*Aston Villa boss Dean Smith says his side do not have a “mental block” about going ahead after they twice let the lead slip to draw with Burnley at Villa Park.*

The Villans went ahead when Anwar El Ghazi swept home Frederic Guilbert’s cross in the first half before Jay Rodriguez equalised early in the second.

John McGinn then restored their lead, firing home from Trezeguet’s cross, after the break, only for Chris Wood to restore parity shortly afterwards to ensure the points were shared.

Smith’s side have now dropped a league-high eight points from winning positions this season, having led against Tottenham, Arsenal and the Clarets.

“There is no mental block, that is for sure, we have dominated a team that some struggle to play against,” he said.

“There is a confidence and belief in the players - even after their second equaliser there was one team who were going to win it, it was going to be us.

“I think Burnley will go home with what they came for, we saw from the first minute how long it took them to take goal-kicks, they wanted to stop our rhythm.”

The hosts were the better side for much of the first half and could have gone ahead early on when Conor Hourihane saw his free-kick strike the upright, while McGinn had earlier seen his tap-in ruled out for offside by the video assistant referee.

But Burnley held firm and could have opened the scoring themselves when Dwight McNeil’s free-kick crashed against the crossbar.

The second half was a more even affair as the game’s intensity was affected by regular breaks for players to receive treatment which eventually saw seven minutes of injury time.

But Wood had the final say as his third goal in two league games saw Burnley claim their third consecutive away draw in the Premier League.

Dean Smith’s side remain 18th while the Clarets slip to 10th.

Before Burnley’s visit to Villa Park, Villa had dropped a league-high six points from winning positions, having let leads slip against Tottenham on the opening day of the season and Arsenal last week.

So perhaps it is unsurprising that they twice surrendered the lead against a relentless Burnley side - despite Smith’s claim that his side do not suffer from a mental block when in front.

The Villans were good for their half-time lead, which was handed to them when El Ghazi finished off a fine free-flowing counter attack involving McGinn and Guilbert.

But they should have made their first-half dominance count for more.

McGinn headed over from close range in the opening exchanges before he swept home Hourihane’s low cross, only for VAR to correctly intervene as the Irishman was in an offside position when he received the ball from Jack Grealish.

Villa’s captain was then denied by Burnley keeper Nick Pope as the first half drew to a close but the chances dried up in the second half as they struggled to maintain the same intensity throughout.

“It’s a game we should have won - we dominated for large periods, we had enough chances to win the game and restricted them to few chances,” Smith told BBC Match of the Day.

A further irritation for Smith will be that he lost Matt Targett and El Ghazi to injury in the second half, with both players needing to be replaced.

“Matt Targett played really well and we’re hoping it’s cramp more than anything else. It was always a risk playing him two games in a row but he played really well,” Smith told Villa’s website.

“El Ghazi will be fine - he just had a clash with their guy and caught one in the face and had to come off.”

While Sean Dyche’s Burnley have not made an eye-catching start to their 2019-20 Premier League campaign, they sat on eight points from their opening six games - the same total as Tottenham and Manchester United.

That total represents a very solid start to the campaign for the Clarets, especially considering they have already travelled to Arsenal and faced leaders Liverpool at home.

And in a word, solid sums up their performance at Villa Park.

They managed to weather the storm in the first half, and they more than matched the hosts in the second half.

Rodriguez, who came on at half-time for the injured Jack Cork, did well to get in-between two defenders to head home Erik Pieters’ cross for their equaliser.

And they could have had a couple more in the second half as Jeff Hendrick blasted over from close range while Ben Mee headed into the side netting from a corner.

But the fact that Wood’s powerful header from Matthew Lowton’s cross came just one minute and 32 seconds after McGinn’s goal will please Dyche no end as it illustrates the Clarets’ never-say-die attitude perfectly.

Man of the match - John McGinn (Aston Villa)

Livewire John McGinn was at the heart of everything good for the Villans. The Scotland international was particularly impressive in the first half but he got his just rewards for his hard work in the second, when he briefly put his side on course for victory

*Aston Villa manager Dean Smith:*

“We knew the dangers Burnley posed. We dealt with them well in the first half and we dominated in the first half. It was probably our best first-half performance of the season.

“We started the second half scrappy and sloppy. But our response to their goal was good. We took the game by the scruff of the neck.

“It was a great bit of work by Trezeguet for John [McGinn]’s goal, which was a goal his performance deserved. But to concede so soon after that goal was criminal. I believe they probably came for the draw and will be happy they’ve come away with the draw.”
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*The Guardian*
*28 September 2019*

Despite stiff competition, Aston Villa are staking their claim to be the Premier League’s most frustrating team. They will trouble most opponents with their expansive, insistent approach and in John McGinn they have a midfielder playing as well as anyone in the division. But their return to the top flight has brought with it a tendency to shoot themselves in the foot and it showed again here, an exhilarating first 45 minutes followed by a patchy second that handed the initiative to a typically belligerent Burnley.

The visitors deserved their point, coming from behind twice through Jay Rodriguez and Chris Wood. Villa never quite dealt with their half-time switch to 4-3-3 and their sloppiness after the break was wearyingly familiar.

Last Sunday they shrank in the final 30 minutes against a 10-man Arsenal and were punished; they lost a lead on the opening day at Tottenham, too, and Villa, who remain in the bottom three, need to start seeing games out if they are not to develop a complex.

