abdulaziz1

3 hours ago, macandally said:

Eze Eberechi for me, he will cost a whack, but best player on the park Saturday

Should’ve got him from QPR, him and Olise would’ve been very good signings. Now I don’t think it’s easy to get them.

11 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Surely skewed by Hibs results in fairness?

Goal for: 11

So no it’s only for League.

I think Konsa is the one to play with him in a highline. Yes we lose much by Mings presence but even Mings needed Konsa’s pace. 
I think we need to be more careful against the top teams, especially away from home.

Last season Newcastle were in a very good form, they lost their form and confidence on the most important moment (League Cup final), but they managed to get back and even beat Man Utd easily. We were going to lose our confidence as well after Utd, but gladly achieved what we want. I remember we were on a perfect form under Sherwood, just to lose every part of confidence before the cup final against Arsenal.

Right now we have players to come back, and players who are settling (Youri, Carlos Zaniolo), and players who are already improving (Duran, Diaby, Torres). There are players who are improving from last season as (Cash, Bailey and Dinge). 

Getting back to Duran, I think he’ll benefit a lot from Europe and hopefully a cup run (and a win), which might help him getting few league starts as well.

4 hours ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Not necessarily.

I'm pretty sure teams like Brighton are now taken very seriously.

It takes time, we can't expect to escape relegation, finish  17th,11th, 14th and most recently conference league, then be " demanding "  to be taken seriously.

It takes time, consistency and a convincing upwards trajectory.

We are obviously biased, but aside from this, there defo are neutral fans and pundits who have identified us as a team to watch.

As a matter of fact as previously mentioned, there was a load of " Villa can finish Champions League " talk prior to season starting which i was apprehensive about. by neutrals and pundits.

People forgot all what happened in the summer and remember Newcastle 5-1, then Liverpool 3-0.

So our wins look fluke for them, possibly even our 7th last season. 
For me I prefer it this way, gain points keep in touch and let them think what they want. 
 

This team still has things that it haven’t shown yet. Two major injuries from the preseason, now two will hopefully be back. New players settling, working to get the right balance. Add to that dealing with pressure of more games. 
 

Even if we hopefully beat Chelsea, people will speak about how Chelsea are bad which is again better for us.

1 hour ago, Tomaszk said:

I'm torn between trying to force some confidence into Ollie and resting him for Chelsea.

No way Duran can start at Chelsea currently IMO. He's too erratic and excitable still. Ollie a large part of our defensive set-pieces currently as well.

This is not the week to start him in the league, he should start in Poland then he have Everton. After Brighton we could start rotating in the league easier I guess. But we have another game most of the coming weeks (especially if we made it against Everton and qualified). 

If we could win next game against Chelsea, I think we would have made up for our two losses, the good part is we’re not fully convinced in our performances or results this season yet we’re doing really fine. Which gives you an indication that we could do even more. So gaining points while improving performances would be perfect. Being satisfied could make things wrong, last season when everyone said we’re going to Europe we went and lost to Utd and Wolves. I said before that the Newcastle result would hopefully turn to our side. It even didn’t make them do panic moves. 
The attention right now is on Brighton, people still remember our results against Newcastle and Liverpool and don’t think we’re that good. 
Still Ramsey to come back and have a better balance hopefully. 
If we can win next game and put some gap with Chelsea (if Newcastle and Utd failed to win as well), then we can go and look upwards as well.

The fact that we’re 7th while we aren’t really satisfied with our beginning, then getting humiliated 5-1 and 3-0, we’re 1+ in terms of goal difference in only 5 matches. It’s really interesting.

Then yesterday comeback.

50 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Come on man, this thread is for people who want a challenge 

I don’t think Man Utd are bad (because of their start), I though they’d be below top 3, but thet’ve lost to Spurs, Arsenal and Brighton. We’ve lost to Liverpool and Newcastle badly.

We can’t to a conclusion out of that. But the much they lose the better for us. 
 

Hopefully Chelsea fail to win as well (a draw between Newcastle and Brentford would’ve been great). 
 

Spurs winning was annoying. 
 

We now have two tough matches against Chelsea and Brighton, we must keep within ranges with other teams after that. 
 

Hopefully a win Thursday would give us a boost in the group stage and help us to try and qualify early so we can concentrate on the league and cup.

6 hours ago, MrBlack said:

He doesn't get counted...but i expect we could register him. For whatever reason we chose not to, but we do have a spare spot.

Maybe thinking ahead for January as think there's a window to add players then, but still don't really know why we wouldn't have registed him as in the first place for the interim.

From what I read, you can add 3 players during January, wether that was by changing 3 current ones or just add? I’m not really sure.

7 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

It was exceptionally bad defending from Mitchell, who has given him time and about two yards of space to turn in, but at the end of the day he's still got to score it and under great pressure as well when it looked like the wind was going from our sails. Bad defending but a fine fine finish. 

He was going to score somehow a similar goal last season against City. The ability is definitely there. He just needs to focus and not keep shooting from areas were nothing would come out of it. He’s a much better goalscorer than Watkins but he needs to improve in other aspects as well. Looking forward for his development.

