Stoke City v Aston Villa - as it happened

7.28pm: Good evening world! And so the eyes of the world, give or take a few, settle on the Britannia Stadium for the lastest instalment in this season's Premier League soap opera. Tonight's cast does not however feature any actual managers, Aston Villa's being not really ready to start work quite yet and Stoke's having the night off (personal reasons, we're told). Team news coming up before you finish this, unless you're a very fast reader. In the meantime, shall we do some statistics? Come on, let's do it: • Villa have won one of their last six against Stoke • But Stoke have only won one (and lost six) of their last nine in the league, and all three this season. The last time they lost their first four top-flight fixtures was in 1906. • But only one team has beaten them in the league at the Britannia Stadium on a week night (got that?) in the last five years. And it wasn't Villa. • However, Villa have only lost one of their last seven away matches on a Monday. And Stoke have never won a Premier league game in September. • The referee is Lee Probert, who took charge of Villa's 1-0 win over Stoke last December. 7.34pm: Teams! Slightly later than advertised because I pressed the wrong button! Stoke: Sorensen, Huth, Shawcross, Faye, Collins, Delap, Whitehead, Wilson, Etherington, Walters, Jones. Subs: Begovic, Higginbotham, Whelan, Gudjohnsen, Fuller, Pennant, Wilkinson. Aston Villa: Friedel, Luke Young, Dunne, Collins, Warnock, Ashley Young, Albrighton, Petrov, Reo-Coker, Downing, Agbonlahor. Subs: Guzan, Ireland, Heskey, Beye, Cuellar, Clark, Hogg. Referee: Lee Probert (Wiltshire). 7.44pm: Obviously Sorensen passed his fitness test. Agbonlahor plays because Carew's mooted comeback hasn't actually happened. Sky have been chatting about Tim Cahill for most of the last half-hour, so I've got no idea what's happening at the Britannia. I'm just a few ads away from finding out... 7.46pm: "Rory Delap is not just a one-trick pony," protests Ian Copestake. "He has a good touch for a man with a big throw." 7.48pm: And Tony Pulis's mother apparently died earlier today, hence his absence. 7.54pm: What do people think about Jon Walters as a Premier League striker? Or Young and Agbonlahor as a front two? Plenty of interest in this one (he writes, before is actually starts). 8.00pm: Teams are out, we're set for kick-off. 1 min: Peeeep! We're off! 1 min: Good early break from Stoke, with Kenwyne Jones playing Etherington down the left and the resulting cross being cleared at full stretch. 3 mins: "To respond to Ian Copestake's remark about Delap's 'good touch'," writes James Tyler, "does that refer to all the time he spends gripping the ball and wiping it down on the sideline before hoisting in a throw?" 3 mins: Another nearly-but-not-actually good attack from Stoke, with Jones disecting the defence with a fine ball for the offside Delap. 6 mins: "First impressions of Walters? Lively; bustling; unafraid; has the technique to go with the moxie," writes Scott. "I think he compares favourably with other Championship graduate strikers – Kenwyne Jones, Ebanks-Blake, Ricardo Fuller, et al. The question is: can Stoke give him the service? He seems to like it played in to feet – a potentially handsome partnership with Gudjohnsen might be in the offing?" Thanks Scott. One question: moxie? 7 mins: Delap has the towel out and is readying his first long-throw, which is headed away by Collins. 8 mins: Stoke work an excellent shooting opportunity, just outside the Villa penalty area and from a central position. Sadly it falls to Robert Huth, whose weak effort rolls into the keeper's hand. Meanwhile, Scott explains: "Moxie: like chutzpha, but with more hustle." 9 mins: Delap absolutely takes the mickey out of Warnock, leaving the full-back on the floor before scooping a cross towards, but not actually to, Kenwyne Jones. Good start for the home side. 11 mins: Great pass from Wilson, 10 yards inside his own half, to Jones, sprinting into the penalty area. Brilliant pass, Fábregasesque, but the finish is guileless and hits Brad Friedel, when it could very easily have been chipped over him. 14 mins: Stephen Warnock has been booked for a silly leaping foul on Jones. 15 mins: Aston Villa's first shot – Stewart Downing from 35 yards, low and hard (but nowhere near hard enough). 