BigJim

27 minutes ago, MaVilla said:

Buendia has the 4th most chances created in the prem this season, behind De Bruyne, Alexander-Arnold and Grealish.

4th......playing for Norwich, I want buendia on one wing, and grealish on the other please, pretty please.

Fabulous player, agreed, but perhaps most of all we need to sign someone to put those chances away. We can't depend any of Wesley, Samatta, or Davis, for different reasons. 

1 hour ago, Tomaszk said:

I can't remember Balague being correct about anything ever.

Don't understand this bit.

"Smith and Suso have received media criticism for passing on interesting information that protects Purslow. Difficult to work in these conditions. Suso has preferred not to continue despite having one more year of contract, and he told the owners a while ago."

The translation is slightly off I think. The tweet doesn't imply that Smith and Suso passed on the information, but rather that information was leaked which protected Purslow and led to criticism for Smith and Suso in the media.  That's my reading of it anyhow.  

Isn't he managed by his dad?  I'm afraid a huge amount of cash heading in the old man's direction if he leaves may be too hard to resist.

40 minutes ago, villalad21 said:

Watching United i can say that they don't need Jack. Not at all.

Let's all hope they see it the same way.

4 minutes ago, nick76 said:

Well I guess we’ll see over the next six games but I still think we’ll stay up.

This is the sort of post I come on here to read. Stops me from falling into deep despair.  

Cheers Nick!

Need Jack to slip them a message saying he'll only sign for them if we get something out of the game.

IF we stay up, is there a chance the board might keep Smith and fire Suso?  Smith hasn't had the support he needed, he could do better with a different DF.

On 22/06/2020 at 13:11, TRO said:

That second line is rubbish......we didn't play like that against Liverpool. We stood our ground.

We simply make it too easy for everyone.......shall we just throw the towel in and crawl back down our hole, because we are outclassed.

Was there a gulf in class against Leicester and Southampton, who dismantled us?

I am not wishing to be rude, but that second line is defeatist.....we have to get a team who can win, before we can attract, players like they have.....its never going to happen thinking like that.

just as an example.....when Andy Gray arrived at 19, his second game against Man U he ripped the arse out of them and arrived like a thunderbolt, he wasn't the most gifted of players, technically, but had the heart of a Lion and made things happen for himself.....you cannot be constantly over shadowed by talent, you have to fight back and make them work for what they get.....we just hand it on a plate.

As far as possession is concerned (and that is what I was commenting on), we absolutely did! Look it up if you don't believe me. 

The game against Liverpool felt a lot closer, and the performance was maybe a bit better, but they still had all of the ball and that's what happens when you have two teams of players of such vastly different ability. It happens all the time in the PL and the result is nearly always the same. It's not being defeatist to say there is a gulf in class - it's simply being realistic.  It pissed me off that an Everton fan should presume to say our possession stats were a disgrace right at the time when his team was surrendering all the ball to Liverpool.

I know you perceive a lack of fight and it hurts you.  I also want us to be able to give any team a game and to fight like lions, and I hurt when we lose just as much as the next fan.  We do have fighters in our squad as we have shown like in that game last November. They weren't so much in evidence on Sunday but there are reasons for that and I'm not going to be so hard on them. The team and manager need all the support they can get in next few weeks. It's a pity they seem to have lost the VillaTalk faithful.

I see people on here say we have no chance against Wolves, Liverpool, ManU in the upcoming games. There's defeatism for you. I KNOW we are going to be outclassed again, but I still cling to the hope that we can scrape a point or two out of those games. That's what being a fan has become for me over the course of this season, and often enough in the past (and I've been watching them for as long as you).

21 minutes ago, striker said:

Mate Smith has totally abandoned the style of play he was known for at Brentford. He has in affect bottled it. Over the last two games I feel you are seeing tactics heavily influenced by John Terry.

How do you explain Grealish being played out wide? That’s not forced on the manager. How do you explain McGinn being played as a DM? That’s not forced on the manager either. How do you explain hoof ball when the players Villa have aren’t suited to it.

You can see the players aren’t happy with the way in which they’ve been instructed to play. The possession stats were an embarrassment especially at home. 
 

Smith needs to go.

Pretty similar to Everton's at the moment?

What do you expect given the gulf in class between the sides?

2 hours ago, Chindie said:

The only conspiracy I can see having much merit about this whole thing is the possibility that the virus isn't entirely natural and may be a case of someone **** up in a lab. But the thing with that is, it's kinda neither here nor there - it doesn't really matter if the thing is the result of decidedly shit food production methods in China, or if someone in a lab studying these kinds of viruses **** up and accidently got it outside the Jan environment. Ultimately it's here now and until there's an element of control over it it doesn't really matter what it's origin is. Anything else is nonsense.

Don't you think it matters if scientists are being directed by lunatics to mess around with viruses to see if they can make them more virulent/lethal?

I could hardly imagine a practice that it would be more important to eliminate.

Obviously I don't know the truth behind any of the allegations floating around.  However, I have examined a little of what Mikovits has to say on a number of videos. It is clear that she is vastly experienced in the field and did a lot of important work in her day (Cancer/HIV). She claims she was directed to do this sort of experimenting on the ebola virus ffs.

