Ezri Konsa

[paul_e]

It's not really about what is or isn't his best position, it's how do we play as a team with various combinations and Konsa is more valuable to us at RB if Pau is playing LCB. If we can replace Carlos with someone much more commanding in the air then we open up a lot more options for how we line up in defence but even then Konsa at right back is a solid and useful option for us.

fundamentally we, like all the good sides, play with a defensive and offensive shape that are very different and how successful we are largely comes down to how quickly we transition between those. Given that 325 is the default attacking shape for most teams having 1 fullback who stays deep and 2 6s makes things a lot easier and quicker.

[Toronto Villa]

Nice.

I found Matty Cash in the pack.

That graph is just full-backs, but Ezri is terrible there apparently.

The narrative is Trumpian, so far removed from reality, it’a like they don’t watch Villa play.

Not just that they preferred him at centre-back, but that he's 'awful', 'terrible', etc etc. I guess some people just want to see it, and couple of bad days (and everyone, everyone has bad days) gave this meme a specious credence.

Whilst I largely agree with you both, it’s just people disagreeing about a footballers best position.

It’s not like they’re failing to reach their UCCA or PCAS (or whatever they’re called now) grade requirements, or voting Reform or something. It’s not like we need to dunk them to check they’re not witches or something. This all seems a bit “wear this pointy hat and sit in the corner, you hopeless idiots”.

Interesting historic point. If we trained an AI model to plough through 20 years of posts on here and asked it which position on the pitch provoked most “he should / should not be playing there” controversy, without a doubt it would be full back. By a mile.

That or why he haven’t got a defensive midfielder, or who more specifically, who should be one of the current players because we didn’t have a proper one. We seemed to go an eternity without having one then like the number 11 bus we got them all at once.

[Monty]

I think the Konsa-is-somehow-bad stuff got to a pretty rarefied level of weird though, I must say. People can disagree about players, but sometimes it does hit this level of reality-denial that strikes me as an effort to maintain.

[brontebilly]

Nice.

I found Matty Cash in the pack.

That graph is just full-backs, but Ezri is terrible there apparently.

The narrative is Trumpian, so far removed from reality, it’a like they don’t watch Villa play.

Not just that they preferred him at centre-back, but that he's 'awful', 'terrible', etc etc. I guess some people just want to see it, and couple of bad days (and everyone, everyone has bad days) gave this meme a specious credence.

Whilst I largely agree with you both, it’s just people disagreeing about a footballers best position.

It’s not like they’re failing to reach their UCCA or PCAS (or whatever they’re called now) grade requirements, or voting Reform or something. It’s not like we need to dunk them to check they’re not witches or something. This all seems a bit “wear this pointy hat and sit in the corner, you hopeless idiots”.

Interesting historic point. If we trained an AI model to plough through 20 years of posts on here and asked it which position on the pitch provoked most “he should / should not be playing there” controversy, without a doubt it would be full back. By a mile.

I sympathise with your general point, but like Monty says it’s all the ‘he’s awful’ stuff, when we’ve all watched him mark Vini Jr out of the game on his England debut, and a judge at the level of Unai Emery plays him there whenever we need to be at our defensive best. But that’s dismissed as a ‘blind spot’. I read it like someone is trying to convince me that black is white.

You’ll remember I think paulie, the zonal marking saga on here. One season we marked like that and were the best team in the league at defending set-pieces, conceding one goal. The next year we went man-for-man and conceded 28, the worst in the league. And I still found people on here arguing that man-marking was better. H&V for you.

Konsa/Vini Jr is fast approaching Carlos/Haaland territory. At least Carlos did it in a competitive game in a Villa shirt! Speaking of the conceding goals metric, since you brought it up, it's somewhat odd that we conceded 10 goals more last season than the one previous under Gerrard/Emery. It was certainly clear by the end of the season we had a serious problem at the back, one not helped by playing our best CB out of position.

[brontebilly]

Wow, I’ll concede that i didn’t think he looked that good at RB.  Not bad, by any stretch, but that’d make him probably the best RB in the world. 

I can only think the stats are somehow skewed by him playing CB but I cannot work out how.