17 mins: "Dwight Yorke [co-commentating for Sky tonight] just said that Kenwyne Jones had 'all the attributes apart from his goal scoring' – isn't that quite a disadvantage for a striker?" wonders Adam Lord. 21 mins: "Lots of talk on commentary about Villa's lack of a target man," notes Gary Naylor. "It's a lack of decent passes from the midfield, I feel." True enough – the main purpose of a target man often seems to be to provide the rest of the team with an easy option when they've got the ball, but here the team with the target man is also the only one showing any ingenuity. 24 mins: Dwight Yorke is suggesting that Aston Villa could have won a penalty for a foul in the penalty area as the players waited for a corner kick. As in, before the kick was taken. As in, in no way possible under the laws of the game. 25 mins: Kenwyne Jones unleashes a rocket shot from 25 yards that Friedel pushes away at full stretch. 27 mins: "Strikers with all the attributes except scoring? There's one who's built a career on that sitting on the Villa bench right now," notes Robin Hazlehurst. (clue: it's Emile Heskey) 29 mins: Dwight Yorke is proving a bit of a comedian. "Again, Villa showing inven ... inven ... [just gives up] in front of goal." The inven ... inven ... they showed on that occasion was a Downing turn and right-foot shot from 25 yards. GOAL! Stoke 0 Aston Villa 1 (Downing, 34 mins) Here's a wacky combination: Agbonlahor with a left-footed cross from the right, Downing with a stupendous stooping header at the back stick. 37 mins: From a long throw, the ball flicks off Reo-Coker's head and across the Villa area, where Kenwyne Jones heads it into Collins' raised left arm. Nothing given. 41 mins: Incredible miss! Another cross from Agbonlahor – this time right-footed, from the left wing – finds Ashley Young perfectly, arriving at pace at the far post. Young's header flies a couple of yards wide. 43 mins: Downing crosses from the left and the ball flies about for a bit before falling to Collins, who lashes it goalwards from about eight yards, out to the left of goal, only for Sorensen to block. They were nowhere for the first half-hour, but should be two up and counting. 45 mins: Now Albrighton crosses from the right, Downing sticks out a leg to reach it, out beyond the far post, and does pretty well to poke it goalwards. Sorensen pushes it away. There'll be two minutes of stoppage time here. 45+1 mins: Danny Collins booked for diving in on Albrighton. 45+2 mins: Some neat play just outside Stoke's penalty area ends with Young bursting into the box and to the byline before boshing the ball across the goal, where nobody manages to touch it in. Half-time: Credit to Villa for turning that around. Albrighton is playing well again, and they could have been two or more to the good by the end of that first half. Stoke ended it in utter disarray – Pennant and Gudjohnsen surely to arrive shortly. Heskeygate: Quite a few people are defending Heskey after Robin Hazlehurst's 27th-minute comment. "Ashley Young offers a lot outside the box but, arguably, so does Heskey, albeit with a different skill set," writes Gary Naylor. "Heskey is much the better finisher of the two." Really, though Young's missed header doesn't help any rebuttal, it's been years since I've considered Heskey a better finisher than anyone. I don't think that he was never a good goalscorer, just that he hasn't been for a long time. He's missed plenty of chances as good as that one. 46 mins: Peeeep! And they're off! Again! 46 mins: Tony Pulis has just turned up, to a massive ovation. 48 mins: Do you think it's a good thing that Pulis has turned up, on the day his mum has died? Obviously I'm not asking you to judge his level of bereavement, but as a dad I'd be a bit miffed if my eventual passing isn't worth at least one day off work. 50 mins: Stoke scoop a free-kick into the penalty area from deep and Jones thumps a header goalwards, which Friedel pushes away. 51 mins: Another Delap throw fails to get even near the six-yard box. Has he lost it? 52 mins: "So, after Barry and Milner, it seems Stewart Downing is going to be the next apparently eternal English prospect to finally break through at the Villa. Move him into the centre, get him all hench after countless hours in the gym and let him loose alongside Stilian Petrov. Simple," writes Scott. "Nigel Reo-Coker must be wondering when it's his turn." 52 mins: "Great things are expected of him in and around the Aston Villa area," says Dwight Yorke of Gabriel Agbonlahor. 