Villa 1-2 Bournemouth. Aug 17th
It was Villa’s first home game of the season today and while 40,000+ congregated at a sunbathed Villa Park, the Aberdeenshire branch of the supporters club were 398 miles away, dodging showers from grey slated skies and relying on Radio 5 updates.
My two young boys played tennis on the village’s cinder court (I remember slide tackling on a surface like that as a kid, never again) while I endured Radio 5’s Southampton v Liverpool match commentary, making do with sporadic Pat Murphy Villa Park updates. He’s been reporting on Villa for decades but I can never work out whether Pat Murphy likes our club or not, I think it depends how he’s treated by the incumbent owners and management during press conferences. It wasn’t long before he was reporting on the first goal of the game, sixty seconds in fact, our new keeper Heaton conceding a mindless penalty which was emphatically converted. Ten minutes later, Murphy was back on the airwaves again, this time describing Bournemouth’s second goal, a deflection after our new signing Luiz gave the ball away. Hmm, two down after ten minutes, not the Premiership return Villa Park had been hoping for.
I delivered the news to my boys and they received it in differing manner, Ernie (6) with a non-plussed shrug of the shoulders, a kind of ‘so what, I’m busy playing tennis’ response, while Freddie (11) stopped in his tracks and looked to the skies in disgust, “Two nil! But it’s only Bournemouth! Aren’t we at home?” His shock wasn’t entirely warranted mind, before Dean Smith turned things around halfway through last season he had become accustomed to his Dad’ regular announcement of Villa reverses, usually against much lowlier opposition. I suppose our promotion has given him a taste of relative success and a sense of entitlement, a few more weeks in the Premiership will soon knock that out of him.
By the time the final score came in the boys had ceased looping cloud high returns to each other on the tennis court and were back home on the X-box. It was my solemn duty to report that Luiz’s wonder goal from twenty five yards had not been sufficient to redress the earlier arrears and we’d gone down to our second defeat of the new season. Hey ho, it’s Everton at home this Friday and it’s on Sky so a chance for the Aberdeenshire Junior Villa Massive to watch Villa instead of biffing tennis balls at their father.
Highlights below...
My two young boys played tennis on the village’s cinder court (I remember slide tackling on a surface like that as a kid, never again) while I endured Radio 5’s Southampton v Liverpool match commentary, making do with sporadic Pat Murphy Villa Park updates. He’s been reporting on Villa for decades but I can never work out whether Pat Murphy likes our club or not, I think it depends how he’s treated by the incumbent owners and management during press conferences. It wasn’t long before he was reporting on the first goal of the game, sixty seconds in fact, our new keeper Heaton conceding a mindless penalty which was emphatically converted. Ten minutes later, Murphy was back on the airwaves again, this time describing Bournemouth’s second goal, a deflection after our new signing Luiz gave the ball away. Hmm, two down after ten minutes, not the Premiership return Villa Park had been hoping for.
I delivered the news to my boys and they received it in differing manner, Ernie (6) with a non-plussed shrug of the shoulders, a kind of ‘so what, I’m busy playing tennis’ response, while Freddie (11) stopped in his tracks and looked to the skies in disgust, “Two nil! But it’s only Bournemouth! Aren’t we at home?” His shock wasn’t entirely warranted mind, before Dean Smith turned things around halfway through last season he had become accustomed to his Dad’ regular announcement of Villa reverses, usually against much lowlier opposition. I suppose our promotion has given him a taste of relative success and a sense of entitlement, a few more weeks in the Premiership will soon knock that out of him.
By the time the final score came in the boys had ceased looping cloud high returns to each other on the tennis court and were back home on the X-box. It was my solemn duty to report that Luiz’s wonder goal from twenty five yards had not been sufficient to redress the earlier arrears and we’d gone down to our second defeat of the new season. Hey ho, it’s Everton at home this Friday and it’s on Sky so a chance for the Aberdeenshire Junior Villa Massive to watch Villa instead of biffing tennis balls at their father.
Highlights below...
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