Villa crumbled in the second half to see a 1-0 lead dissolve into a 3-1 defeat at Ashton Gate on Saturday.
Aston Villa manager Roberto di Matteo has insisted to the club’s official website that he is attaching no blame to goalkeeper Pierluigi Gollini for the Bristol City equaliser which kickstarted the hosts’ comeback at Ashton Gate.
Villa led 1-0 with just under an hour gone against the Robins thanks to Jack Grealish’s goal before Gollini could only parry Lee Tomlin’s shot into the path of Tammy Abraham, who made no mistake from the loose ball.
Di Matteo has already found himself having to comment on Gollini this season after the young Italian summer signing was at the centre of a bizarre late equaliser for Huddersfield Town at Villa Park last weekend.
On that occasion he suggested that the 21-year should have done better, but he has more sympathy for the goalkeeper this time as he believes Tomlin should not have been able to test the stopper in the first place.
Di Matteo said, via avfc.co.uk: “He had a lot of bodies in front of him for the first goal. We could have done better to block it because we had a lot of people around it. It’s on the edge of the box.
“He got his hand to it, unfortunately it bounced in front of their striker. We didn’t react to kick it away. You expect us as a team to react with it.”
Abraham’s equaliser had, in truth, been coming in the first 14 minutes of the second half and saw Villa collapse like a house of cards.
Two minutes later Joe Bryan completed the turnaround and Tomlin added a third late on.
Villa now have just five points from their first five games in the Championship and have suffered last-gasp defeat at Sheffield Wednesday, the late equaliser against Huddersfield, and Saturday’s demoralising result.
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