Burnley wilt under Villa's fire

Aston Villa 5 Burnley 2:THE BEST kind of wins, brighter Formula One drivers such as Jackie Stewart and Niki Lauda used to say, are those achieved when driving as slowly as possible. For the best part of an hour yesterday Villa pootled along, like a Ferrari keeping pace with a Mini. Then they yawned, glanced in the rear view mirror, and accelerated into the distance, leaving Burnley choking on the dust.

“Instead of shutting up shop after their second we opened a few more doors and allowed them to trash the place,” was the Burnley manager Brian Laws’s colourful summation of a 12-minute period during which Villa scored four goals, and could have scored six.

Martin O’Neill described his team as “electric”, and they certainly looked as though someone had applied crocodile clips and turned up the voltage.

Judging by his full-strength selection, next Sunday’s League Cup final against Manchester United was the last thing on O’Neill’s mind, never mind Wednesday’s FA Cup fifth-round replay against Crystal Palace, but it was hard to avoid the conclusion that, as a group, Villa’s players had come to a sub-conscious collective decision to harbour their resources for battles to come.

Burnley buzzed around, and deserved the early lead when Jack Cork, on loan from Chelsea, took advantage of a slightly fortunate rebound to put David Nugent clear into the right side of the Villa penalty area. Nugent drew the Villa keeper, Brad Friedel, and crossed for Steven Fletcher to fire home.

Even now there was little response, either from Villa or the home crowd, who seemed to be aware how much their team had in reserve. They might have become more concerned if Villa had not got back on level terms as quickly as they did, and the equaliser was a poor goal for the visitors to concede, in more than one sense.

Ashley Young’s free-kick from the left had pace, but it was hit head-high straight at the Burnley goalkeeper, Brian Jensen. It appeared to be a straightforward catch, but the Dane, as is his wont, stuck out both fists and succeeded only in deflecting the ball for a corner. Young took the corner, exchanged passes with James Milner, and whipped in another pacy ball, which bounced through the crowded penalty area and past the unsighted Jensen.

Having seen his side regroup and play out the rest of the first half, and the first few minutes of the second, Laws was a happy man. Soon afterwards he hardly knew what to think, because once Young, running on to a throw-in down the left, had outpaced the cover and crossed for Stewart Downing to angle his shot beyond Jensen, Burnley simply collapsed.

First Downing scored again after Jensen had saved in a one-on-one with Gabriel Agbonlahor. Moments later Agbonlahor outpaced Clarke Carlisle to cross for Emile Heskey to side-foot home from close range. Downing then saw Jensen block his side-footed volley, but shortly afterwards Heskey and the excellent Milner combined cleverly to set up Agbonlahor for a fifth.

Martin Paterson’s late consolation goal will have meant little to Burnley’s supporters. This was their 14th away game this season, and their net return is still only a paltry one point.

“We started pretty slowly, and to come from behind in a game where expectations of winning were very high is pleasing,” said O’Neill. “The spell in the second half was great – the movement, but especially the finishing, which hasn’t been our strongest point this season.”

He picked out the wingers Young and Downing for particular praise, especially Downing, who in fitness terms is still playing catch-up after missing the early part of the season with injury.

Laws, still slightly shell-shocked, insisted Burnley can and will recover from the trauma.

“It was a crazy 12 minutes. If you go 2-1 down you don’t go and chase an equaliser in the next 30 seconds, and leave the back four exposed,” he said. “They brushed us aside, but we allowed them to do it by going too expansive and giving them too much time and space. We will keep on working to eradicate that sort of mindset.

Guardian Service