Ajer salvages a point for Brentford at Aston Villa
Aston Villa and Brentford shared the spoils in a thrilling 2-2 draw at Villa Park, with quick-fire goals in both halves of this Premier League contest.
Tyrone Mings' sloppy pass gifted Brentford a chance in the 10th minute, with Yehor Yarmoliuk on hand to drill home from the edge of the Villa box.
Yet Nicolas Jackson restored parity within two minutes when he latched on to a deflected effort and coolly slotted the ball in the back of the net.
Caoimhin Kelleher made a superb double save on the stroke of half-time, denying Jackson and John McGinn.
McGinn, however, seemed to have put Villa on course for its first home win of the season in the league when his effort deflected in off Kristoffer Ajer in the 77th minute.
Ajer, though, had the final say, brilliantly cutting inside from the left flank to meet Jaidon Anthony's pass, before dribbling his way through a crowd of defenders and slotting home a sublime equaliser just two minutes later.
Brentford boss Keith Andrews had mixed emotions after the match.
"[I am] Torn to be honest. I liked a lot today – spirit, grit, determination," he said.
"There was evidence of rustiness, which is understandable, but I don't like to use that as an excuse, but the boys have been away for three weeks so it's trying to find the balance.
"Then we had Kevin's [Shade] injury, Jannik [Schuster] wasn't right and came off at half time, so we got tested today.
"But we're also up against a team who I thought were just starting to click before the international break.
"But the fact that we're disappointed coming away from home to a Champions League team who spend big money tells you a lot."
Villa boss Unai Emery considered the result to be fair.
"To draw at home is not a good result. I think we played a match with a lot of things improved from our last home match against [Nottingham] Forest. We created chances but conceded more chances than I expected," he said.
"Maybe the result is fair, but analysing how we are improving things, competing better, I can't tell nothing to the players about the match.
"We'll try to analyse again how we can improve even more. A better match than against Forest. Keep going forward.
"We tried, we pushed, we had chances but so did they. At the end we could've won, but also we could've lost."
Emery will be hoping for different fortunes in midweek, as his side hosts Fenerbahce in the UEFA Champions League.
