Aston Villa returned to winning ways on Wednesday night, and the return of Tyrone Mings to our starting line-up proved to be an influential factor in our 3-1 victory over Brentford.
As well as going eight games without a win across all competitions, Villa’s porous defence was proving to be a critical issue for Unai Emery, as we’d conceded 11 goals in our previous four Premier League games.
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With the worst defensive record of the top 10 sides in the standings, something had to change, and the Villa boss opted to make one tweak to his backline in midweek, with Mings replacing Pau Torres.
We lose a lot with no Torres in the line-up, as his composure, technical quality and passing ability all make him a key cog in how we want to play, while he has made improvements to the defensive side of his game too.
However, Mings was drafted in to solidify and stabilise a struggling defence, and the 31-year-old centre-half did exactly that with a commanding performance against Brentford.
He made six clearances, blocked one shot, won six of nine duels and was a key presence in marshalling the Villa backline to maintain a higher level of organisation and discipline.
With 52 touches and a 90 percent pass completion rate, Mings was also effective in possession too.
Nevertheless, it was his ability to make crucial interventions and clear danger that stood out as he did it so efficiently and consistently, and he was certainly deserving of the praise from Emery below after the game.
“Fantastic, fantastic Tyrone Mings,” Emery said in his post-match press conference. “He played matches in the Carabao Cup and Champions League but in the Premier League it was the first match in one year and three months. We were speaking about it before the match of course, to help him and try to feel comfortable with everybody supporting him playing like he was playing before his injury.
“I think he played fantastic, he was helping us in our box defending and clearing some important balls. He was as well in their box on set pieces threatening them. I think it’s important how he’s again recovering his good form like today he did. And of course he’s going to be very tired tomorrow, but for Saturday he will be available.”
Time will tell if Mings is able to displace Torres over a prolonged period, or as suggested by Emery, perhaps the pair could play alongside each other in a reshuffle of our backline.
Having made a costly error in the Champions League and after a defeat in his Carabao Cup outing, it hadn’t been the best of returns for Mings from a team perspective, but we’ve struggled defensively with or without him so far this season.
While we were unable to keep a clean sheet against Brentford, it was a fundamental win to build our confidence back up and gain momentum, and there was undoubtedly a big step up from a defensive perspective as we had a more solid structure to our set-up and looked harder to break down.
Even when coming under pressure in the second half as the visitors threatened to mount a fightback, we were more robust and resilient in seeing out that period and going on to win the game.
The influence of Mings was key in that, and it’s hoped that we can make this a pillar of our performances and progress moving forward having found important answers in this win.