He is weird, some of his touches says he’s not even a professional player, but again some of his finishing and plays turns out to be perfect. I’m not talking about his nonsense shots as he’s trying to impress at any cost, but some blindly runs and bad touches. But to be fair even Watkins used to have those touches (well still does as well but improved). 
When you see him playing with his national team, and remember that he’s actually 1 or even 2 years younger than Archer, you’d still be hopeful about his ceiling. 
For me he’s either going to be up there with our best strikers (which isn’t a miracle achievement to be honest), or he’d fall apart. I’m hoping for the first one, we’ve invested a huge amount (considering his age and league he came from). Seems an Emery player as well.

13 hours ago, MrBlack said:

As stated above, he hasn't been with us for 2 years so doesn't qualify for the younger list... and yes the forced hand with Philogene that he wasn't happy with bit part time...could have been confirmed before we registered him for the Europa League.

Is he not allowed, or he doesn’t get counted as 1 of 4 young players that played for 2 years?

I just hope we don’t rush him back, hopefully nor even needing to. 
Some tough games coming up, better to manage him and Ramsey with a longer term view. 
Although that two were of the main reasons of our progress last season.

I haven’t read the forum for a while (part of being busy but mostly because of last result). Losing that way before an international break is really bad. But anyway, we’ve still lost games we expected to lose (not that way though). We know we can get back to track (happened last season twice, after Leicester..etc, then after Wolves and Utd). This season aftet Newcastle. The quality is much better, but expectations are higher. Emery is trying to force and implement his tactics more (last season he was more cautious). I’d still be cautious especially away from home and against top teams. 
We still need some time to get the right balance and to have our attacking left side back. 
Until then we have to keep pace and minimize the gap (as I kept saying last season). We should consider going into cup games with an intent of winning. Now that we’re in group stages, we shall focus as well on Carabao cup. 
Our run will be tough anyway, I’d take qualifying against Everton and having an easy draw (against non PL Team) while winning European matches. Winning against Palace, drawing against Chelsea and Brighton. If we can keep winning Carabao cup games without having tough draws, keeping pace in the league I think that would be perfect. If we got to the Carabao final and kept progressing in Europa, we could win the Carabao and guarantee another European trip (doing that while being still in Europa and FA Cup would be fantastic). That might make us prioritize cups while competing in the league but with less pressure. It would also loose pressure at both cups as we would have already won one which would help us mentally. 
We’re still from a final article, yet we’re showing some progress at easier games while regress at tough games. 

I watched him in the preseason and he clearly was good, against Hibs he was great going forward. Happy for him to find a good move, hopefully he show that he can have a future here.

2 minutes ago, Adam2003 said:

Hasn’t gone - I think he’s carrying an injury.

I thought he’s gone not sure why as he was linked somewhere earlier in the window.

1 minute ago, zab6359 said:

Injured

Hope it’s not a bad one? He have a chance to show what he can do in the group stage. I guess there is a chance as well for him to feature and have some PL minutes.

2 minutes ago, Adam2003 said:

Have I… have I just seen someone pick Leon Bailey over Jacob Ramsey in a first XI, even though it means McGinn playing on the left…? Thank heavens this isn’t Unai Emery

‘Second XI’ I think Dendoncker in midfield, Lenglet in defence, and I don’t think Iroegbunum is challenging for minutes just yet (but we will see).

I am 100% on board with your depth point though!

Is Tim on loan or he didn’t go?

Great window, we’ve matured in terms of buying and selling as well. If we sold Coutinho as well I guess we’ve done a fantastic job. Still a January window were we could recheck our squad and needs. We might be able to sell Dinge (which is doing really well right now) if we can find a good/cheap/young replacement for him. 

Dwight Gayle, although can’t say he’s rubbish.

Something strange with this guy, hois shots and crosses…etc are very good. Sometimes his first touch is ok but at times you feel the ball as a burden to him. There were two moments (one against Burnley) and now when he could’ve give it to Kellyman he made it hard for himself. Yet again because he moves strangely so can’t really say if he’s failing to keep the ball or is that he just looks not to. 
He has great attributes, one of the most encouraging things with Emery is that he knows what he wants from his players, Ings is more talented than Watkins, Archer than Duran. But he wants attributes that doesn’t only come with talent (well much room for Duran to improve). It’s not that Emery wants cloggers (such as some of our previous managers) but he wants the right balance. 
Anyway I think Duran has shown amazing attributes, I saw some people saying he looks like Benteke. Not really as Benteke use to keep the ball perfectly, Duran still look a bit panicked especially when he runs with it. He’s more of a Watkins I’d say (with a better finishing). 
I’m not sure what to write more, but if he can sort this thing I guess he might be starting for us earlier than we think, but that’s a big ask. 

12 minutes ago, Tom13 said:

Declare for Portugal mate. Southgate continues to waste years and years.

Martinez isn’t really far from Southgate, I’m not sure how are they still managing big national teams.

Hopefully he has his first start with us  tonight.

1 hour ago, VillaParkAvenue said:

How the **** does a player like Ansu Fati end up at Brighton?

Because they’re a well run club, earning big money and spending smartly. They have a system that would show anyone that he’s good. Fair play to them. 
We’re doing our way as well, and hopefully we’re much better and sustainable. But we can’t deny what they’re doing. They have money to spend as well.