Analysis: Little new learned as Aston Villa make another early FA Cup exit

To Tottenham, Peterborough and Swansea, you can now add Fulham to the list of opponents who have, without too much exertion, managed to knock Villa out of a competition they have not won since 1957.

Next term Villa will be targeting their first FA Cup win for five years. It is a lamentable recent record, one which not so long ago would have been the cause of serious anger among supporters. This 2-1 defeat at Craven Cottage, meanwhile, is the kind of result which would once have featured on the back pages. Yet no longer.

Instead the prevailing mood of fans on Saturday evening was one of acceptance, albeit grudging in some quarters, at a defeat which would sting for a few hours, but probably not a whole lot longer.

For while all those broadcasters who pay for the rights might still talk up the glory of the Cup, the truth is what took place by the banks of the River Thames was much more representative of the competition as it now exists, at least in the third round: One much-changed team against another a little less, both keen on victory but always aware defeat was the more preferable outcome to a draw.

Villa boss Dean Smith confirmed as much in his post-match press conference, before going on to claim the Cup had ‘lost much of its sparkle’.

There are many who might baulk at such comments but frankly, on this occasion, Smith’s honesty felt refreshing. You don’t have to like what he did on Saturday to understand it and he is hardly the only manager this weekend who was prepared to risk a Cup exit in order to save key players for other challenges ahead.

Fulham boss Scott Parker also made six changes to his most recent Championship XI and this was not a tie either team could claim to have busted a gut to win.

The first half was played with all the intensity of a pre-season friendly and for a while it was tempting to wonder whether asking both teams to draw lots would have delivered more drama. It might have least saved the 12,980-strong crowd the journey.

Neither was Smith’s decision to make nine changes to the team which had won 2-1 at Burnley in midweek, leaving the likes of Jack Grealish and Tyrone Mings at home, exactly short on mitigation.

After all, his primary task this season is keeping Villa in the Premier League, a challenge which has been made considerably tougher by the loss of three key players to long-term injury over the space of just 12 days across the festive period.

Little wonder, in such circumstances, he was reluctant to subject Grealish to what would have been his fifth match in a fortnight.

The prospect of Wednesday night’s Carabao Cup semi-final first leg at Leicester, when the line-up named will be far stronger, will also have played into his thinking.

In truth, the XI named at Craven Cottage was, at least in terms of strength, not dissimilar to the type which has seen Villa progress to the last four of that competition.

But then that run has been aided by a series of opponents who have fielded significantly-weakened teams. Fulham’s team, despite the changes, was still relatively strong and pre-match suspicions there was little between the two XIs on paper were proved to be correct in practice.

If there was one big disappointment on Saturday, it was the failure of several fringe players to stake their claim for more regular playing time, or change the perception Smith’s squad lacks quality in depth.

All told, this did not feel like an afternoon when we learned anything particularly new about Villa, or their need to find reinforcements in the January transfer window if the chief goal of Premier League survival is to be achieved.

The performance of Jonathan Kodjia, for instance, will have done little to change the opinion their most pressing need is up front. Villa’s only fit striker, the Ivory Coast international would admittedly have scored were it not for the brazen cheek of Anwar El Ghazi, who volleyed home his team-mate’s goal-bound lob just inches from the line.

But for that and a few brief flashes, Kodjia put nowhere near enough pressure on the home side’s backline, his display typical of the inconsistency which has blighted his Villa career since the days when he was, briefly during the 2016/17 season, their star man.

Yet, right now, Smith has no-one else to turn to and Kodjia is a shoo-in to start on Wednesday. At least the head coach has options in midfield, where Henri Lansbury did little to repair the damage done by his limp showing at Watford a week previously. On the wing, Jota helped create Villa’s goal and saw a shot saved, but was otherwise barely noticeable for the other 75 minutes he was on the pitch.

The loss of Tom Heaton for the rest of the season means the other area where Smith may look to strengthen is in goal, though for now Orjan Nyland has the No.1 shirt and on Saturday it was difficult to pinpoint anything the Norway international did particularly wrong.

He was beaten by two stunning strikes which, probably, no goalkeeper on the planet would have stood a chance of saving. Nyland also produced a fine stop to prevent Joe Bryan from doubling Fulham’s lead just a minute after Anthony Knockaert’s opener, before then denying the Frenchman a second of the match in stoppage time, while his handling – so often shaky during his early months at the club – was assured throughout.

The quality of all three goals was completely in contrast with the rest of the contest, on what was for Villa another regrettably forgettable FA Cup afternoon.