[Albion] Brighton & Hove Albion vs Aston Villa *** Official Match Thread ***

[BensGrandad]

Showed glimpses of real talent. And more than a few glimpses of not being all that BOTHERED.



Considering he is supposed to be a fringe first team player, and is 3 or 4 years older than most of the debutants, he was comfortably the most disappointing performer on the night. An awful lot more to come, you would hope.

How opinions differ as I thought that Baluta was one of the bright sparks of the evening at times along with Richards and obviously Roberts but the rest just made up the numbers and were disappointing if they are to be on the way to the first team. As they had played together so often I expected them to show the ability to read each others game better and know what they were going to do.

It was said by somebody on the train back to Brighton that GP was forced into the U23s as he has 9 of the team against Newcastle out with sickness or injuries, not sure if it was true. It wouldnt be fair on them to name the failures but there were many.who didnt rise to the occasion for whatever reason..

 

[Recidivist]

Think the crowd (15k+) deserved better than putting out a wholly uncompetitive team.

Even Duffy looked disinterested, I thought, and it was his mistake that led to the first goal!

Can't say I was too impressed with any of the youngsters, with the possible exception of Connolly and Richards, and, if we didn't care about the result, then why did we set up to be so negative with only one up front most of the match!?

Can't blame the kids but I can't see what it achieves to throw them in against seasoned premier league players who just waltzed through them time and again?

I really enjoyed our cup run last year so to just throw in the towel from the start rather annoys me.


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[Eddiespearritt]

Showed glimpses of real talent. And more than a few glimpses of not being all that BOTHERED.



Considering he is supposed to be a fringe first team player, and is 3 or 4 years older than most of the debutants, he was comfortably the most disappointing performer on the night. An awful lot more to come, you would hope.

Baluta played in Stephens position until Duffy went off when he moved into defence. In Stephens role he's certainly able to match the amount of balls given away when trying to launch an attack - shocking pass completion rate I should think. Very disappointed, condiering his apparent quality during the Under 21 Euros in the summer.

I also felt sorry for Connolly - playing 40 yards distantly ahead of anyone else - and still nearly scored two goals. Bizarrely on his best chance he could have passed to DUFFY who had made the supporting forward run into the box.

Rotten team selection - and I'm afraid some odd tactics too. As a positive the crowd did realise at a certain point that just supporting the youngsters, in what was going to be a kicking, was ok.

 

[Richy_Seagull]

Baluta played in Stephens position until Duffy went off when he moved into defence. In Stephens role he's certainly able to match the amount of balls given away when trying to launch an attack - shocking pass completion rate I should think. Very disappointed, condiering his apparent quality during the Under 21 Euros in the summer.

I also felt sorry for Connolly - playing 40 yards distantly ahead of anyone else - and still nearly scored two goals. Bizarrely on his best chance he could have passed to DUFFY who had made the supporting forward run into the box.

Rotten team selection - and I'm afraid some odd tactics too. As a positive the crowd did realise at a certain point that just supporting the youngsters, in what was going to be a kicking, was ok.

Don’t let facts get in the of way of “Stephens can’t pass” myth eh.

He’s been absolutely brilliant in the DM roll this season so can only assume you haven’t seen us play yet.

 

[fosters headband]

Many of us paid just a tenner.

A tenner I could have put to better use if I had known we were just going to gift the tie to Villa
What really annoys me is we have a better team out on loan than the one the club put out to give Villa a free entry to the next round

 

[blue-shifted]

It’s the sort of match you can’t give player ratings for as it wasn’t a real match, but I have comments

Button – May be a decent shot stopper, but his distribution means he’ll never be seriously considered a contender for Maty’s jersey
Davies – Some decent runs forward
Bong – Provided some much needed strength
Duffy – An aerial threat, weirdly seems to give up the chase for their second goal. Expecting a foul?
Roberts – Very good on the ball for such a young player. You could see how much the goal meant to him. Still a lot of work to do, some bulking up, as you would expect.
Jenks – Well done young man. Composed on the ball and athletic for his years.
Baluta – Looks a CB rather than a midfielder to me. Loose in possession and well off the first team on this performance.
Cochrane – Mixed bag. Looked a wing back playing further forward than he should. Didn’t get up to support Connolly
Gwargis – A few nice moments. Same as Cochrane, needed to get closer to Connolly
Richards – Clear evidence of talent. Consistency has to be his aim, as you would expect from a young player
Connolly – He’s got a lot to learn, but he’s a proper threat and a useful outlet up the channels. Ploughed a lone furrow I believe the phrase is

Potter – I’ll give him a mark. 0. Sorry mate. You went too far.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

How opinions differ as I thought that Baluta was one of the bright sparks of the evening
..