54 mins: "According to Wikipedia (so it must be true) Emile Heskey's scoring rate for Villa (45 games, 5 goals) is only 1/3 as good as Savo Milosevic (90 games, 30 goals)," notes Mark Ireland. "And poor Savo got the nickname "miss-a-lot-ovic" for his trouble, so where does that leave Heskey?" 56 mins: Another Delap long-throw, this one from the other (left) wing, causes genuine panic. Obviously there's a bit of a wind. 59 mins: Stoke are about to make a substitution, but it's not Gudjohnsen or Pennant cominng on – it's Ricardo Fuller. 60 mins: Stoke having a bit of a spell. Sterling Etherington cross forces Dunne into excellent clearing header with Kenwyne Jones lurking. 61 mins: Jon Walters comes off for Fuller. 62 mins: And now Pennant's stripping off. "No MBM is complete without some insufferable pedantic, so I will oblige: I would suggest that the combination that led to the goal was not particularly wacky. The permutation that created it, on the other hand, was," notes Patrick McGovern. 65 mins: Pennant comes on for Marc Wilson, his previous spell with Birmingham City ensuring a good chorus of boos from the away end as he does so. 68 mins: Shawcross nearly sells Sorensen short with a back-pass, which the keeper blasts at Nigel Reo-Coker, barely a yard away from him by then. The ball flies over the bar. 70 mins: This is a bright but not a brilliant game, played at sufficient tempo for it not to become dull. If not quite end-to-end stuff, it's at least 30-yards-from-one-end to 30-yards-from-the-other stuff. GOAL! Stoke 1 Aston Villa 1 (Kenwyne Jones, 80) A good cross from the left and a firm header. Stoke helped by the fact that Villa's entire central defence had just flung themselves to the edge of the penalty area to block a shot from Etherington. 81 mins: I was just about to praise the Dunne/Collins duo for being absolutely the best in the league for last-ditch desperate blocking, when they got punished for it. 82 mins: Delap with a long throw from the right and Jones heads the ball at goal, Friedel catching. That wind must have died down. 84 mins: Villa yet to make a substitution, or suggest they're particularly interested in one. 86 mins: Lovely lay-off from Agbonlahor and Reo Coker has a brilliant shooting chance, level with the penalty spot but a few yards to the right. He didn't have much of the goal to aim at, however, and hit the nearest defender. 87 mins: And here is a Villa substitution, with Agbonlahor coming off for Emile Heskey, while Stoke bring Glenn Whelan on for Delap. 88 mins: Fuller has one of his three-times-a-season moments of magic – lovely first touch, good twist to bemuse Collins and a shot that Friedel pushes clear. 88 mins: As Jermaine Pennant prepares to take the corner, Dwight Yorke praises the reliable nature of his deliveries from wide. At which, inevitably, Pennant balloons the corner over the entire penalty area and out the other side. 90 mins: We're going to have three minutes of stoppage time. 90+1 mins: And the entire first minute is spent collecting Glenn Whelan's ludicrous free-kick from wherever it landed, a very long way from goal. GOAL! Stoke 2 Aston Villa 1 (Huth, 90+3 mins) Pennant wins a free-kick wide on the right – looked rather dubious, I felt – but the delivery is good, it bumps around a bit, is centred again from the left and Huth turns it in, about six yards out. 90+4 mins: Peeeeeep! It's all over, Stoke stealing victory 30 seconds from the end. "It never ceases to amaze you, this game," says Andy Gray. "Tony's mum might well have been looking down on him tonight." Final thoughts: A good game, really. Neither of these sides will worry the trophy-engravers this season, in all likelihood, but this was good, honest, stereotypical Premier League action. Skill, drama, emotion, it had the lot. Surprisingly good fun. Petrov, who "gave away" the free-kick from which Stoke scored their winner, was booked for dissent after the game ended. Predictably and understandably peeved – Pennant seemed to dive, not particularly convincingly, and then took the free-kick 15 yards closer to goal than he should have. Which will only make the result even more painful for the visitors.