Tim Sherwood has appealed to Gabriel Agbonlahor to ignore the social media trolls and help play the role of lieutenant in the Aston Villa camp.
The Villa manager advised his club captain not to worry about Twitter critics after Agbonlahor, who missed Saturday’s entertaining draw with Sunderland due to illness, posted a cryptic message on Instagram saying he agreed with all the fans’ recent comments following his poor performance in last week’s defeat at Crystal Palace.
With 10 new signings at Villa, Sherwood knows he needs the club’s longest-serving player to help lead the way as he plans a brighter future for a team that have struggled against relegation for five years.
“What Gabby has to realise is no one is going to like you all of the time,” Sherwood said. “I realised that when I played through my career. You get ups and downs. [But] when you come through it, you get stronger.
“He has a huge part to play because we bought a lot of new boys into the club [so he has] a crucial part to play in the dressing room. I haven’t spoken to Gabby and I don’t know what he is thinking but he is club captain. I don’t underestimate the role he plays at this club and it is crucial for a manager to have some lieutenants.”
Villa’s leading Premier League goalscorer has been at the club since childhood and, at his pacy best, would have provided Sherwood with the extra cutting edge required to overcome a fragile Sunderland team.
Instead, with Rudy Gestede struggling to fill Christian Benteke’s boots at this early stage of the season, it was left to Scott Sinclair to add to his midweek Capital One Cup hat-trick with the goals that should have set Villa on their way. But Yann M’Vila’s wonderful free-kick and Jeremain Lens’s deflected shot enabled Sunderland’s new boys to salvage a draw.
Dropping points against Sunderland is not usually a laughing matter and Leandro Bacuna admitted that the Villa bench had to restrain themselves from giggling when they saw their manager back out of kicking the team water bottles to show frustration and damaging his hamstring instead.
Sunderland slipped to the bottom of the table after surviving late Villa pressure that culminated in the midfielder Carles Gil being denied a penalty as he fell inside the area under pressure from Younes Kaboul 11 minutes from time to leave Sherwood kicking thin air to avoid injuring supporters.
Bacuna had been replaced by Gil shortly before. But while Sherwood could not be accused of bottling the opportunity to dominate lower-half rivals, failing to put away a team on their knees represents two points dropped.
This is the fifth season in succession that Sunderland have failed to manage a win in their opening four league games and, with their manager bemoaning the lack of high-calibre signings over the summer and his defence’s deficiencies, they remain a club in peril despite salvaging a point at Villa Park.
Sherwood was still chipper because of his team’s decent performance despite having to limp along the touchline at the final whistle after his air shot. “I was on the bench so I saw it happen right in front of my face,” Bacuna said. “But you can’t laugh, you have to stay serious. It was just his emotions showing. Those things happen. He tried to backheel the bottles but his foot went over the top of it.
“But you can’t laugh because there are cameras on us all the time so you have to keep a straight face. When you get back in the dressing room you can make fun about it. [But] he is the boss at the end of the day. Everybody was a bit disappointed about the game so we were not thinking about making jokes.”
Dick Advocaat asked for personal assistance concerning the conundrum of where to play Jermain Defoe when Sunderland require three in central midfield. “I still think that he as a striker on his own is not good enough,” the Sunderland manager said. “But he will do it [track back] because he’s a really positive guy.”
Man of the match Scott Sinclair (Aston Villa)
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