Premier League news: Aston Villa break scoring drought in Sunderland draw but problems persist
Aston Villa finally scored their first goal of the Premier League season at the fifth time of asking on Sunday in a 1-1 draw with Sunderland at the Stadium of Light.
Although the breakthrough will no doubt have brought some much-needed relief to manager Unai Emery, Villa remain mired in the bottom three after a poor start to the campaign.
Here, Sports News Blitz writer Harrison Pearce examines why Emery’s team could not get the job done against the Black Cats.
Offensive struggles
Villa created more scoring opportunities at Sunderland than in previous games, but that isn’t saying much despite Matty Cash’s 67th-minute screamer.
And even though Cash is known to take a notorious long shot, eyebrows must be raised for the home goalkeeper, who just parried it into the top corner.
The celebrations did not last long, though, as Wilson Isidor scored an equaliser for Sunderland with his third goal of the season.
Emery and company threw everything at their opposition in the last 10 minutes, and they had two great chances with Harvey Elliot’s shot going wide and Ollie Watkins’ header missing.
In the end, a draw was a fair result as neither side was clinical enough to hurt the other’s defence.
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Deflated performances
Aston Villa’s first five league games haven’t been good by any stretch of the imagination, and Emery will accordingly be putting all his focus on the Europa League clash against Bologna on Thursday night.
Indeed, the Spanish manager managed to win the Europa League with Sevilla after a similarly bad start to the season, so perhaps the Midlands club can get its act together and at least play well in cup competitions.
One major disappointment so far has been Morgan Rogers, who only made an impact at Sunderland when he was moved out to the left-hand side.
The English international is one of Villa’s standout players, capable of impacting a game like nobody else, but he hasn’t looked anywhere near his best recently.
Yet, while he has looked decidedly flat, so has the whole forward line, and they really need a positive result sooner rather than later.
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Emery questions
Former Arsenal manager Emery is one of the best managers in the Premier League and has received deserved praise for transforming Aston Villa over recent years.
However, the start of this season has been disappointing by his high standards, leading to question marks about his future at the club.
It is a hard one to call because the lack of transfers and injuries have meant that Emery has not had a fully fit squad to play with for the most part.
Therefore, it is likely way too early to be thinking about waiving the white flag at Emery.
With that said, you do not want the third-year curse to come back to haunt him, and from the club’s perspective, they cannot afford to become stagnant in this day and age, especially after all the recent progress at Villa Park.
Of course, it is worth remembering that getting rid of him might not change anything either as the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.
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