Pre-Match “I was aware a little bit before it was announced yesterday [Philippe Coutinho’s permanent signing], and I think it’s fantastic news for everyone connected with the club - most importantly the supporters. “The reaction has been very positive because you’ve seen over the last five months he’s played very well. There’s still loads left in him, in our opinion. “To have him here full-time and settled, he’ll go up another level - because that feeling of knowing where he’s going to be playing his football for the next four years will help him settle. “He’s a player who needs to feel wanted; he needs to feel support. Everyone has played a part – me, the coaching staff, all the support staff and, most importantly, the owners, Christian Purslow and Johan Lange have made him feel really special. “That’s where the decision’s come from. He feels really happy here and it’s fantastic that he wants to be part of this journey. “Phil is very humble, he is extremely professional and he sets standards on a daily basis. “This is a brilliant signing for Aston Villa. “Phil is a model professional and his impact on the group has been very clear since he joined in January. “With the way he conducts himself on and off the pitch, he’s also a valuable role model for our younger players who can only benefit from his experience. “As we look to build towards next season, it is incredible to work at a club that executes its business so decisively and smoothly. “There is always a purpose and an importance to every fixture. We want to finish as high as we can.” Steven Gerrard. --- “I think Patrick [Vieira] will say that [it was a fair result]. “We’re a little bit frustrated. It was a good battle. We improved a lot in the second half. We expect to score more than one goal and we’ve conceded naively on a set play. “Credit to Ollie [Watkins] for pulling through [after suffering an injury in midweek]. Maybe a lot of other players wouldn’t have put their body on the line today. “If you can’t win the game it is important to take something from it. “We didn’t need to give the foul away. We need to defend situations better. If you don’t defend second phases you will concede goals. “We need to be more ruthless and clinical. 🥊 We are creating good chances. We still concede stupid goals. There’s a lot of areas we need to improve and we will try and do that for next season. “I don’t think there was much wrong with it, in all honesty. It was a really close game. I thought Patrick’s team caused us some issues in the first half and we had to tweak one or two things at half-time. “Going over the chances in the game, I think on another day if we were more ruthless and more clinical, 🥊 we would have been sitting here talking about three points rather than one. It was really naïve in terms of the goal we’ve conceded but, overall our performance, there wasn’t too much wrong with it.” “We’re concerned about Ezri. Normally, someone like him wouldn’t come off the pitch unless there was a problem. I think we have got a problem. We’ll send him off for an MRI scan. He’s got a problem in the knee area. I’ll be extremely surprised if he plays again [this season]. We’ll know in the next 24-48 hours when we send him for an MRI scan. The issue is in the knee area. “I don’t think any of my staff were joking around with him [Wilfried Zaha]. I think he was talking to himself or the crowd. None of my staff were engaging with Wilfried Zaha. Listen, it’s a sideshow at the end of the day. He had a really quiet afternoon and we dealt with him well. That’s the main thing and that’s all I’m concerned about. “They’ve got dangerous players, they’re a good team and we haven’t conceded one set-play well enough on a second phase. That’s cost us two points. We were naive to give the foul away in the first place because we’re 1-0 up at home and still creating chances in and around that to take the game to Palace. “We were extremely naive to concede in the way we did. Outside of that, I thought we did just enough to edge the game. I expected a close game because of where we’re sitting in the table and that’s what everyone has seen. “It’s on [a top 10 finish to improve on Dean Smith’s 2020-21 final position] but it’s slightly more difficult now. We needed to take control of that and take maximum points today but my players are frustrated and I really like it, I like that there really frustrated and, hopefully, we can take that frustration out on Burnley on Thursday night because if we want to be a more consistent team at home, we have to be more ruthless 🥊 and clinical in front of goal. “That’s two games now in a short space of time where we’re a little frustrated where we haven’t taken the big chances that we’re creating. We’re doing ever so well to create them. “At times we have. You look at Southampton, for example, where everything clicks in and you take your chances. A lot of away games we’ve been ruthless. At Burnley, we were clinical to take the points. We’ve had chances; Man City late on to sneak a draw, chances against Liverpool, Tottenham in the first half, double figures in the first half. Chances again today, they’ve caused us some issues with chances. But you look at who had the clearer of chances. “Danny had a couple in the first half where you expect him to burst the net with his quality. Ollie has a header cleared off the line and gets put through on a tight angle. I think we created enough to score more than one goal today.” “I was asked about [Ollie Watkins] before the game and a lot of the players wouldn’t have been available given the way he’s battled through and put himself and his body on the line for 90 minutes. He’s a warrior, he’s strong, he’s a delight to work with. Maybe that’s why he wasn’t firing on all cylinders in terms of his chances today but his performance was fine for me. “I’m sure Patrick will have something to say but the duals and challenges were getting played on all over the pitch so I don’t see any reason why it [Ollie Watkins’ goal] shouldn’t have been ruled out. Ollie deserves all the credit for that goal. We asked him to really play with the eye of the tiger in the second half and he did. He deserves the credit. “Great cross from Lucas who was outstanding but, without Ollie breathing down [Guehi’s] neck, we don’t get that goal. The ball was a wonderful cross but the presence of Ollie has led to the defender to concede a goal. That’s where we had the game exactly where we wanted it. “We were so naïve to let them back in the way we did today. “We need to cut out the moments. We said that Crystal Palace carry a threat and they were throwing more profile at the game in terms of Benteke and Edouard, big guys, so we knew they were becoming more dangerous at set-plays. To concede that foul in the final third when there was no need to was naïve. But, once we accepted that, we need to deal with the first ball which we did. Second phase, we were caught sleeping so we’ve got ourselves to blame and that’s where the frustration has come from.” Steven Gerrard.