HIGH AND LOW FOR VOKES AS BANKS HAILED
DEAN Smith hailed his Aston Villa side’s second-half display as they earned a point at Stoke on a day when the Potters paid tribute to club legend Gordon Banks.
Substitute Albert Adomah struck just after the hour at the bet365 Stadium to cancel out Sam Vokes’ fifth-minute opener to secure a share of the spoils.
Smith was pleased with Villa’s performance after the break as they ended a run of two straight defeats in the Championship.
He said: “In the second half, I thought we dominated the ball, dominated the game and fully deserved our equaliser and probably should have gone on to have won the game.
“Stoke have a lot of good players, relegated from the Premier League last year, one of the favourites to go up. To go and dominate them as we did in the second half was really pleasing and we can certainly take a lot from that.
“We certainly deserved something out of the game.
Stoke led through Vokes after five minutes, with the forward reacting first in the six-yard box to back-heel leftfooted from Sam Clucas’ low cross from the left to beat Jed Steer, who, despite getting a hand to it, could not prevent the ball trickling over the line.
Both teams were then forced in to early changes after injuries, with goalscorer Vokes making way for Mame Biram Diouf, while Adomah replaced fullback Alan Hutton for Villa.
In pursuit of a quick-fire second goal, midfielder Charlie Adam, making his return to the Stoke side, tried his luck from range, seeing his drive from 30-yards dip wide of Steer’s post.
With the clock ticking down until half-time, captain Danny Batth later saw his powerful header, following Adam’s corner from the left, well held by Steer.
Villa equalised after 62 minutes when Anwar El Ghazi burst down the left flank to feed Adomah inside the penalty area, who guided his low rightfooted drive beyond Jack Butland which found the bottom right-corner of the net in front of the away support to earn a point.
Stoke manager Nathan Jones was proud of the club’s tribute to Banks, while he also believes that there is a mentality problem within the squad.
Jones said: “I think we lost our focal point, but let’s start by saying, I’m proud of our club today, in terms of our club, our fans, Villa also contributed to that, I thought they were exemplary.
“I think we have paid a wonderful tribute to a wonderful player, a legend and a wonderful human being so both clubs need credit there.
“We started superbly well, we want to be on the front foot. Villa are similar to us, underachieving with fantastic players and a fantastic squad. We wanted to make sure we started well and got the first goal, and we did that.
“We are not the side that I would like us to be yet, but I think it is more of a mentality problem really in terms of we take the lead and then there is that fear factor of losing the game or not seeing the game out, rather than going for the jugular.”