Aston Villa secure all three points on Friday night
Aston Villa ended a run of 15 top-flight fixtures without victory when they secured all three points against Everton on Friday night.
The Toffees went into the game as favourites following their win over Watford the week prior.
Aston Villa had also just come off the back of a disappointing loss to Bournemouth, losing 2-1.
However, the game didn’t pan out as many expected.
Despite a ten minute period in which Everton dominated early on, Aston Villa ran riot.
The Villans had Everton all over the place at times and finally made their dominance pay when Wesley Moraes scored in the 21st minute to open the scoring.
The Toffees didn’t even look like threatening until late in the game when both Alex Iwobi and Moise Kean were introduced.
Kean even put an equaliser on a plate for Theo Walcott, but the former Arsenal man blazed over the bar from eight yards out.
Then, Villa made sure of all three points with practically the last kick of the game, with Anwar El Ghazi scoring in the 95th minute.
A first #PL win of the season for Aston Villa#AVLEVE pic.twitter.com/fSgwzQaKfI
— Premier League (@premierleague) August 23, 2019
The Villans will do alright this season
Initially this season, it did look a little doom and gloom for Dean Smith’s Villa.
Despite positivity over the summer, shoddy defending against both Tottenham and Bournemouth brought the Villans back down to earth a little bit.
However, Dean Smith’s team actually defended very well in this game.
While Everton did have a few chances, such as Iwobi hitting the post, Walcott’s miss and Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s big chance, Villa did limit the Toffees.
With that in mind, fans will be looking to see more defensive performances like that in the coming weeks.
If they can replicate it, they should do well this season.
Everton need their creative players to step up
It really doesn’t look great for Everton right now.
Despite some decent results initially this season, the loss against Villa emphasised a lot of things.
One that Everton fans have known about for a while now is the lack of creativity.
Despite having some brilliant passers such as Bernard, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Andre Gomes, the Toffees look devoid of ideas for most of the game.
All three of those players failed to create many clear cut chances, which they are expected to do.
Instead, substitutes Alex Iwobi and Moise Kean brought more threat in 35 minutes than any of those players throughout the whole game.
FT | Blues pay the price for not being clinical enough at Villa Park.
2-0 #AVLEVE pic.twitter.com/nfAko5hlwl
— Everton (@Everton) August 23, 2019
Everton desperately rely on their new signings
That brings us nicely onto our third point.
Just three games into the season, Everton already rely heavily on their summer signings.
Alex Iwobi and Moise Kean looked like genuine threats when they came on, and both could have contributed to an equaliser.
Jean-Philippe Gbamin also missed the game through injury, with both Schneiderlin and Gomes struggling.
If Everton are to mount a top-six challenge this season, they need their signings fit and ready to start games ASAP.
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