Whilst accepting that it is purely a matter of opinions - that statement, to me, is absolutely incredible. Did you really go to the game?

As they had played together so often I expected them to show the ability to read each others game better and know what they were going to do.
..

How many times HAD many of them played together? Baluta and Richards have barely played any games for the club. Davies, Connolly, Gwargis, Cochrane play U23s, but the rest - Roberts, Longman, Jenks, Spong are U18s / scholars.

 

[Bakero]

Just had a quick look at the match thread on the Villa forum. They seemed to be quite unaware that they were playing against a bunch of kids. Lots of talk of players demanding a place in the starting 11 on Saturday.

 

[Johnny RoastBeef]

How opinions differ as I thought that Baluta was one of the bright sparks of the evening at times along with Richards and obviously Roberts but the rest just made up the numbers and were disappointing if they are to be on the way to the first team. As they had played together so often I expected them to show the ability to read each others game better and know what they were going to do.

It was said by somebody on the train back to Brighton that GP was forced into the U23s as he has 9 of the team against Newcastle out with sickness or injuries, not sure if it was true. It wouldnt be fair on them to name the failures but there were many.who didnt rise to the occasion for whatever reason..

Are you sure you were watching the correct player? In midfield he was awful, gave the ball away several times and allowed his man to run in behind him without tracking so many times I lost count.

I saw his performances in the u21 Euros where he looked very talented, but last night he was nowhere near as good.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

Just had a quick look at the match thread on the Villa forum. They seemed to be quite unaware that they were playing against a bunch of kids. Lots of talk of players demanding a place in the starting 11 on Saturday.

The Villa fans are idiots.

 

[LamieRobertson]

Many of us paid just a tenner.

Some of us paid £15 plus the same again for parking as they weren’t sure what time they would finish work

 

[pasty]

Couple of tasty draws in the next round

Chelsea v Man Utd
Arsenal v Liverpool

Crawley and Colchester get rewarded for getting this far by playing each other Although that guarantees a League 2 club in round5

 

[Swansman]

Never heard so many people be negative about giving a lot of youngsters from the academy the chance to get experience and show their skills against qualified opposition. If you want to create something long term, that is what you need to do. Sounds like Broom might have misjudged the mentality of the Brighton fans and should have gone with Tony Pulis or Sam Allardyce instead.

 

[Napper]

Never heard so many people be negative about giving a lot of youngsters from the academy the chance to get experience and show their skills against qualified opposition. If you want to create something long term, that is what you need to do. Sounds like Broom might have misjudged the mentality of the Brighton fans and should have gone with Tony Pulis or Sam Allardyce instead.

BHA fans have embraced the youth getting chances in pre season , the premier league and in the league cup.

The negatives you hear are more to the fact that last night was effectively a whole side of kids. When people have forked out cash to see a training exercise then you will get comments. Most people would of preferred to see more of a mix of first team / kids. Unfortunately , our injury situation dictated this to an extent.

 

[TottonSeagull]

Never heard so many people be negative about giving a lot of youngsters from the academy the chance to get experience and show their skills against qualified opposition. If you want to create something long term, that is what you need to do. Sounds like Broom might have misjudged the mentality of the Brighton fans and should have gone with Tony Pulis or Sam Allardyce instead.

What a load of rubbish!
Most are all for giving the youngsters a chance. However to have an almost complete team of youth and U23 players is complete folly! The youngsters need to play with experienced players to learn!
I thought the young players did brilliantly yesterday but Potter completely disrespected the cup and the fans with that selection.

Taking time off work and making a 170 mile round trip to watch a game that was men against boys was a total waste of time. I will not be bothering with any cup games again whilst GP is in charge. I have no problems with GP and I think he is doing a decent job but I totally disagree with his team selection last night!

I don’t think many Brighton fans give a toss what you think!

