BirminghamWorld reporter Charlie Haffenden reacts to Fulham 1-3 Aston Villa in the Premier League after refereeing and VAR drama took centre stage at Craven Cottage.
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00:00Aston Villa are up to fourth in the Premier League, or at least for now, after today's 3-1 win away at Fulham.
00:07A fantastic comeback victory for Unai Emery's men today, who went down 1-0 just after five minutes.
00:13Raúl Jiménez scoring that opening goal. It was a poor bit of defending from Pau Torres, the Aston Villa defender.
00:19Simply had to do better to defend from a long pass from Fulham goalkeeper Bernd Leno.
00:25Just that one long thing over the top completely unlocked Villa's defence.
00:29And Pau was the man who was responsible for Jiménez's run, but he allowed the striker to get goal sides.
00:35Crucially, allowed the ball to bounce and Jiménez struck first time in off the post to beat Emi Martínez.
00:42I think Unai Emery on the touchline, very frustrated after that one.
00:45But it wasn't long until Morgan Rodgers got Villa back into the game, making it 1-1 in the ninth minute.
00:51Quite a fortuitous goal, to say the least. Struck from range, aimed for the right-hand side of the goal.
00:57It deflected massively off Calvin Bassi and went into the bottom left-hand corner, giving Leno no chance.
01:03It was then very end-to-end, frantic, both teams having decent chances.
01:08Uri Tielemans, the man crafting so much for Villa in the end of the first half,
01:14and then that carried over into the start of the second. Villa really gaining momentum.
01:18Wally Watkins, Morgan Rodgers having so many opportunities. Jacob Ramsey, Luca Dean finding space on the left-hand side regularly as well.
01:25And eventually Watkins found the breakthrough to make it 2-1.
01:28A fantastic header from a Tielemans cross. It just had to be Tielemans, didn't it, to get the assist.
01:33In off the crossbar from Watkins. One of his best headers he's probably ever scored in his career, actually.
01:38The way he kind of wound back and got the power before heading in off the bar was really impressive.
01:43And then there was a red card for Joachim Andersen. Watkins, who'd made so many good runs in behind all game long, had another getting in behind.
01:52And Andersen, it was a bit of a shove. It wasn't too much power on the shove.
01:57And Watkins went down quite easily. He certainly made a meal of it.
02:00But at the end of the day, it was a clear goal-scoring opportunity.
02:03And I think the referee was right to send Andersen off for that.
02:06At that point, obviously, Villa with the man advantage, you'd expect them to go on and win the game.
02:10And Luca Dean didn't take long to make it 3-1.
02:13When I say Luca Dean, it was his cross. It's a Diop scoring the own goal from Dean's cross.
02:18But it wouldn't have been a goal for Villa if it wasn't for Luca Dean's fine run down the left.
02:22And then his delivery into the area causing all sorts of problems for Diop and Leno, who had a mix-up at the near post before it winded up in the back of the net.
02:30You thought it would be fairly straightforward from that point on. Villa 3-1 up against 10 men to see out the game.
02:37And that's what they did in the end. But Jadon Filagin wanted to make things a little bit difficult, it seems.
02:42Receiving two yellow cards needlessly in the 88th and in the 94th minutes.
02:47Getting sent off, bringing Villa down to 10 as well.
02:50I think Unai Emery will be quite delighted that it was so late in the game and it didn't have an impact in the end.
02:56But yeah, it was silly from Filagin, really, who will now be banned for the next game against AFC Bournemouth at Villa Park.
03:02In the end, it didn't matter as Villa ran out 3-1 victors here at Craven Cottage.