Unai Emery admitted it is time for a deep dive into Aston Villa’s propensity to concede from transitions after Crystal Palace ruthlessly exploited them here.
First it was Darwin Nunez and Mohamed Salah as Liverpool scored both goals after Villa surrendered possession from their own set-plays. This time it was arguably even more spectacular as Crystal Palace’s Ismaila Sarr bulldozed his way through to open the scoring.
Villa manager Emery, who ended the worst run of his managerial career with four consecutive defeats in all competitions, refused to criticise his defence. It is, however, a back line lacking authority and leadership in the injury-enforced absence of Ezri Konsa and Tyrone Mings a spectator on the bench.
“We are conceding more goals than normal and have to try to find a solution,” Emery said.
“Of course we conceded one transition today and they scored. After we played against Liverpool, we made the same mistake again today.
“Overall we had more chances, dominated the match and wasn’t conceding a lot of them. We deeply analysed the transition against Liverpool, this time it was different but even allowing for that, they scored.
“Against Liverpool we had two around the box and today we had three around the box.
“But of course it is a balance in terms of how many players we can have in the box and how we react and respond when they are running at us.”
Sarr held off Ian Maatsen after Jean-Philippe Mateta put him through with a perfect through ball to pierce Villa’s high line in the fourth minute. The forward then buried his shot inside Emiliano Martinez’s near post.
The equaliser came in the 36th minute. Ollie Watkins waltzed around Dean Henderson and tapped into the unguarded net after John McGinn put him through with a perfectly weighted pass. Villa survived a VAR call for offside.
Villa were awarded a controversial penalty in the 44th minute after referee Tim Robinson was asked to look at the pitch-side monitor. It came after Will Hughes appeared to tread on Leon Bailey’s left foot twice but it looked like a harsh decision. Goalkeeper Henderson brilliantly tipped away Youri Tielemans’ spot kick.
A minute later, Justin Devenny fired home to put Palace ahead. Cheick Doucoure sent Sarr racing away down the right after a Villa attack, his cross was missed by the sliding Jean-Philippe Mateta but Devenny slotted it in.
Villa levelled in the 78th minute when Ross Barkley sent a glancing header high into the net from Tielemans’ in-swinging corner.
But Villa had Martinez to thank for preserving a point after he made a breathtaking save. He tipped substitute Jeffrey Schlupp’s first-time angled drive onto the post.
“I’ve got two emotions,” Palace manager Oliver Glasner said.
“The big one is being proud of the team, because of the performance and the style we played in, in the circumstances of missing many attacking players.
“We were always playing forward and attacking, creating chances and we scored two fantastic goals.
“But the other emotion is a bit of disappointment because we led twice then conceding the second goal after a set-play is not what we want.”
