> **Villa beat Bournemouth as Dave Woodhall looks forward with optimism,**
**After the machinations of the past few days a low-key win where the team never needed to get out of second gear would have been preferred on Sunday afternoon, although it looked unlikely given that the opposition were doing so well. And so it proved, with Villa doing a lot more than winning with minimum effort.**
The team had a familiar look. Emiliano Buendia started, Youri Tielemans was on the bench and Harvey Elliott nowhere to be seen. I’d have swapped Buendia and Tielemans, but many people know a lot more about football than I do and Unai Emery is one of them.
Matty Cash ran onto a good ball early on and almost chipped the keeper then after 28 minutes a free-kick just outside the box was perfectly placed by Buendia to give Villa the lead. If that was good, five minutes before half-time Morgan Rogers put the ball through a defender’s legs and laid it off fpr Amadou Onana to score from 25 yards.
Two up at the break and with Buendia in particular looking capable of winning the game on his own, we seemed on the way to that routine win. Then the visitors started the second half like a different team and Villa were rocking for a while. Emiliano Martinez showed that he might not be on top form but he’s still capable of match-winning moments when acrobatically pushing a goalbound lob over the bar and then saving a penalty.
That gave Villa new heart, as did a raft of substitutes, which again showed Unai’s genius. There aren’t many managers who would have risked a triple substitution with a two-goal lead but there aren’t many managers like him. On came Ross Barkley, another player unrecognisable from his pre-Unai days and six minutes later his back header from a Lucas Digne corner put Villa three up and uncatchable.
Then Donyell Malen entered the proceedings and within seconds he’d received the ball from another corner with his deflected shot giving Villa a fourth goal. Another three points and after the weekend’s results were completed Villa are going into the next international break sixth in the table and only headed one way- which is a far cry from the last one.
In the end it wasn’t exactly a routine win; in fact it was perhaps the best performance of the season. Buendia was man of the match but Martinez’s contributions meant that in terms of importance he wasn’t far behind. Malen isn’t a bad player to bring off the bench and Tielemans once more showed his class. Ollie Watkins grafted but isn’t getting the breaks at the moment while John McGinn celebrated his new contract by doing pretty much what he does every match. One day he’ll have to be replaced and whoever gets the job will have to have impressive feet to step into those shoes.
Villa haven’t really hit top form yet which makes tat sixth place the ore impressive. Looking at the rest of the table there are a couple of clubs above us that you can’t imagine lasting the distance, while of course the teams below us will stay there. Who’d have thought at the start of the season that a point at Sunderland would look a good result while losing at Liverpool would be so annoying?
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