Gary O’Neil has now explained the main reason Wolves lost 2-0 against Aston Villa tonight.
Wolves travelled to Aston Villa in the Premier League tonight looking to bounce back from their FA Cup quarter-final defeat against Coventry City before the break.
Without key first-team stars through injury and naming multiple youngsters on the bench, it was always a tall order to come away from Villa Park with a positive result.
After all, Unai Emery’s side boasts the fourth-best home record in the division, and so it proved.
Despite dominating the opening stages and missing a gilt-edged chance through Rayan Ait-Nouri, Wolves conceded to a thunderbolt from Moussa Diaby.
The Wanderers tried to get back into the game, but in truth, the second half fizzled out and Gary O’Neil had no one on the bench to change the game.
This was when Villa unleashed the likes of Lucas Digne and Nicolo Zaniolo before doubling their lead minutes later as Ezri Konsa’s attempted cross-looped over Jose Sa.
Aside from the result, O’Neil was still happy with his side’s performance and has now explained how it could have been different.
Gary O’Neil explains why Wolves lost against Aston Villa
O’Neil’s squad is light on the ground and he could only name 14 senior players aged 21 or above against Villa.
This demonstrates the difficult problems he’s faced in the medical department, with Wolves paying the price for not investing properly in the summer and winter transfer windows.
Currently, he has key first-team stars Pedro Neto, Jean-Ricner Bellegarde, Craig Dawson and Hwang Hee-Chan out through injury, while Matheus Cunha has recovered from his, but wasn’t named in today’s squad.
With only young strikers Nathan Fraser and Leon Chiwome to choose from, Wolves lacked that killer edge in the final third and O’Neil believes if he had Neto, Hwang and Cunha at his disposal, the scoreline would have been different.
“We were ahead on loads of things, more shots, more possession, higher xG away to Aston Villa with the attacking players we have missing, it makes a huge difference today,” O’Neil told Wolves official.
“Let’s not do any disservice to the ones who played because they gave everything and had some good moments.
“But when you have Pedro Neto, Cunha, Bellegarde and Channy [Hwang] to some of those moments with the xG we had, I’m sure we’d have converted higher.”
O’Neil is partly right
Wolves did dominate in the opening stages and stamped their authority on the contest without scoring.
Ait-Nouri had the best chance to do so within 15 minutes, but he blew it and Villa grew in confidence.
In truth, up until Diaby’s goal on the half-hour mark, Wanderers were the better side. They just couldn’t convert their chances to reward such dominance.
If they did have some of their attacking firepower on the pitch, perhaps the game would have taken a different path, although it’s difficult to say whether the result would have changed.
Villa looked very dangerous in the attacking third and even with the likes of Neto and Cunha on the field, Villa Park is one of the toughest places to go.