Newcastle United manager Steve Bruce suffered a defeat upon his return to Aston Villa on Monday night.
Steve Bruce has questioned whether Aston Villa should have been awarded two free-kicks as his Newcastle United side suffered a 2-0 defeat at Villa Park on Monday night.
After the game, Bruce stated that Joelinton should have been awarded a foul, whilst he also thinks DeAndre Yedlin’s push on Jack Grealish was ‘soft’ as Villa’s dead-ball specialist Conor Hourihane punished the visitors on both occasions.
At first, he scored a brilliant free-kick by out-foxing the Newcastle goalkeeper before providing a brilliant cross for Anwar El Ghazi to tap home two minutes later.
Speaking to Sky Sports PL straight after the game, (25/11/2019 at 10:20 pm), Bruce’s comments about being unhappy with the awarding of the free-kicks won’t sit well with the Villa supporters.
“I’ve seen Conor do it many times,” Bruce told Sky Sports. “Whether they are free-kicks, we thought we were harshly done by with big Joe [Joelinton] and we thought that was a foul.
“Whether it was a foul on Jack, it looked a little soft for me, but the way he [Hourihane] has executed it [his free-kick] and then the second goal has made it difficult for us.
“I don’t know [if the keeper could have done better]. I have seen Conor do it many, many times and when he shift it like he does and of course he has the accuracy and he puts enough power to score the second one. I think our defenders should be doing better than that.”
This was Bruce’s first game back at Villa since being sacked by the club last October, as the decision to part ways with him was justified given that Dean Smith guided the club to promotion in May.
Both goalscorers, Hourihane and El Ghazi were bought by Bruce during his time at Villa, as Jack Grealish, who took his game to the next level under the Newcastle man, ran the show last night.
Nonetheless, Dean Smith won’t be complaining too much because it means his side are now three points behind ninth-placed Manchester United, who they face on Sunday afternoon.
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