GREEN SENDS SHARP WILD

Villa comeback kings shatter hat-trick hero

ANDRE GREEN capped an amazing Aston Villa fightback to completely shatter Chris Wilder’s promotionchasers last night.

Villa looked dead and buried before scoring three goals in the last eight minutes to grab a dramatic draw.

Sub Green headed home in deep into injury time to kill Sheffield United’s hopes of going top.

Billy Sharp looked to have sent Wilder’s men to the summit with a stunning hat-trick before Tyrone Mings and Tammy Abraham set up a grandstand finish.

Then Green headed home, leaving Blades hero Sharp crestfallen.

Sharp said: “I can’t quite believe it at the minute, 3-0 up with 10 minutes to go, we’ve got to do better, we’ve got to see the game out.

“We’re trying to win promotion and these are the games when you get in front, you’ve got to win the game.”

You could tell the visitors fancied it last night. And why wouldn’t they? They demolished Villa 4-1 in September and were bang in form.

Wilder no doubt told his men to try and hit Villa hard – and preferably early – and he wasn’t disappointed.

After just 11 minutes, the Blades stunned the home side. Sharp scored with a goal that needed technological assistance after Abraham had made a desperate attempt to clear it off the line. Gary Madine who peeled away from his markers to get a head to Oliver Norwood’s corner.

He powered it towards goal and Sharp reacted quickest with an instinctive shot which the goal line cameras showed had gone over.

You could sense the anxiety among the home fans as delighted Blades followers chanted “We are top of the league.”

And it was Sharp again showing what a predator he is with a goal that he must have thought might be ruled out. Villa keeper Lovre Kalinic didn’t cover himself in glory but was claiming that he had got both hands on the ball.

He had made a decent block to beat away Kieran Dowell’s shot from outside the box and when Madine nodded it over him, it started to get a bit messy.

Kalinic scrambled to get to the ball, but as he snatched at it, Sharp jabbed a foot out and poked it into the net.

There were no doubts when Sharp completed his hat-trick in the 62nd minute with a powerful close range header from a Dowell cross.

A lot of Villa fans had left when Mings headed home in the 82nd minute from Conor Hourihane’s corner.

Abraham pounced four minutes later after keeper Dean Henderson could only palm out Tommy Elphick’s shot.

There was still time for Green to head home John McGinn’s cross for one of the comebacks of the season.

Abraham said: “We knew the game was never over, even at 3-0. We’ve got a fantastic team and we kept going until the last minute.”