Well, it turned into a very enjoyable Tuesday night for Aston Villa fans, as meeting Barrow for the first time in our history in the EFL Cup definitely didn’t turn into a banana skin, despite head coach Dean Smith giving debuts out to youngsters.
At no point were we ever in any real danger, although Jed The Stare did have to pull off a couple of great saves to ensure bums didn’t twinge. But with goals coming from a Cameron Archer hattrick, and Anwar El Ghazi brace and a later effort from Freddy Guilbert – 6-0 – you aren’t arguing with that are you.
Statistics website Whoscored clearly had us as the side on top following that fantastic performance, and for every understandable reason they gave debutant Archer as their star man for Man of the Match with a perfect post game score of 10.00.
Completing the top five on the day were Anwar El Ghazi (9.65), Jaden Philogene-Bidace (8.86), Freddy Guilbert (8.71) and Kortney Hause (8.18).
For a change, extra mentions for Axel Tuanzebe (7.81), Matt Targett (7.56), Carney Chukwuemeka (7.50), Marvelous Nakamba (7.48), Jed The Stare (7.22) and Conor Hourihane (7.19).
With a bit more time on the pitch I don’t doubt our three substitutes on the day wouldn’t have also been in the seven plus range.
Well done all.
Barrow MotM
Cameron Archer
Anwar El Ghazi
Jaden Philogene-Bidace
