Robbie Keane made his starting XI debut for Aston Villa yesterday at Molineux against his former club Wolverhampton Wanderers. Robbie Keane was introduced to Villa fans last Saturday when Aston Villa welcomed Everton, it may of only been for the last 10 minutes of the game. Villa fans were up in arms about Alex McLeish’s decision to limit Keane a small allocated amount of time to weave his magic.
Yesterday Robbie Keane proved to the Premier League that he’s still got it with two fantastic goals.The sparkling winner from 25yards which won the game for Villa was greeted with muted celebrations from himself out of respect for his former employer.
The game was a very entertaining, free-flowing West Midlands derby with possession between the two sides being separated by 0.8 % this was edged by Villa(50.4) and Wolves (49.6).
Villa started promisingly and should have gone ahead in the first moments of the game as Ciaran Clark delivered a telling cross from the left of the Wolves box and Gardner found himself unmarked at the far post only to head wide. But Aston Villa were given a penalty on 11 minutes when Christophe Berra brought down Darren Bent in the box with a mistimed tackle. Darren Bent stepped up calmy sending Wayne Hennessey the wrong way, this was Darren Bent’s 8th goal of the campaign although having the fewest amount of attempts on goal. When Darren Bent has scored he has favoured the lower half of the net with 3 in the bottom right, 2 in the bottom left, 1 top right, 1 top centre and one straight down lower centre.
Wolves equalised on 21 minutes through Kightly who drove the ball passed Shay Given in the goal and went on to take the lead just 10 minutes later with a greatly worked corner following a flick on from Roger Johnson to find David Edwards.
Wolves went in at the interval leading 2-1 but it only took 6 minutes from the restart for Aston Villa to peg back the deficit. It was written that Robbie Keane would score against his former club and on 51 minutes he did, with a fiercely hit right foot shot into the bottom left corner. Hennessey was outstretched and was unable to stop the shot, Keane’s celebrations we muted and was congratulated by his new team-mates who gathered in the middle of the field.
Villa were granted a lifeline when Karl Henry was sent off during a tussle between himself and Villa’s Mark Albrighton in which Henry back heeled Albrighton in the chest. This was witnessed by referee Michael Oliver and was given a red straight red. Wolves boss Mick McCarthy later admitted that Henry’s red was justified.
Villa became more sergeant in the final third following the sending off and was greatly rewarded 6 minutes from time with a cracking strike from Robbie Keane for the winner with the minimum of back lift, he struck an unstoppable shot into the roof of the net. Keane almost grabbed himself a hat-rick in the dying moments of the 90 minutes with another long range shot going agonisingly wide before been substituted in the 8 minutes of stoppage time.
Robbie Keane offered more than goals to the game making an impressive 81% success rate with his ability completing 44 passes out of 54. The majority of Keane’s successful passes came from when they went forward contributing to 44%. Robbie Keane managed to get two goals out the game his other 2 attempts at goal went went late on in the game and the other was blocked earning him a shot accuracy percentage of 67%.
