Murillo

And, you know, that area of the field with Nottingham Forest playing the five back and, you know, it's a very physical team.

And, you know, just as Tammy Abraham, right, who kind of was, we were, you know, kind of, hoofing balls up to for the majority of the second half and Murillo and those guys were just you know eating him alive back there but yeah Manzambi I think came on and the pace and you know that the kind of physicality of the Premier League I think he's going to take a bit of adjusting to I think it's probably an easier position to come into for Mbaye in that he kind of comes on in that wide position you get a little bit more time on the ball you get a little bit more squares you're usually in kind of 1v1s 1v2 situations and you're not you know, having to kind of slalom tackles and you're not getting closed down as quickly.

And, you know, it's a tricky place for Manzambi to come on to.

But, you know, I think with both of them, I saw green shoots, probably more so Mbaye than Manzambi.

It was going back and forth and it felt like a, it felt like, I really felt like a Villa winning was on the way or a couple of really big chances were coming.

But, you know, then, you know, I think at some point Murillo should have been off.

Got away with a lot.

He got one yellow, but again, I don't know how many times I've had to repeat myself about Aston Villa in the Premier League.

I'm not blaming wind.

I'm just saying the distribution from Zion Suzuki is, was not quite as good today.

And if you look in the first half, when he kicked the ball long, there was a moment the ball got held up and both McGinn and Murillo looked a bit confused by it.

And then in the second half, he's booting it long and it's going further.

so left themselves basically with just four centre backs when they play with three normally so you could sort of predict that that was going to happen but and it has happened straight away so there you go maybe Glasner won't do that again but nonetheless Ole Aina filled in at centre back and he did an admirable job in the end Yeah, so Munoz kept his place on the right-hand side.

Eina, Murillo and Diamande.

Now, as we know, Murillo is an absolute boss.

Diamande is also an absolute boss.

I mean, we already knew that, but seeing him today, he's really good.

I think he's just as good as Murillo, to be honest.

I really do.

Already, I just think he's top class already.

Where do we start? Where do we start? Let's start with the clown show that was the first half, right? Because...

Because I'll tell you what, like that weird freaking sequence where it comes off Murillo, nearly goes into the back of the net and then sells with a worldie save.

You have to call it a worldie save.

Keeps it from going over the line.

I thought...

And Joy was crap.

I thought Murillo was poor in the first half.

I thought we didn't get Gibbs White into the game.

Yeah, I mean...

This one's interesting, I guess, because you've kind of got potentially quite a new-look Villa attack against a fairly kind of settled Forest backline, other than the new shape, because you've got Murillo, Milenkovic, and you've got Sels back in goal, who've been kind of at the heart of all that's been good about Forest over the last couple of seasons, especially obviously when they got into Europe that season.

Jesus up front, I think, is a good player.

I've always liked Gibbs-White.

Ola Aina, Ousmane Diamande especially, both those two were fantastic.

There's still a little bit of a question mark over Murillo.

I mean, today I just felt that he, at times, just didn't look like he was completely at it.

And he gave away that needless foul as well in the second half in that dangerous area outside the box that Milenkovic had been guilty of in previous games.

And it just felt to me that...

There's something just not quite clicking with Murillo.

He's still a wonderful player.

We know that.

That really threw me off.

But then I thought, Murillo's on a yellow card.

McGinn was on that side.

Surely McGinn will end up trying something on him.

Keep giving it to him.

That's literally what everybody was saying in and around us.

Murillo's on a yellow card now.

Keep giving it to him.

And then on his bench, Tyreek Mitchell from Crystal Palace was a differential.

Murillo from Forest got 8 points.

Slater got 3 and Keleher got 2.

So that gives you an idea that try not to think of just the big hitters, which obviously we do have to make space for.