So you just reiterate my point, which is that the role of a manger goes beyond team selection? Even beyond that, I am of the opinion that a manager should tailor his starting XI to the opposition to give his team the best chance of winning. I wouldn't want to use the same tactics against Burnley and Wolves. Or Arsenal and Sheffield United. Lampard selecting the same teams for those fixtures is a point against him. Also, how could I have known he'd make these dumb selections as they hadn't happened yet?
And re: Villa, we absolutely could have played Emerson there given that Villa disproportionately attack down their left via Grealish - Azpi being a more conservative fullback there makes sense. We also could have played, I dunno, Havertz as the right sided 8 instead of Kante, we could have played Werner down the middle, we could have played Zouma instead of that absolute muppet Christensen, etc. I think Lampard has been very fortunate to escape criticism for his selection as it seems our players emerged unscathed - Pulisic and Kante in particular have had troublesome hamstrings over the past 2 years so playing both of them was mind-bogglingly stupid.