Ferdinand was quoting some stat about him last season as the CB having being dribbled past least. Not exactly sure of the relevance of that stat, or most quoted stats these days, but Konsa was clearly far more comfortable in a central position in/out of possession rather than near the sideline.

Ben White is another CB moved to RB but he is far superior on the ball to Konsa.

[Percy McCarthy]

Nice.

I found Matty Cash in the pack.

That graph is just full-backs, but Ezri is terrible there apparently.

The narrative is Trumpian, so far removed from reality, it’a like they don’t watch Villa play.

Not just that they preferred him at centre-back, but that he's 'awful', 'terrible', etc etc. I guess some people just want to see it, and couple of bad days (and everyone, everyone has bad days) gave this meme a specious credence.

Whilst I largely agree with you both, it’s just people disagreeing about a footballers best position.

It’s not like they’re failing to reach their UCCA or PCAS (or whatever they’re called now) grade requirements, or voting Reform or something. It’s not like we need to dunk them to check they’re not witches or something. This all seems a bit “wear this pointy hat and sit in the corner, you hopeless idiots”.

Interesting historic point. If we trained an AI model to plough through 20 years of posts on here and asked it which position on the pitch provoked most “he should / should not be playing there” controversy, without a doubt it would be full back. By a mile.

I sympathise with your general point, but like Monty says it’s all the ‘he’s awful’ stuff, when we’ve all watched him mark Vini Jr out of the game on his England debut, and a judge at the level of Unai Emery plays him there whenever we need to be at our defensive best. But that’s dismissed as a ‘blind spot’. I read it like someone is trying to convince me that black is white.

You’ll remember I think paulie, the zonal marking saga on here. One season we marked like that and were the best team in the league at defending set-pieces, conceding one goal. The next year we went man-for-man and conceded 28, the worst in the league. And I still found people on here arguing that man-marking was better. H&V for you.

Konsa/Vini Jr is fast approaching Carlos/Haaland territory. At least Carlos did it in a competitive game in a Villa shirt! Speaking of the conceding goals metric, since you brought it up, it's somewhat odd that we conceded 10 goals more last season than the one previous under Gerrard/Emery. It was certainly clear by the end of the season we had a serious problem at the back, one not helped by playing our best CB out of position.

Good of you to acknowledge goals conceded as a meaningful metric, but it destroys your argument.

We conceded more goals last season when Konsa played at centre-back than when he played at right-back. despite him playing there in all the toughest games, while Cash got the gig against the less threatening teams (because despite what you say, Emery is not an idiot). So your conclusion should have been ‘helped by our best CB playing out of position’.

Not sure why this fact is failing to sink in with some people.

[edgysatsuma89]

Konsa against Vini match rating: 2/10.

[Percy McCarthy]

Konsa against Vini match rating: 2/10.

Rated by who?

[Bent Neilsens Screamer]

Isn’t it more the fact that although great in 1v1 situations there were quite a lot of games, particularly towards the end of the season where Konsa was played at rb and that wasn’t particularly a key requirement in those matches so the other parts of his game were exposed, hence our more pressing need for a rb upgrade. This could be Ned or KKH (unlikely), if I’m being greedy another option centrally as well.

It’s horses for courses and some games it’ll work but I like him centrally and an upgrade on the right, ideally someone who is comfortable in defence and attack. It was only a few seasons ago that we were bemoaning his omission from the England squad when, to us, he was clearly one of the best centre halves in the country and he hasn’t got any worse but now we’re shifting him out to rb.

I’m aware of the lopsided defence and judging by the number of more attacking left sided defenders we have it looks like Konsa will be the right back option but even given all the evidence I don’t particularly like it.

[Drummond]

We got worse defensively when we lost Kamara; that was, by far, the biggest difference to us.

Konsa is a Rolls Royce of defenders, he's good anywhere. Like any other player though, you can only get results when you have the best team around you.

The argument of where he is best/worst is really quite small, because he's able to play anywhere. Put a shit keeper behind a defence they will be more vulnerable, same with the midfield in front.

Konsa and Mings together were brilliant as a pair because they complement each other so well. It doesn't mean anything other than that though.

[chrisw1]

I agree.  Konsa is a fantastic centre-back, but he's not a particularly dominant player, so in my opinion is at his best next to someone like Mings.

