A wild second-half at Villa Park ensured points were distributed evenly between Stoke City and Aston Villa. Tammy Abraham and Jonathan Kodjia had the goals for the claret and blues.
Amidst a small injury crisis at Aston Villa, manager Dean Smith called upon a youthful bench to serve in the matchday 18. 20-year-olds Callum O’Hare, Keinan Davis, James Bree, alongside teenager Dominic Revan formed 4/7 of the reserves.
None saw action, however, as substitute forward Jonathan Kodjia powered Villa to a 2-2 draw.
Scoreless at the break after a feisty first-half, Stoke City drew first blood as Joe Allen hammered home a cutback 90 seconds in. It stayed that way for 20+ minutes until Jonathan Kodjia drew a penalty kick via Erik Pieters’ foul. Tammy Abraham calmly tucked the ball in to make it 1-1. Minutes later, Ahmed Elmohamady returned the favor with a conceded penalty of his own. Stoke substitute Benik Afobe made it 2-1 to the visitors.
With five minutes left in regular time, Glenn Whelan played the ball down the right-wing. Yannick Bolasie’s crossed ball saw Kodjia head the ball downward and into the back of the net. The match finished 2-2 in adverse weather conditions.
FT: #AVFC 2-2 Stoke. Fair result as both teams were pretty poor. Weather conditions definitely factored in. Villa sorely missed Grealish. #utv
— Claret Villans (@ClaretVillans) December 15, 2018
A point in the bag, but parts of that #AVFC performance were really bad - particularly the FBs. Both essentially culpable for goals, Hutton rinsed repeatedly by whichever man Stoke put on his flank.
— Sam Tighe (@stighefootball) December 15, 2018
In all, a fair result.