“There’s no mental block, that’s for sure,” said Dean Smith. “We’ve dominated a team people find it a real struggle to play against.”

That was certainly true early on and Villa could have been more than one up at the interval. They took near-total control once Conor Hourihane and Dwight McNeil had traded left-foot free-kicks against the woodwork early on and thought they had scored when McGinn turned in the former’s cross.

It was not until Burnley were preparing to restart that VAR correctly decided Hourihane had strayed offside. Having exploded, the home supporters seethed, the length of the decision‑making process a bigger issue than the reasoning.

Eight minutes later they were allowed to hold on to their emotional high, Anwar El Ghazi neatly helping Frédéric Guilbert’s delivery past Nick Pope for the lead Villa merited.

“As good as we’ve played this season” was how Smith described Villa’s first half but thereafter they were drawn into Burnley’s preferred pattern. In Sean Dyche’s words, the match turned into “a bit of a ding-dong”.

The more frayed and fractured it became, the more an equaliser seemed inevitable and it arrived in the 68th minute when Rodriguez, who had come on for the injured Jack Cork at the break, got a run on the Villa substitute Neil Taylor and nodded in firmly.

Villa were floundering but gathered themselves to regain the lead through McGinn, who was a force of nature from beginning to end. The Scotland international looks the complete package of tenacity, timing and precision; when he controlled his far-post volley well enough to beat Pope it seemed they might have left it late enough to see the game through without incident.

But it never pays to discount Burnley. Within two minutes they levelled again when Wood, running between Guilbert and Bjorn Engels, thundered a header past his former teammate Tom Heaton.

Burnley know how to make that compensate for their failings; Villa still need to discover the kind of steel that would make them a truly formidable proposition.
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*Sky Sports*
*28 September 2019*

Sean Dyche’s men take point in dramatic encounter. Burnley twice came from behind to snatch a 2-2 draw against Aston Villa in a dramatic Premier League encounter at Villa Park.

The controversy started early on when John McGinn had a 25th-minute goal disallowed by VAR for offside against Conor Hourihane, before Anwar El Ghazi put Aston Villa (33) ahead eight minutes later.

Burnley pulled themselves level when Jay Rodriguez (66) nodded home, before McGinn (79) found the net for the second time to put Aston Villa back in front. But 92 seconds later, Chris Wood (81) cancelled that out with another header to seal an away point for the visitors.

The result does little to change the two teams’ Premier League standings, with Burnley actually dropping to 10th after results elsewhere, while Aston Villa remain 18th with five points.

It was an even start at Villa Park with both sides going close in the opening 15 minutes. McGinn directed a header just over the crossbar before Wood did the same at the other end, glancing a fine Erik Pieters cross wide. The ‘anything you can do, I can do’ theme continued not long after, with Nick Pope sending a Hourihane free kick onto the post before Dwight McNeil also found the upright with his wonderful set-piece delivery.

Aston Villa scored for the first time in the 25th minute - but it was disallowed for offside. Hourihane whipped a cross into the area and McGinn fired the ball home from close range. But as the teams set up for the restart, VAR reviewed the goal and ruled it out, with Hourihane offside by a shoulder. The tight call prompted boos from the home fans, who have not had a happy time with VAR this season.

But they were redeemed eight minutes later with a sensational finish from El Ghazi. McGinn picked out Frederic Guilbert down the right-hand side with a lovely floated pass, before the right-back produced a similarly fine cross into the area for El Ghazi, who flicked a strong foot at it to send it past Pope.

The second half was punctuated with injuries and fouls, but also saw three of the four goals, and Burnley equalised for the first time in the 66th minute.

Barnes held the ball up well on the left, but as El Ghazi tried to defend him, he fell into the arm of Pieters. But the left-back picked up the loose ball, delivering a cross before also going down under pressure from Guilbert, with Rodriguez hammering a header past former team-mate Tom Heaton. After an injury stoppage, El Ghazi was eventually replaced by Trezeguet.

Thirteen minutes later, and McGinn scored a wonderful goal that would stand. Trezeguet darted past Pieters down the right before pinging a cross for the incoming McGinn on the left of the area. He then sent a thunderous shot goalwards, which took a nick off the legs of Pope on the way through.

But the lead did not last long as 92 seconds later Burnley equalised for a second time.

Aston Villa’s defenders stood off Matt Lowton at the top right corner and he was allowed to float a cross into the area. Wood then rose high in the middle of the defensive line to divert the ball home and score his third goal in his last two Premier League games.

Aston Villa manager Dean Smith: “It’s another frustrating afternoon because it’s another game we probably should have won. We dominated the first half, played really well and I was really pleased with how we adapted with Jack [Grealish] playing a little bit higher.

“We had one [goal] disallowed by centimetres I think, then we’ve got a good goal and had a number of chances after. Unfortunately, we didn’t get the second goal which I think we deserved in that first half.

“I don’t think we started the second half too well, it was a little bit scrappy but we’ve got to be better at stopping crosses. Two crosses have cost us goals today.”

Man of the match - John McGinn

Once again, Scotland international McGinn shone for Aston Villa. Theoretically, he scored twice and both were fine finishes, with the first only ruled out because of Hourihane’s offside. He deserved to be on the scoresheet and his celebration highlighted his delight. But perhaps a true reflection of how he played was how often he was fouled, particularly in the first half, but he still managed to create for his side, showing how important he is to Aston Villa’s season.