Aston Villa continue to blow hot and cold but, with Marco Asensio scoring another two goals, they progressed to the last eight of the FA Cup for the first time since they went on to reach the final in 2015, with some comfort.
Unai Emery’s team can go from beating Chelsea 3-1, when Asensio scored his other pair of Villa goals last Saturday, to losing 4-1 at Crystal Palace on Tuesday. But, four points off fifth place in the Premier League and with a last-16 tie with Club Brugge to relish on Tuesday, all feasible targets remain on the table.
Cardiff, six points above the relegation zone in the Championship, made Villa work hard for their win but Asensio, on loan from Paris Saint-Germain, was delighted to convert another assist from Marcus Rashford and one from Leon Bailey.
Rashford remains in search of his first goal for Villa, and spurned a couple of very convertible opportunities here but, since he made his Villa debut after joining on loan from Manchester United, no Premier League player has created more than his 13 chances.
“Marcus is a top player,” Asensio said. “We are together not so much but I know what he wants to do, where he passes and I am very happy to have Marcus and all of the teammates.”
Emery revealed that part of gambit to entice Asensio to Villa was that he would play in his preferred position. “He’s adapting very well and has a very good opportunity with us here to play as a 10,” the Villa manager said. “He decided in the last window to join us because we planned for him to play in his best position. He’s showing us his qualities to link through him with our midfield, strikers and wingers and has the capacity to score goals too.”
The game was preceded by a celebration in memory of Peter Whittingham, who died five years ago this March after a career in which he represented both these teams with distinction.
The 6,500 Cardiff fans, in particular, were in fine voice for this rarified occasion. But with John McGinn and Youri Tielemans anchoring the Villa midfield, the game soon settled into attack versus defence mode. This made penetrating a low block challenging, and the Cardiff goalkeeper Ethan Horvath performed superbly throughout.
Having only returned to the Cardiff team for their 1-0 win over Hull City on Tuesday, after the first-choice, Jak Alnwick, was ruled out for the season with a hamstring injury, the pick of the American goalkeeper’s saves came from Leon Bailey’s piledriver and Ollie Watkins’s point-blank volley in the first half and from Rashford’s powerful effort early in the second.
“He was brilliant,” Omer Riza, the Cardiff manager, said. “He’s had to show real patience and a great character and application [and] had to wait for his chance because Jak’s had a real good season as well. He produced a great performance and deserves all the accolades he gets this evening.”
Rashford, it has been reported, has made his mind up he wants to turn his loan from Manchester United into a permanent deal this summer. Although he has impressed to some degree with flashes of his outstanding talent in his first month at Villa Park, he will want to finesse his scoring technique if the admiration is to be as strongly mutual. When Bailey got to the byline and flashed over a cross to the far post, Rashford failed to set himself properly and wafted his volley over the bar from six yards out.
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Still it was the Cardiff fans making themselves heard most volubly, even as Watkins, receiving Rashford’s pass, curled another chance just wide. If Yousef Salech’s effort from Perry Ng’s cross had squirmed past Emiliano Martínez, the roof might have come off the visitors’ stand.
Instead the Villa fans were celebrating moments later as Asensio gave the Premier League side the lead. Tielemans spotted Rashford’s run and lofted his pass into the left channel perfectly for the England striker to square a pass first time for his fellow loanee to half-volley home.
The clinching goal arrived 10 minutes from time when Bailey pulled a cross back from the right byline and, after Watkins dummied, the former Real Madrid forward slotted the ball calmly into the bottom corner.
Source: theguardian.com