 

[hans kraay fan club]

Never heard so many people be negative about giving a lot of youngsters from the academy the chance to get experience and show their skills against qualified opposition. If you want to create something long term, that is what you need to do. Sounds like Broom might have misjudged the mentality of the Brighton fans and should have gone with Tony Pulis or Sam Allardyce instead.

Nobody really cares what you think, tbh.

Either way you're hopelessly wide of the mark. Most of us are more than keen to see academy prospects given a chance - in the first team. This was NOT a first team. this was an entire U18/U23 side offered up as sacrificial lambs, on the altar of pragmatism. We threw the game, pure and simple, and could not argue if we recieved some form of punishment for it.

It was disrespectful to the competition, disrespectful to every person who took time out and spent money to attend, and did very few favours to the young players themselves.

If you had taken time out of work yesterday afternoon, then suffered a 5 hour round drive in horrible weather, to actually attend the game, rather than sat in ****ing Sweden, pontificating to actual fans of the club, you'd probably feel differently.

 

[Swansman]

BHA fans have embraced the youth getting chances in pre season , the premier league and in the league cup.

The negatives you hear are more to the fact that last night was effectively a whole side of kids. When people have forked out cash to see a training exercise then you will get comments. Most people would of preferred to see more of a mix of first team / kids. Unfortunately , our injury situation dictated this to an extent.

Training exercise? Most of these players have not played in any game even close to the "importance" (or rather "size") of this; its an extraordinary experience to these youngsters. Once they get the chance in more important games, it will be really valuable having played in a real game against PL level players with 15 000 people watching.

Sorry you all feel "tricked" or whatever having to pay money to watch some future key players & fan favorites. Maybe next time you'll get a manager who puts the ticket price first in his reasoning in how to build the team for the future and selects some half-injured players and their possible replacements for the next PL game into your "Carabao Cup" side.

I think people are being plain silly and dont really understand what Bloom/Potter is trying to do.

 

[HantsSeagull]

What a load of rubbish!
Most are all for giving the youngsters a chance. However to have an almost complete team of youth and U23 players is complete folly! The youngsters need to play with experienced players to learn!
I thought the young players did brilliantly yesterday but Potter completely disrespected the cup and the fans with that selection.

Taking time off work and making a 170 mile round trip to watch a game that was men against boys was a total waste of time. I will not be bothering with any cup games again whilst GP is in charge. I have no problems with GP and I think he is doing a decent job but I totally disagree with his team selection last night!

I don’t think many Brighton fans give a toss what you think!

Nobody really cares what you think, tbh.

Either way you're hopelessly wide of the mark. Most of us are more than keen to see academy prospects given a chance - in the first team. This was NOT a first team. this was an entire U18/U23 side offered up as sacrificial lambs, on the altar of pragmatism. We threw the game, pure and simple, and could not argue if we recieved some form of punishment for it.

It was disrespectful to the competition, disrespectful to every person who took time out and spent money to attend, and did very few favours to the young players themselves.

If you had taken time out of work yesterday afternoon, then suffered a 5 hour round drive in horrible weather, to actually attend the game, rather than sat in ****ing Sweden, pontificating to actual fans of the club, you'd probably feel differently.

This and this. I didn't have to travel any further than Hove but it cost £40 for two tickets and an evening of my life I wont get back. No intention of trying to win the game. If you are going to play a youth team in its entirety charge me a fiver and I might come anyway. I wont be coming back for any future Carabou Cup games. If that makes me a bad fan, then so be it.

 

[fosters headband]

Never heard so many people be negative about giving a lot of youngsters from the academy the chance to get experience and show their skills against qualified opposition. If you want to create something long term, that is what you need to do. Sounds like Broom might have misjudged the mentality of the Brighton fans and should have gone with Tony Pulis or Sam Allardyce instead.

Can I asked how you and Swansea's fans, would have taken Potter putting out a squad which was 90% under 23 players in the cup tie against Man City last season

 

[Swansman]

Can I asked how you and Swansea's fans, would have taken Potter putting out a squad which was 90% under 23 players in the cup tie against Man City last season

Since that was the FA Cup which Potter values very, very highly, it wouldnt have happened, and people would not have been too pleased - though incredibly excited.

When Swansea put 90% U23 players in the Carabao Cup tie against Crystal Palace, people in general were incredibly happy to see the future of the club.