Arsenal smash any lingering confidence Villa had from FA Cup

Carles Gil.

There's your list of Aston Villa players who did really quite well today. Everyone else was varying levels of mediocre to shockingly bad. The defense decided to crumble, allowing five goals (although one was a penalty, so perhaps we only credit them with four [though the penalty came because the defense were bad so five it is]).

The midfield didn't even bother to show up. Carlos Sanchez got a lot of flak on twitter for being atrocious, and it's true that his passing was terrible today. But he also seemed to be the only midfielder willing to go to the ball and do anything, so I'm willing to go a bit easily on him.

And the attack? Well, it was okay. Carles Gil continues to be a revelation. But we continue to have trouble with that whole scoring of goals thing. In the 78th minute, Villa reached TEN HOURS without a Premier League goal. The last they scored was on December 20 against Manchester United. Andi Weimann had a great chance (on a Gil cross) and couldn't get it in. And Christian Benteke did more of his stand-around-looking-useless schtick that's getting so tiresome.

I don't really have it in me to analyze this match today. There was an intent to attack, and a high line. I like that! The problem was, the players couldn't be bothered to get back on the counter, and Arsenal have a very good counter. That's how you end up shipping four. That's how you end up being crushed.

Next weekend is Chelsea. Let the bleeding continue.