coverage of awards celebrating the region's best businesses.
Lifestyle
Interactive Dining Out map
Hundreds of reviews by the Express & Star and Shropshire Star's teams to help you decide where to eat.
LIVE traffic updates
Road, rail and airport - latest
Our new, live traffic and travel updates service - check before you set out.
OUR NEW APP
Get the new E&S app
Download the Express & Star’s new app to your iPad or iPhone to get one week of access to our digital newspapers absolutely FREE.
expressandstar.com
Popular sections
Useful links
At least it wasn’t a defeat, but just picking up a point every now and again isn’t going to be good enough. Are there three worse teams in the Prem? I’m not sure…
Report abuse
We need to win games likes these. As we did when we played Wigan away, and Blackburn at home. Knowing our luck Sunderland will have a new manager in place this week before we visit the Stadium of Light. Then we play Man City who seem to be playing better. Why is it we always catch teams at the wrong time!!!
Report abuse
Portsmouth were there for the taking yet we could not complete the job – as usual.
Plenty of possession matched by plenty more wasted chances.
Again, at times our defense was very poor.
More fumbles from Carson, more hesitant defending from Robinson.
No win now in the last NINE games. If we cannot get a result at Sunderland next week then our survival prospects are next to zero.
Report abuse
“Slight deflection”????
The only reason the ball went in was the “massive” deflection -the shot was going nowhere (although we did back off again, like we did against Andrews of Blackburn).
Report abuse
4-5-1 at home AGAIN!
Miller crocked AGAIN!
Depressing and Boring sideways passing AGAIN!
Bottom of the League AGAIN!
Mowbray sees the positives AGAIN!
We are going down AGAIN!
Mowbray OUT…Before it is too late….
Report abuse
Happy Baggy..Where are you we need your words of wisdom to put some joy into our xmas before its too late, I know its hard to be hopefull but have faith …we will come good and a 17th place finish is still possible,we new it would be tough but onwards and upwards. Boing Boing
Report abuse
5.. Get a grip THE 4-5-1 was mor like 4-4-1-1 and I thought it looked ok (even motd 2 said it looked a good formation)
as for Mowbray out are you for real!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Report abuse
4-4-1-1 looked good, We can’t play 4-4-2 as we don’t have 2 strikers we created more chances with this formation than when we went 4-4-2 Mowbray out get a life or go support th Dingles
Report abuse
The one thing that concerns me is lack of goals. 7 goals all season is a worry. The fans calling for Mowbray’s head though have very short memories, we are playing the right way, 3 points takes us out of the relegation zone remember.
We do need a striker desperately, particularly now Miller’s out, draws now are not good enough against these sorts of teams. We’re not doomed yet, but we need to start winning otherwise we’ll get cut adrift.
Report abuse
Definitely not time to call for Mowbray’s head. I like the way we’re playing and I’m positive it’ll come good. Even if we get relegated I’d still want to keep ToMo because it’s so much fun to watch.
Report abuse
5 – Baggieandy – you’re an idiot
Not the time to be thinking about changing Managers, especially one with a very bright future in the game. Yes, we need to get a couple of players, but we will get the rub of the green soon, come on you baggies, we’re staying up!
Oh and P.S – 1. Distantbaggie – yes, there are at least 3 worse sides in this division – Stoke, Blackburn, Fulham, Wigan, West Ham, Sunderland.
Report abuse
Disapointed dropping a deserved 2 points,but a good allround display.Trust the GAFFA,listen to his words of wisdom.Last week he said the best finisher in training was Johno so had a bet on him him, came in 16 to one.As for No 5 If you cant enjoy good football take your girlfriend shopping instead.WE ARE STOPPING UP.
Report abuse
No.1 Distant baggie…
its not so much there being 3 worse teams, more a case of about 10 teams all being of more or less the same standard/quality (B’burn, Bolton Stoke Wigan Fulham, Sunderland, Newcastle, west ham etc…)
As there are so many of them they can’t all be in the bottom 4 or 5 places, so some of them find themselves in the lofty heights of top half of the prem! The big difference is they are well versed at this level (well most or them) and know how to pick up important wins or the odd point here and there (something we need to learn fast!) also as there are so many of them you get the current situation where evryone seems to be beating evryone else, all the more alarming is the fact we are currently the exception!
Report abuse
Kinver Baggie:-
Well no one wants to wants to sound defeatist but again it’s fairly obvious that we can’t cut it at this level, yes we pass the ball around but it’s more sideways and backwards than forward particularly when Greening gets the ball. We don’t possess any quality strikers so scoring goals is always a problem, how Mowbray must regret letting Phillips go (I smell Peace’s grubby hand in this debacle). If, as it looks very likely, we are bottom come the trnsfer window, who will want to come to us for a relegation fight?
Carson just doesn’t look confident at the moment so perhaps a ‘rest’ would do him good, Robinson is making too many mistakes and again a change here might be good so why not give Cech a try afterall we signed him from a club who’d played in the Champions League so surely he must have some quality otherwise why waste money signing him? The other change should be Greening, he might have had a better game yesterday but as I said earlier all to often when he gets the ball it goes sideways, backwards and everything slows down giving defenders time to get back.
From talk coming out of the club new quality signings appear very doubtfull and I think they are already planning for life back in the Championship – more money in Peaces back pocket I fear, afterall he’s been reluctant to sign players in the past at this time so don’t hold your breath for signings this time.
Report abuse
Sick of hearing ToMo,s stock answer every time we get done over,”plenty of positives”well, positives yes, but the more negative results we get the nearer we are to that dreaded trap door.We can all see the good attacking play,but no results.I do hope there is a good fairy on ToMo,s Christmas tree this year?It might not be J.P.
Report abuse
ToMo needs a good fairy on his Christmas tree this year thats for sure.”Pop”he sees “plenty of positives” every week but nothing else, but points dropped, or defeat.Where on earth are we going to pick up that goal scoring saviour,or two.i,ve no idea.but know ther was never a better time for Moore to show his worth.£3mill.Beattie scored a cracker tonight for Palace thats about 7 for them i think?should he be recalled?
Report abuse
“P.O.P”ToMo,s favourite phrase,”plenty of positives”.It isn,t going to keep us UP!It,s flaming goals we need but from where?.I fear the worst,if we cannot get any strikers that can finish we are doomed.No good keep giving every body at the club the benefit of the doubt.Something needs to happen and quick!
Report abuse