‘I must admit’ - Every word from Dean Smith on VAR complaint, Aston Villa’s shape & Leicester

Aston Villa news includes full transcript from the head coach after the 4-1 defeat to Leicester City

Aston Villa were left battered and bruised after being brushed aside by title-chasing Leicester City on Sunday.

A double from 16-goal Jamie Vardy, Kelechi Iheanacho and Jonny Evans stamped the Foxes' authority at Villa Park with Jack Grealish scoring his fourth goal in seven in a failed attempt to drag Villa back into proceedings.

As for Dean Smith, he spoke afterwards about Villa not taking their chances while explaining why Tyrone Mings stayed on with an injury. The boss had some lovely words for the late, great former manager, Ron Saunders, who tragically died at the age of 87 over the weekend.

Here's every single word from Smith after Sunday's 4-1 defeat...

If El Ghazi scores early on, does it change the game?

"Goals always change games. Anwar's missed a chance but they've had a couple before that as well on the breakaway. We've had one where if Douglas puts it in front of Wesley it's a tap-in.

"We got in some really good areas. Our play was really good and then Tyrone goes down with a hamstring injury. He tells me he's OK but they then score.

"The third goal, though, we just got back into it before half-time with Jack and there's a clear block on Ahmed Elmohamady. It goes up to VAR but, for me, VAR should disallow it. They've been doing that all season. That's what their role is. I'm not sure why it wasn't. Chris Kavanagh, who was the referee on Wednesday at Chelsea, was the VAR match official today and I'll probably have to wait for a reason why it wasn't disallowed."

Why didn't Mings come off sooner?

"I thought he pulled his hamstring straight away, that's why I called Bjorn Engels. He's never had a muscle injury before. The message I got from the medical staff was that he wanted to carry on. He felt it might've been cramp and not a muscle injury, so we carried on but, unfortunately, they scored."

Rodgers mentioned how to get at Villa, did you get it wrong tactically?

"None of the goals were due to the tactics, I must admit. Tactics went out of it. The difference was they went over the top with Vardy a couple of times and got really good chances from it. We switch play a number of times in the first half and got at their full-backs, we could have scored the first goal but we didn't take our chances.

"I was quite happy they were playing a diamond in all honesty. Get our full-backs to tuck in, we've got Nakamba and we had a four-vs-three there. We just didn't defend the goals well enough."

How's Tyrone?

"We'll wait for a scan. It's a hamstring injury of some sort and we'll find out."

What about Matt Targett?

"I don't know about Matt to be honest. All I got told was that he had to come off."

Leicester are a good side...

"Listen, you can't expect to win football matches at Villa Park when you concede 23 opportunities. Saying that, we go toe-to-toe with teams because we had 15 ourselves. I just feel, defensively, our structure should be better. Individually, our defending has to be a little bit better. Up until half-time, we had as many chances as Leicester. They were more clinical. They've got a player who, two-and-a-half years ago, was a £70m player who's in a rich vein of form at the moment. It was always going to be difficult to contain."

Too open?

"No, I don't think so. The chances they created today, they got in behind on the one, Iheanacho's got in front and poked in. They made something of the goals rather than us being too open. The third should have been chalked off. We've got to be better defensively and, if you're a team who have won seven on the spin and you've got a two-goal cushion, you can play a bit more freely.

"The lads never gave in. The biggest disappointment was their fourth goal. It's not the first or last time someone's going to get beat by Leicester, it's the first time since Spurs that we've been beaten by more than two goals. Tom's kept the score down, it could have ended 8-4 in the end, such was the openness and basketball nature of the game."

Dean, it was an emotional day following the passing of Ron Saunders...

"The whole club has paid their respects to him really well. Unfortunately we didn't get a performance to match that. I grew up as an Aston Villa fan in the 70s when Ron Saunders was in charge. He built an unbelievable team, won the league cup twice in 75 and 77, built an incredible team that I was fortunate to be able to come and watch here. To win the league in 80-81, using just 14 players, six or seven played 42 times of every minute of every game. That team went onto win the European Cup. I'm very thankful I managed to be a supporter during that historical period. My heart goes out to his family."

Did Ron inspire you to be a manager?

"I'm sure he has in some way because he was my first Aston Villa manager I watched play. I know some of the players he managed, Chris Nichol was my assistant at Walsall. I know Pat Heard very well, Gordon Cowans, Ken McNaught. It was Ken who phoned me last night to give me the sad news. I have special memories, it was a great period to follow the club with Ron."