Arnautovic double seals win for Stoke against Villa

Swansea City will join Norwich City and Aston Villa in being relegated from the Premier League this season, according to Paul Merson.

“But first half I was more than pleased with what we produced”.

When Leandro Bacuna scored to half Villa’s deficit here, it appeared to be a mere interruption on an afternoon stroll; his sad stationary reaction reinforcing the idea that although more than 10 minutes remained, Villa’s fate as the losing team was already secure.

Despite the 6-0 thrashing by Liverpool in their previous fixture, Aston Villa boss Remi Garde makes just one change as captain Micah Richards drops to the bench with Alan Hutton replacing him at right-back.

“When I see players not 100 per cent committed I need to know why and my job is to try to make them fully committed”.

Ashley Westwood summed up Villa’s habit of shooting themselves in the foot when he conceded a needless penalty with a crude barge into Phil Bardsley and Arnautovic stepped up to send Bunn the wrong way from the spot.

“But today the spirit of the team was better”.

“I wonder how much they work on defending crosses and set-plays in training”. But we have to stay as solid as we can and have as much solidarity as we can have.

MARK Hughes was grateful for the three points after seeing his player eventually see off doomed Villa at the Britannia this afternoon.

“I thought we took a bit of time to get going”, Hughes admitted.

“We had to up our intensity [in the second half] and that’s what we did”, he said. We started with some good intent after the break and scored two quick-fire goals and took the game away from them. I am only focused on the next three games, the next eight days which will be very important for us.