After enjoying an incredible opening to the new Premier League campaign, Aston Villa were brought back down to the ground with a comprehensive 3-0 defeat at home to Leeds United on Friday night.
Dean Smith’s side have already pulled off some notable scalps, including a 7-2 thrashing of reigning champions Liverpool, but it was a newly-promoted side in Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds that popped their balloon.
And Villa can’t have too many complaints either. The Whites had more than double the amount of attempts on goal that the home side did (27-12), and but for some profligate finishing, could have given Villa their own mauling.
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But whilst defensively Smith’s men looked shaky, Villa’s usually reliable talisman Jack Grealish had one of those disappointing displays. As per Sofascore, his 5.6 match rating was the worst of any player on the pitch by far, and it was no surprise to see why.
He lost possession 19 times over the course of the game – the most of any outfield player for Villa – whilst his composure and ability to spot things before anyone else also deserted him.
None more so than a particularly damaging moment when he could potentially have played Ollie Watkins in for an easy goal, before seeing Leeds go up the other end and score just a couple of minutes later.
With all the talk about how he’s being snubbed by England boss Gareth Southgate, Grealish has to consistently show he can be the main man for Villa. And to his credit, he’s been doing exactly that for a number of seasons now.
But with the England talk dominating the headlines in recent days and weeks, Friday night’s clash against Leeds gave him the perfect opportunity to prove the doubters wrong.
Instead, things fell flat, and it proved costly for his team.