Aston Villa had 27 shots without scoring in Thursday’s 0-0 draw with Burnley despite having Ollie Watkins, Anwar El Ghazi and Jack Grealish in attack. Bertrand Traore was also guilty of missing gilt-edged chances at Villa Park, leading to criticism from some supporters on social media.
The 25-year-old had a close-range effort thwarted from an El Ghazi cross that he should have done better with, and then he failed to tee up Watkins for a tap-in after his shot was stopped (Sky Sports). He was eventually hauled off in the second half for Keinan Davis as Dean Smith lost patience with the Burkina Faso international.
Against Burnley, Traore played for 79 minutes, had 51 touches, won one aerial duel, completed 16 of his 24 passes, created one chance, had four shots with only one hitting the target and whipped in seven crosses with just one finding a teammate. [WhoScored]
These Villa fans on Twitter slammed his “awful” performance on a frustrating night against the Clarets:
https://twitter.com/NorthernVillan/status/1339664932338589696?s=20
Really need to invest in further quality at the top end of the pitch dont we?
Traore has as many bad moments as he has good ones. If we had Jarrod Bowen instead of Traore or Anwar tonight we probably won 2 or 3-0. #avfc
— Scott (@CaptainScott87) December 17, 2020
https://twitter.com/Vincentvilla81/status/1339662232930672641?s=20
Very frustrating to watch el ghazi I thought played ok but very wasteful,traore hasn't hit it off in a villa shirt yet and I thought should of been took off earlier than he did but they are games we would of lost last season with all the chances we had. #UTV #avfc
— Sam Brogan (@SamBrogan3) December 17, 2020
Traore and El Ghazi need some finishing practice, bless em #avfc
— Jacq Bennett ⚽️ AVFC & KHFC (@Jacq_Bennett_) December 17, 2020
Following on from last night it seems recently all of our ‘big’ clear cut chances at important moments in games seem to fall to the wrong players. For example Traore and El Ghazi miss guilt edge chances but in 90 mins not one falls to Watkins #avfc
— Mike Land (@Mike_Land10) December 18, 2020
The Burkina Faso international has made 11 appearances in all competitions since joining Villa from Lyon in September, scoring one goal and supplying one assist (Transfermarkt). He has not had the best start to life at Villa, so time will tell if Smith keeps him in the firing line.
In other news, many AVFC fans bemoaned another player’s performance in the goalless draw against Burnley.
