The result:
It was a good result for us in a sense. Aston Villa are a notoriously poor team at the moment and them going down today proves that. However, the result is a good one. Its no secret that we need to keep pressuring City to at least try to get the fourth spot.
The performance:
For the most part we were pretty much what we've come to expect from Manchester United under Van Gaal. Slow, zombie like passing and very few players who look like creating much of anything.
I thought in spells we looked okay though, I thought Rooney had a good game and Rashford was involved throughout. I even thought Valencia was pretty good, he got up and down and he obviously got the assist for Rashfords goal. He also put a few nice passes in to the likes of Mata though, definitely an improvement over some of his previous performances.
Towards the end we fell apart. It was a real shame because if we'd have pressed on and got a second the post match thread would probably be totally different to what it is now. That's the problem with the team at the minute though, we just seem to coast along and hope the opposition aren't good enough to punish us.
Players I thought were poor:
The obvious mentions are the likes of Mata, Memphis and Rojo. I thought Memphis looked nothing out of the ordinary against one of the worst if not the worst side in the league. I want it to happen for him but I don't think it ever will.
Mata is someone I'm a big critic of. I often think he's vastly over rated pretty much everywhere you look.
He's slow, he's weak, he isn't creative enough, he can't provide the killer pass and most importantly he looks a shadow of himself from when he was with Chelsea.
I hope if we get someone new in next season he can have some kind of resurgence but I highly doubt it.
Chris Smalling, all he's cracked up to be?
Smalling is someone who throughout the year has seemingly won the hearts of many fans and pundits alike.
He started the season in fine form, often making up for Blinds lack of experience in the centre back role.
Over the course of the season I think he's been on a steady decline though. Particularly for the past couple of months I don't think he's looked as good as he previously was. In one on one situations he looks a bit lost, and in the air he doesn't look a patch on what he once did.
Daley Blind, ending on a high note:
I was really impressed with Blind today, I'm a big big fan of Blind and this season he's really made the left centre back slot his own. He's improved massively whilst tackling, and looks a lot stronger than he did at the start of the season.
That block towards the end actually shows how much he's improved as the seasons gone on. Personally I think with him we definitely don't need a new left centre back, and if Smalling can pick up his form from earlier on in the season we might only need a backup in the summer providing Jones and Rojo go (which I wouldn't mind one bit if they did)
It's just occured to me that I've made this a lot longer than it need be so sorry for that!