Aston Villa gave themselves work to do once again this weekend, but Unai Emery saw his side come storming back to seal a 3-1 win over Wolves.
Second-half goals from Ollie Watkins, Ezri Konsa and Jhon Duran completed another memorable comeback, after Matheus Cunha had given the visitors a lead in the first half.
READ MORE: Villa player ratings vs Wolves: Decisive impact from key trio in comeback win
It was an opening 45 minutes that Wolves were the better side in and ultimately deserved their lead, as Emery was critical of our performance before the break before praising the reaction in the second half.
Nevertheless, it was another important victory as we continued our fine start to the campaign, and we now go into another busy week with more momentum and positivity behind us.
Emery management, substitutions decisive once again
The Villa boss was highly critical of our first-half performance, even going as far as to label it the worst half he’s seen us play at home since he arrived. With no shots on target, we looked off the pace, sloppy and fell behind to a soft goal born from our own mistake, and so it was no surprise that he was displeased.
However, once again his managerial brilliance came to the fore, as aside from inspiring a reaction from his players after the break to step up our tempo and intensity, his changes were crucial in helping us turn it around to secure all three points.
From the introductions of Leon Bailey and Ian Maatsen at half-time to Ross Barkley and Jhon Duran coming on around the hour mark to give us another big push and to maintain our sustained pressure to break Wolves down, it was another masterclass from Emery in helping produce another big comeback. Ideally though, he’d probably quite like to take a lead and have something to protect more often.
Morgan Rogers finally makes breakthrough with goal contributions
The 22-year-old conceded in the week that he was missing an end product to his play so far this season, having failed to register a goal or assist in our opening five games.
Some of that was out of his control in terms of wayward finishing from his teammates at times, but Rogers has lacked a clinical edge to his play in front of goal, despite enjoying a really positive and impressive start to the season to follow on from his exceptional development last year as he has been a huge threat for us in attacking areas.
However, he produced two excellent assists in this one to help Watkins and Duran get on the scoresheet, and he’ll hopefully take a lot of confidence from that and find more consistency in the final third moving forward.
Is Ezri Konsa at right-back the best option?
Given we won the game and Konsa scored one of our three goals, it’s perhaps hard to argue that it wasn’t a good decision from Emery in the end.
However, there is still something not quite right about the Villa defender being shifted across, and it certainly doesn’t help when Diego Carlos comes in and makes a costly mistake that leads to a goal.
It surely can be argued that Konsa is at his best as a centre-half and shouldn’t be moved over, particularly when we have right-back options available. Nevertheless, we’ll need rotation and different tactical solutions at different times this season, and it’s something that Emery will likely utilise again in the coming weeks and months.
Villa’s strength in depth inspiring our early-season form
After a busy summer trying to build and improve the Villa squad, we’re seeing the rewards of that with so many important contributions from across the group, particularly those coming off the bench to make a positive impact.
Aside from the obvious choice in Duran who is enjoying a superb run of form, Villa brought on Ian Maatsen, Leon Bailey, Duran and Ross Barkley against Wolves, all of whom had an influential role to play in our comeback.
The starting XI is obviously doing a great job too, but with the tactical solutions and individual strengths and characteristics that Emery can call upon, with Matty Cash, Tyrone Mings and Boubacar Kamara still to come back, we’ve not just got strength in depth on paper, but the Villa boss is finding ways to get decisive contributions from them.
John McGinn injury concern
There was one sour note in the win this weekend, as John McGinn went off with a hamstring injury at half-time, and it’s expected that he will miss our upcoming games, perhaps including Bayern Munich’s visit in the Champions League.
It’s hoped that further tests and treatment can reduce his time out, but the Villa skipper will be a big miss given what he adds to the team both in terms of his quality and leadership.
As noted above, Villa have the strength in depth to cope with the setback and Bailey will probably come in and fill that void, but it’s hoped McGinn can make a speedy recovery as we’ll need his presence and ability to set the standard on the pitch for big games in the next few weeks.
