Steven Gerrard says these four Aston Villa players need to ‘step up’ after Forest draw

Aston Villa boss Steven Gerrard is losing patience with his attacking players after another blunt display at Nottingham Forest.

Villa needed a spectacular strike by Ashley Young to earn a 1-1 draw with Forest, who went ahead through Emmanuel Dennis’ first-half header. Gerrard has bemoaned his side’s lack of attacking quality this season and again it was evident as Villa failed to put one of the division’s leakiest defences under any real threat.

He hinted he could be prepared to change things around for the weekend clash with Chelsea.

‘I need these players to step up’

Speaking to Sky Sports after the game, the Villa boss said: “The important thing is how I get this team to be more potent,” Villa boss Gerrard told Sky Sports.

“For effort and application a lot of our play is ok until you get to a certain point. But look around the dressing room and you see Coutinho, Buendia, Watkins, Ings and Bailey will be back soon.

“I need these players to step up and provide big moments and go and be headline writers for us.”

Reaction the the performace

“I think we were the better team and we created the better out of the two teams in terms of opportunities,” he said.

“I still think we need to create more in the final third, I still think we lacked a bit of quality, moments of magic, outside Ashely Young’s fantastic strike. We need to demand more from the players.

“I don’t want to sit here and talk about four games unbeaten, because it’s not enough, the last two performances we need to be taking maximum points.

“There is a lot of frustration there. I have challenged the forward players to give us more in that area of the pitch.

“We just need more quality from some of our big hitters. When we get that and when they step forward with more for us I am sure we can turn these draws into wins. Tonight was a incredible opportunity for us to really jump up the league and we haven’t grabbed it.

“Once we get that from the big players I am sure we are going to move up the league. Hopefully players can get into better form. If not I am going to have to change things, whether that is personnel or system.

“Right now, I am thinking about the weekend and there could be changes in the team. So it could be pretty quick.”

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