Aston Villa News 24/7Writer: J P Fear 
Date:Tuesday January 22 2008
Time: 9:39AM
UK time is: 10:59:43
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MON & Rafa Post Match Reactions
Martin O'Neill spoke to avfc.co.uk after the 2-2 draw with Liverpool at Anfield last night.
The Villa boss said, following a poor start where we gave the ball away far too cheaply:
'At times, we just need a bit of belief. I know I keep talking about it but it's very important. But we have gained our 40th point of the season tonight which is terrific. At half-time, we knew we had to go and do something about it. In the second half, we weathered an early storm by Liverpool when they were trying to get the second goal. We came out of that spell and started to get into it.'
Adding, 'Marlon came on and suddenly we get an equaliser. He made a big contribution. We had the confidence to go and get ourselves in front. It would have been great to hold on for a fantastic victory but it wasn't to be.'
He also praised the away fans who once again were in fine voice.
Meanwhile Rafa Benitez (or as the Everton fans now call him Rafa Beneath-us) said on the Liverpool official site:
'We were controlling the game and creating all of the chances, but we needed to score the second goal to kill the game off. If we'd have scored the second goal I'm sure we'd have scored more because we were playing well. I told the players after the game that if you can't kill off the game you will give the other team hope and that was what happened. They were waiting for a free kick and they scored from two set pieces.' Adding, 'We had the chances to win, but we didn't take them and in the end you have to be happy because we could have lost.'
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Your Comments
Unlucky,was hoping you would get the three points.
MFC67
So was I!
It's a bit annoying having people like Rafa saying they had chances to kill the game when they clearly didn't. They had plenty of the ball, sure, but it was sat outside the box with no real penetration, count the saves Taylor had to make... 2? 3? You know when you were a kid and your dad'd put his hand on your forehead and you'd try to hit him, they're not chances to hit your dad, that's just you not being able to do anything of any note.
lorenzo
They were pulling us out of position constantly though and there were a few times i was sure they would score. I think we did great to get a draw and I'm chuffd with it. How about we give Marlon a chance now? I though he played really well, holding up the ball much better than Carew was and maybe if we give him a chance now he'll know if he plays well he'll get in the side.
PTP
I was disappointed with the first half, we certainly didn't play the in-yer-face attacking footie we did at Stamford Bridge. I thought our "passing" (if you can call it that) was terrible, ffs guys keep it on the deck, pass & move ??? No, let's hoof and head it to.. the opposition. Not good. Marlon made a big difference, thought he was great. We missed Barry a lot. 2-2 was as much as we could have hoped for, even towards the end when I was praying for us to hold out I just feckin *knew* the 'pool were going to equalise, jammy bargepoles. Ah well, a draw at Anfield ain't too bad and we're still in 6th, bring on the home game.
ExpatVillaShirt
Think lpool are going for the 17 draws record of last season, the y are well on the way! Funny that they spent so much in the summer and compare that to what villa have spent, who have scored more goals and won one more game! Brilliant
krisvilla
MON keeps telling us he wants to play attractive attacking football and we still spent the majority of the game yestreday hoofing a long ball. That said we coud have had all 3 points if we had scored the 3rd goal when we had the chance.
Hoss The Villain
Rafa's a worried man, and he clearly didn't see the same game as everyone else. Wakey-Wakey Rafa.
glensider
There is a lot of rubbish talked about us and playing a long ball game sadly sometimes from our own misinformed fans. The mail on sunday website has done an analysis of which teams play the long ball the most entitled who is going to be the net Wimbledon. Arsenal are top with the least number of long balls and we are 9th, at about the same number as Liverpool, West Ham, and Spurs. Below us are Portsmouth, Everton, and Newcastle. Interestingly Blues are the third worst. The actual percentages for us are that 17.79% of our passes are long ball and for Blues its just over 20% along with Reading and Fulham. Add to that we play with wingers and a huge striker and a good percentage of our long balls are direct passes which find their target unlike others who really do just lump it forward and hope.
daveldvilla
Well if we are playing a long ball game, then I like it. Hellfire! Sixth in the league, you better believe that I like it!!
glensider
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