Luke Moore: Villa misery could continue as Bradford City reach the Promised Land

24Jan 2013

England - Capital One Cup

After a famous night at Villa Park for Bradford City fans, Luke Moore conducts a post-mortem and then looks ahead to this weekend's FA Cup fixtures.

And so again the Capital One Cup throws up another night, performance and result for the ages. At the very least, the League Cup has rivalled the FA Cup for entertainment in recent years, and Bradford's incredible overcoming of Premier League Aston Villa last night genuinely was a night to savour. Whatever happens in the final, it'll surely be talked about in the ale houses of Bradford for years to come.

It was tough to take for Villa fans, as their season lurches from bad to worse amid rudderless management and no real on or off-field strategy immediately apparent to the onlooker. A Wembley final would have been just the tonic for growing discontent and given an increasingly beleaguered Paul Lambert valuable breathing space in the Midlands, but it wasn't to be, and in truth Villa deserved their defeat over two legs.

While Bradford have found joy over two Premier League teams in this competition previously, a two-legged triumph is a wholly different affair, and the Bantams verve, set-piece prowess (the deliveries of which would shame just about every Premier League team) and in-your-face energy was simply too much for a soft-centred, fragile Villa team devoid of any sort of confidence. It's easy to imagine that Lambert will be given at least some money to spend should Villa survive this season with their Premier League status intact (something that's not in any way guaranteed at this stage), but he must be careful not to scar his charges with almost continuous disappointment. A relegation scrap is no environment in which to learn the finer aspects of top level football and Lambert may find what remains of his team completely bereft of confidence entirely next term if things don't change.

As well as a player or two to offer stability and experience, Aston Villa are also in desperate of some guile. The blustering, bustling and sledgehammer-like lack of subtlety of their forward line over two legs against Bradford was as frustrating as it was ineffectual. Bradford gave the impression of a backline who deal with that sort of thoughtless power-first attacking play every week, largely because they probably deal with that sort of thoughtless power-first attacking play every week. As well as a greater propensity to move the ball into wider areas more effectively (something Villa actually did for the first third of the game last night), what's needed is a safe-cracker, a cat-burglar of assists and goals, and although Charles N'Zogbia tried for his regulation 20 minutes, it was nowhere near enough.

But, it shouldn't be forgotten that the night belonged to Bradford City and their fans. A club that have a solitary FA Cup win to their name almost 102 years ago have now earned the chance to add the League Cup to their honours list and with that a scarcely believable spot in the Europa League.

And after the way they've performed in the competition this season, you'd have to be a fairly callous character to not be cheering them on.

This week's bets

We welcome the return of the FA Cup again this week, and although we missed out on two winners (unluckily in my view, but then I would say that) last round when Crystal Palace and Swansea could only manage draws, there's a couple more fixtures in the same vein this round that catch the eye.

Liverpool travel to Oldham in good form, but were vulnerable against Mansfield in the last round. Suarez's controversial goal came at a time when the hosts were in the ascendancy and continually threatening the Reds' goal. I expect Liverpool to win the game, but there's no value in backing them. Oldham haven't won in the league since early December but overcame Nottingham Forest in the last round at the City Ground and scored three goals in the process. I think they've got it in them to score, so back Both Teams to Score at 2.14.

If you're cruel enough to think Aston Villa's downward spiral is bound to continue, their trip to Millwall on Friday looks even tougher now than it did yesterday. Millwall are fairly handy at home and usually worth a goal, so both 2.44 on them To Win and 3.65 on The Draw seems decent to me. Take your pick.