Aston Villa feel as if they are moving into relatively uncharted territory.
Excursions into the latter stages of the FA Cup have been rare in recent years. Not since they reached the final of this competition in 2015 have they made it beyond the fourth round, but that is their aim now.
Their selection on Friday night, Emi Martinez’s absence with a minor injury aside, signalled their intent as they pursue success on three fronts: the FA Cup, Champions League and Premier League.
Yet progress beyond West Ham United had looked unlikely through a poor opening 45 minutes and they trailed at the interval.
Unai Emery’s team revived after half time and the goal that completed their comeback was slickly constructed through 12 breathless seconds. A move that played out in a flash, starting with goalkeeper Robin Olsen and culminating in Morgan Rogers’ tap in from inside the six-yard box. In a game that had started with Villa players misplacing passes all too regularly, their winner could not have been more precise.
Emery wants his side to dominate games and be flexible in how they do so. “It depends on the opponent and how they face us,” explained the Villa manager. “Sometimes we can get to our attacking third quickly and sometimes slowly, but always we have to try and build and be comfortable with how we can control the game.
“We can score one goal with two passes, (or) we can score one goal with 20 passes, and this (flexibility) is really important for us.”
After conceding early on, a regular occurrence this season for a team who have fought back to win 12 points from losing positions in the Premier League to date, Emery’s men had to figure out how to exert some kind of control on this game. The answer was to take more risks, to go direct and offer more intent.
They benefited from some luck along the way. Villa, wearing a commemorative black strip to celebrate the club’s 150th anniversary, were spared having to face Crysencio Summerville in the second half after the winger, one of West Ham’s best players early on, was forced off with a hamstring complaint. That offered the hosts some encouragement.
Then there was the erroneous award of the corner from which Amadou Onana equalised, the ball having gone out without a deflection off a visiting player.
Nothing, though, can be taken away from the quality of Villa’s second and winning goal. Here is how the 12 seconds unfolded and how Aston Villa sliced West Ham apart.
With Olsen on the ball, West Ham hold a high line as they did for most of the game under new manager Graham Potter.
They invited Villa to play the ball out wide to Tyrone Mings or Ian Maatsen, with their left-sided players tucked in. But on this occasion, Olsen instead plays it into Youri Tielemans in central midfield.
Tielemans receives the ball on the half-turn.
He had struggled to pick out passes in the game up to then. On one occasion, in the 39th minute, Villa held the ball in a promising position after Boubacar Kamara won possession high up the pitch, but Tielemans overcooked a simple pass to the overlapping Leon Bailey in West Ham’s box. That had rather summed up his night.
But in this instance, Tielemans finds Emi Buendia in between the lines of West Ham’s defence and midfield, catching seven opposition players behind the ball in the process.
Buendia, who had been introduced 18 minutes from time for Kamara, occupied the No 10 position which Rogers usually plays, while Rogers stayed on the shoulder of the last man.
The substitute opts to play through Ollie Watkins into the inside left channel as Aaron Wan-Bissaka is not covering the right-back position but, instead, marking Villa’s wide threat Maatsen.
Watkins takes a quick glance up to assess where his team-mates are while gathering the ball. He thrives when given space to run in behind.
The striker’s first touch is to the inside and his nearest defender, Konstantinos Mavropanos, shows him back outside on to his weaker left foot and tries to prevent him from cutting inside further and dispatching a shot on goal.
With quick footwork, Watkins completes a stepover to shift the ball onto his left foot and fires a square ball across the box, through Mavropanos’ legs, in the direction of Rogers. The latter has already scanned the situation and anticipates the delivery.
Rogers moves toward the ball. He occupies the space in between the centre-back and full-back well, to the point neither is able to track his movements effectively and prevent the England international supplying a straightforward finish.
When asked what changed in the second half, Rogers said: “A bit of belief, a bit more patience, probably a bit more forward-thinking. We had a lot of the ball in the first half, and we weren’t risking enough or trying to go forward and make that difficult pass when, in the second half, we did.
“I know we didn’t always get it right but we created more chances, we created mayhem in their attacking third, and that’s where our goals came from.”
Villa benefited from being bold after the break. If their season is to progress on three fronts, they will need to emulate that approach in the months ahead.
(Top photo: Ben Stansall/AFP via Getty Images)