I think the same applies to Pau, although I don't think he's as good defensively as Konsa he makes up for it with superb ability on the ball.

Unfortunately, I don't think they make a great pairing.  I also don't think Carlos is quite good enough to be that dominant partner.  A fully first Mings, however, is perfect.   

I don't particularly like Konsa at right back, but if when he plays there we are essentially playing as a 3 then I get the theory.  Konsa, Mings and Pau would be a pretty awesome combination.

[brontebilly]

Nice.

I found Matty Cash in the pack.

That graph is just full-backs, but Ezri is terrible there apparently.

The narrative is Trumpian, so far removed from reality, it’a like they don’t watch Villa play.

Not just that they preferred him at centre-back, but that he's 'awful', 'terrible', etc etc. I guess some people just want to see it, and couple of bad days (and everyone, everyone has bad days) gave this meme a specious credence.

Whilst I largely agree with you both, it’s just people disagreeing about a footballers best position.

It’s not like they’re failing to reach their UCCA or PCAS (or whatever they’re called now) grade requirements, or voting Reform or something. It’s not like we need to dunk them to check they’re not witches or something. This all seems a bit “wear this pointy hat and sit in the corner, you hopeless idiots”.

Interesting historic point. If we trained an AI model to plough through 20 years of posts on here and asked it which position on the pitch provoked most “he should / should not be playing there” controversy, without a doubt it would be full back. By a mile.

I sympathise with your general point, but like Monty says it’s all the ‘he’s awful’ stuff, when we’ve all watched him mark Vini Jr out of the game on his England debut, and a judge at the level of Unai Emery plays him there whenever we need to be at our defensive best. But that’s dismissed as a ‘blind spot’. I read it like someone is trying to convince me that black is white.

You’ll remember I think paulie, the zonal marking saga on here. One season we marked like that and were the best team in the league at defending set-pieces, conceding one goal. The next year we went man-for-man and conceded 28, the worst in the league. And I still found people on here arguing that man-marking was better. H&V for you.

Konsa/Vini Jr is fast approaching Carlos/Haaland territory. At least Carlos did it in a competitive game in a Villa shirt! Speaking of the conceding goals metric, since you brought it up, it's somewhat odd that we conceded 10 goals more last season than the one previous under Gerrard/Emery. It was certainly clear by the end of the season we had a serious problem at the back, one not helped by playing our best CB out of position.

Good of you to acknowledge goals conceded as a meaningful metric, but it destroys your argument.

We conceded more goals last season when Konsa played at centre-back than when he played at right-back. despite him playing there in all the toughest games, while Cash got the gig against the less threatening teams (because despite what you say, Emery is not an idiot). So your conclusion should have been ‘helped by our best CB playing out of position’.

Not sure why this fact is failing to sink in with some people.

Where's your data confirming Cash got the gig at RB against the non threatening teams? West Ham, Everton, Brighton, Ajax away all come to mind late on in the season where Konsa was at RB, and he was rubbish offensively and defensively. Not sure if those teams fit within your "non threatening" definition.

Definitely in the first two, Cash came on at RB and improved us immeasurably. Saved us a point at West Ham with a great block and nearly scored the winner at Everton. Cash isn't a world beater, far from it, but at least gives us better balance across the back. Everton from memory Carlos got hooked early and Konsa moved inside when Cash came on. Same change at West Ham, Lenglet hooked early and Konsa moved in. Go through those post match threads and all you will see is criticism for Emery for unnecessarily tinkering with our back 4.

We can all cherry pick largely irrelevant stats to suit narratives.

[Monty]

Why don't we all just stop talking about this, it's the dullest ongoing subject on the forum and nobody's ever going to change anybody's mind.

[Sexual Ealing]

Why don't we all just stop talking about this, it's the dullest ongoing subject on the forum and nobody's ever going to change anybody's mind.

Agreed. Let's have a think about our wage bill Vs Tottenham's for a bit.

[LeeB]

Why don't we all just stop talking about this, it's the dullest ongoing subject on the forum and nobody's ever going to change anybody's mind.

Agreed. Let's have a think about our wage bill Vs Tottenham's for a bit.

I personally feel there's more to explore regarding the crest and ground redevelopment.