I made the trip to Villa Park on Friday night to watch the clash between Aston Villa and Leeds United.
I give my view of the Leeds performance in the 1-0 defeat.
Peacock-Farrell 8
He kept the scoreline down with a string of quality saves. He has been one of the few shining lights in an awful end to the season.
Dallas 7
He always puts in a good shift. He tried to get involved pushing Leeds forward in the second half.
Pennington 6
He was at fault for the goal when he lost Lewis Grabban but otherwise, he had a good game. A tremendous last-ditch tackle to deny Scott Hogan a shot on goal late in the game.
O’Connor 7
He is another youngster that has come into the team and played really well. The third game in a week since making his debut last weekend and he has done well in each game.
Pearce 8 Star Man
A superb performance from Pearce. A tough battle against Robert Snodgrass and he was given little protection from those players in front of him.
In the second half, he got more forward and he came close to scoring when he flicked a corner just wide.
Vieira 6
A hard game in midfield against Jack Grealish.
Phillips 5
He almost equalised for Leeds in the second half, but otherwise, I thought he was off the pace throughout the game.
Hernandez 5
He looked a yard off the pace throughout the game and he did little to help Tom Pearce when Villa often had a spare man on the Leeds left.
Alioski 5
He huffed and puffed with no end product. He looked better when Samu Saiz came on to help him.
Ekuban 3
A poor excuse for a centre forward. He couldn’t hold the ball up when we needed someone to put a foot on the ball. Time to try some of the youngsters a go up front because they can only be better than the excuse we have for centre-forwards this season.
Roofe 5
He has only just come back from injury and he doesn’t look fit. He seemed laboured in his running throughout the game.
Subs
Saiz 6
He gave us a bit more impetus going forward but he is guilty of trying to do everything himself.
Grot 0
Grot coming on for Alioski stopped our impetus in the game. A shocking 25 minutes on the pitch.
Lasogga 0
He looked tired running onto the pitch when he came on.
He showed little interest in being out there and a complete waste of space.
Summary
I will be honest, I went expecting a hammering but thanks to Peacock-Farrell, the scoreline was kept down.
We showed little in their final third and our attacking options are embarrassing. The gulf in squad depth between the two sides was shown when we brought on Jay-Roy Grot and they brought on Albert Adomah. Looking at all the Aston Villa substitutes, the vast majority if not all of them would walk into our first team.
Whilst watching Leeds this year has been awful, the one thing to come out of it in the past month is the emergence of Peacock-Farrell, O’Connor and Pearce. All three had superb games. I think it is now time for Paul Heckingbottom to look at more of the youngsters in the final three games. I am sure they would show more commitment and desire than most of those currently pulling on the Leeds shirt.