On such moments can games, seasons and entire managerial reigns turn.
It would be facetious to suggest that all the doom and gloom that has laid like a blanket of suffocating fog over Villa Park this season was lifted in the second it took for Ollie Watkins’ arcing lob to complete its parabola over Bernd Leno and under the crossbar to bring Aston Villa level here. But it’s hard to think of a goal this season that has so visibly altered the entire vibe around a player, team and manager.
Villa had been second best before Watkins produced something very close to the exact opposite of the kind of goal cliche demands drought-ridden strikers require. Far from the ‘in off the backside’ trope, Watkins opted instead for the lesser-seen ‘brilliant, high-tariff finish to make a half-chance look like a tap-in’. Which is better, isn’t it?
Fulham helped Villa out, it must be said. Leno’s no-man’s land position surely helped crystallise Watkins’ decision-making – key given the other cliche around strikers who Just Need A Goal being a known propensity to overthink.
Both centre-backs made a bollocks of things; Joachim Andersen by misjudging the flight of the ball and finding himself trapped beneath it, and Calvin Bassey by failing to adequately track the run of Watkins.
But to focus on those failings is to miss the point, that Lucas Digne’s long pass (and it was certainly that, as opposed to long ball) and Watkins’ finish were both of elite class and dripping with quality that made a mockery of the fact this was Villa’s first home goal of the Premier League season and Watkins’ first for a minute shy of eight hours.
Villa were transformed by the goal. Watkins was transformed by the goal. The Villa fans sang his name for the rest of the first half as joy replaced the stifling nagging irritation that has been the general vibe here this season.
It really could have been so different. Villa were painfully slow out of the traps, and a goal behind to Raul Jimenez’s all-too straightforward header inside five minutes.
And Fulham remained the better side from that moment really until a pair of touches from Digne and Watkins changed everything.
Fulham had two plausible penalty claims at 1-0. The first would surely have been a spot-kick were Josh King’s diving technique even a smidge more refined.
We’re not encouraging diving, but if you’re going to do it then at least have the decency to put a bit of practice into it. King got it all wrong here.
Emi Martinez was out of his element when charging out at King, all flailing arms and trailing legs, but King was a good second early with his fall. Had he waited for Martinez to actually wipe him out as he surely would have, he’d have had his penalty. Instead – just as he did last week – he got a booking for insulting the referee’s intelligence. It’s a skill issue, Josh.
King was the game’s pre-eminent player at that point as well and involved in the second shout when his shot was blocked by Matty Cash’s arm. Again, it wasn’t a clear-cut non-penalty, but nor did it really feel like it definitely was one either. What we’ll say is that if Cash is able to make deliberate no-look saves with his trailing arm then he’s chosen the wrong calling as a sh*thousing right-back. And he’s very good at being a sh*thousing right-back.
But with the equaliser changing the mood, Villa successfully rode the wave in the opening minutes of the second half to London Bus their way into an unassailable 3-1 lead and double their Premier League goal tally for the season in the process. John McGinn thundered a low drive into the bottom corner before Emi Buendia scored from close range less than two minutes later.
Fulham’s attempt to mount a comeback never felt like one in which they had deployed any more than 50 per cent of their arse, and Villa, for just about the first time this season, can start to look up and ahead with something approaching enthusiasm.
There’s an emotional Europa League trip to Rotterdam in midweek, and a home Premier League game against Burnley to come before the international break. Suddenly it all looks a lot less bleak.