Some people will immediately write her off as "antivacc" because of her claims of widespread contamination but she is not to be confused with the ill-informed lay people who have taken up that position.  I don't exclude the possibility that she has gone off the rails, but neither do I exclude the possibility that what she says about being shut down by nefarious interests is true. 

What I believe to be a reliable source has told me the plan is for all PL games to be played in June at St George's Park bcd with 2 or 3 games being streamed for TV daily. Players isolated in local hotels (where they will be the only guests) away from friends and family for the duration.

Horrible idea, but as I say I believe the source is sound.

4 hours ago, PaulC said:

Think he did. George Curtis was captain of the side that got to the final of the 71 league cup  wasn't he. I'm pretty sure Ian Ross replaced him as captain and Chris Nicholl replaced him in the team. 

Godfrey was captain that day, Curtis wasn't in the side.

7 minutes ago, kurtsimonw said:

Just a weird view IMO. It just suggests that owners are responsible for all failures and all successes. It just isn't the case.

Unfortunately it seems we live in an age of no accountability. If you do a shit job, its your fault, not your bosses.

Yeah, just another way of looking at it.  But if you make an investment and it goes wrong, it's not very productive to just pass the responsibility off onto someone else. Sure, you can do it if it makes you feel better.

Look, I'm not blaming the owners in the sense of wanting them out or wanting to yell at them. I'm just saying that if they had appointed different people they may have got a better result. In that sense, they are responsible in my book.

I think we can all agree that the 140m or whatever it was could have been invested a bit better.

The question is whether the owners are responsible and I think the answer ultimately has to be Yes.

You can pass the buck all you want:

"The owners appointed what appeared to be sound football people"

"The apparently sound football people bought what appeared to be good players" 

"The apparently good players need more time to adapt to their new surroundings"

and so on.

I'm fairly sure NSWE would admit they didn't make the best decisions.

Doug, Randy, Xia, NSWE, probably had/have less understanding of the game than the average fan who lives and breathes football. That's why they hire people who are supposed to know better to spend their money for them. 

Maybe the chain has been stretched a bit too far lately: NSWE hire Purslow, who in turn delegates to Suso...  Who knows what the problem is, but we've been chucking money down the drain for a long time now, at least since Doug's later years.  I don't think the record is getting worse, it's just that the amounts are more obscene.

21 minutes ago, imavillan said:

So you can promote teams based on not a full season but not relegate any??!!!

You simply can't have one rule for one and not the other.

I don't like it but you are right and I am afraid this will end up sinking us.

7 minutes ago, ThunderPower_14 said:

I don't think you can relegate anyone and I think it's manifestly unfair to stop 2 teams with commanding leads over 3rd place from coming up. 

 

I'd award Liverpool the league, they absolutely deserve it. 

 

I'd then bring Leeds and WBA up and play a 22 team season, relegating 4 teams the following year and promoting 1 automatically and 1 through the playoffs. It's a bit unlucky for the sides in and around the playoff positions this year but I don't see how you can relegate a team with 10 games left unplayed. 

If only such logic would prevail. But you just know they're going to make an almighty pig's ear of it all.

I would agree about Vassilev and would certainly have him at least on the bench on Sunday. 

The time is probably not right yet for Barry but it wouldn't surprise me if Smith has toyed with the idea of playing both of them - both as a surprise factor to unsettle the opposition (dream on!) and to provide some sort of an excuse for the inevitable thumping.

OK so we would lose Jack if we go down.

But we could always buy him back when we come up again.

Couldn't we, couldn't we?

As we've got Southampton coming up, anyone remember the Cup replay at VP in 1969? First division Southampton were the favourites, Villa being in the second at the time.

I was in the Holte to see Lionel Martin score the winning goal.  Peter Broadbent hit a glorious pass to put Dave Rudge in space on the right, Brian Godfrey stepped over the cross and left Martin on his own to score. Brilliant night!

1 hour ago, TRO said:

Interesting

I kinda meant, would we be able to spend on 3/4 players wisely?

If keeping Jack meant we couldn't invest seriously in new players due to FFP, then we'd be better off with the money, provided, as you say, we could spend it wisely.

I really don't want to believe this is the case though. If we stay up, I think we'll find ways to spend on the sort of players Jack and the rest of us will approve of.

2 hours ago, TRO said:

I have no idea, what Jacks personal feelings are on staying or leaving, which will be paramount in the final decision.

However, I am not suffiently confident, we will receive enough money, to buy players to compensate for his loss.

The 64 million dollar question is.....will we be better off with him gone and the money or better off with him and no money?

Aston Villa's future must come first.

ps we don't want another Dwight Yorke or Ashley Young scenario...once or twice bitten, twice shy.

If that were the question, we'd be better off with the money IMO.  

Is it the question though? If we can keep him, we still have plenty of money, but we may not be able to spend much of it.

On 10/02/2020 at 10:34, Robtaylor200 said:

Whats the cheapest  you remember paying to get in 40p. I remember wearing my Crombie coat with a hole in one pocket making sure I put my 60p the change from a pound into the correct pocket 

I remember Boys' entrance 1/-. circa 1964. (That's 5p for you youths). Anyone else remember that or have I dreamt it?

2 minutes ago, kwoktolai said:

Still hoping for a winger, but sounds like too late in the evening now

Seeing as how we've spent nowt on a striker, maybe we can afford one

You never know, he might turn out like that other Spanish striker Swansea had a few years back...

(where's that clutching at straws gif)