Aston Villa 0-1 Burnley: Instant reaction to a dull loss to end the season

Today meant nothing. Burnley were relegated and Aston Villa were mathematically safe. So just keep that in mind when you look back over this insipid 90 minutes of football. Aston Villa spent the match looking every bit the team who were already looking forward to next weekend's match against Arsenal at Wembley in the FA Cup final.

Burnley opened the scoring in the 6th minute with a Danny Ings header that came as the result of a Leandro Bacuna header that didn't clear out of the box. That ball then pinged off of the heads of two other Burnley players before finding Ings who finished brilliantly.

After that, Burnley looked largely in control. Villa couldn't create chances, and continually got to nice wide areas only to be thwarted by bad crosses. Leandro Bacuna, in particular, had himself a bad day.

The second half wasn't much different for Villa or Burnley. Neither side really got many chances, and neither side seemed too bothered by it. When the final whistle blew, it was a 0-1 loss that had been coming since the 6th minute.

I won't even bother with the quick thoughts today. It was clear that Villa were only half caring and the inclusion of Jed Steer in the lineup and Charles N'Zogbia as a left back showed that Tim Sherwood wasn't too bothered by all of this. It would have been nice to have a win going into Wembley, but whatever. It's a new match on Saturday, and Tim Sherwood's Aston Villa have shined brightest when they've most needed to. Let's quickly forget this, take our 17th place finish that we all would have been ecstatic about in February, and move on.