Aston Villa’s resurgence under Steve Bruce continued on Saturday – as a double from Ivorian talisman Jonathan Kodjia was enough to ensure that their opponents would be making the trip back to Blackburn empty-handed.
The weekends triumph ensured that Bruce kept his unbeaten record in the Sky Bet Championship, since the 55-year-old was appointed as the boss of the Midlands outfit in mid October.
Twenty seven year old Kodjia was the star of the show at Villa Park on Saturday, as his double cancelled out Charlie Mulgrew’s first goal for Rovers, which the Scotsman notched in the 54th minute of the game.
Villa rose to 14th following the victory – and in this article, I’ll be taking a look at three things that we learned from Saturday’s encounter.
Kodjia is on the scene
Jonathan Kodjia has had a relatively quiet start to life at Villa Park since his summer move from Bristol City; however he really announced himself onto the scene in Saturday’s fixture.
The Ivorian netted his sixth and seventh EFL Championship goals on the weekend, before being replaced by Ashley Westwood in the 74th minute.
Boss Steve Bruce was full of praise for Kodjia, and after the game proclaimed:
‘I thought Kodjia probably had his best game for the club and hopefully we can continue moving upwards’.
It will be interesting to see if Kodjia can continue his personal resurgence under the new boss in Saturday’s fixture – a challenging visit to the South coast to face inform Brighton and Hove Albion.
Villa can win dirty
Saturday was far from a beautiful, convincing triumph for Villa – but I think that’s something which will encourage the Holte End faithful.
It was a cagey encounter in the Midlands, with fine margins separating the two regarding possession, pass succession and number of opportunities created from open play.
However, a scrappy 2-1 victory over a team which occupy a relegation place in the second tier I think will give Villa fans as much optimism as a 4-0 triumph over a play-off competitor would – as it would suggest that this team possesses the mental toughness to see out games, in a division which is renowned for being so competitive.
Ross McCormack isn’t the player many thought that they were getting…
Back in August when it was revealed that Aston Villa had beat Norwich City to the signature of Ross McCormack – the Villa Park faithful must have been thinking that they’d made an acquisition that would lead their ascent of the Sky Bet Championship table.
But, that hasn’t been the case. The Scotsman has only scored 2 goals in 14 outings for the Villans, and was withdrawn in the 68th minute of Saturday’s encounter.
There is no doubt that McCormack withholds the goalscoring prowess to succeed at this level – but Villa fans will be getting impatient; the former Leeds and Fulham man needs to find his feet, and fast.
