After coming under significant scrutiny and criticism last week, Aston Villa forward Leon Bailey produced a much-needed response in our win over Everton.
The 26-year-old provided the assist for John McGinn’s opener with good work down the right side before his crucial header allowed Ollie Watkins to win the penalty for our second.
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Bailey then turned goalscorer as he bagged our third to help make the three points safe, and although he went off with a knock in the latter stages, it was a positive performance on the whole, despite struggling in the early part of the encounter to settle.
For Unai Emery to continue to show faith in him, the Villa boss is obviously seeing something in the Jamaican international that he believes adds an important dynamic to our team performance, and thus he continues to select him, perhaps off the back of good work in training.
Bailey will likely be the first to concede that seven goals and seven assists in 56 appearances for Villa isn’t good enough for a player with his attributes and in the important role that he plays for us, and while we’ll always root for any Villa player to do well, there’s surely no disputing that he has to improve.
However, it’s only fair that we praise him when he plays a decisive role in a win if we criticise when he falls below the required standard, and so this past weekend was a lot better from him as he also impressed linking up with Moussa Diaby again following their stint together at Bayer Leverkusen.
Nevertheless, the true test is yet to come for Bailey. While it’s a boost and important that he helped pick apart a poor Everton side at home, he must now find consistency off the back of this display and deliver week in and week out if he is to fully convince us and show why Emery continues to back him.
That has been a significant problem for him since he arrived in August 2021, as he has never registered a goal or assist in back-to-back games in a Villa shirt. While we’ve seen flashes of his quality, it’s not enough from a player who has the level of responsibility he has in the side and the talent to offer so much more.
Time will tell if he starts at Hibernian in midweek or is rested for the trip to Burnley on Sunday, but while his performance against Everton was a big step in the right direction, we’ve seen him take that particular step before and so the challenge again now is to back that up and not continue to be consistently inconsistent.
— 876 (@FootieJa) August 20, 2023
