MessiWillSignForVilla

Oh man I want to believe! But the fact the guy hadn't tweeted for 5 years before that makes me think he's slightly dubious. Has this been "heard" by anyone else?

And as people pointed out last time you brought it up, it's because Collymore's story has changed several times in the past week and works for a radio station that is notorious for winding up listeners so they call in.

What I think is that these are two managers at a level where they probably would have come to Villa who have proven they can work within tighter financial constraints than Paul Lambert has here, and they have instilled their tactics and footballing philosophy into their teams. Yet neither have managed to beat us this season. As much as I want to forget about it, Hughes did beat us this season, very convincingly

The sceptic in me asks "how do you know he was a director of a club?". Then it says "why would a director of one company know any more about completely different companies than anyone else?". I agree, But just to play devils advocate what if he is a director at Southampton and they enquired about Cole. Or perhaps it was Woodward at Utd? Fairly well known director/executive, Lallana has been linked with them before and perhaps they looked at Cole incase Shaw didn't join? Also, the season is pretty much over for Utd, not much for him to stick around for.

I can understand some of the criticisms of Westwood, but I would put that more down to the role he has to play rather than his ability. Westwood is a very good passer of the ball and can create chances, he seems to operate well in a role where he drops deep to receive the ball from the CBs and distribute further up the pitch. He's definitely our best passer, though that may not be saying much, and I personally think one of 5 players who could play for at least top half sides. The problem currently though is twofold imo: 1) Although he often drops off and makes space for himself, he's very rarely passed to and the game seems to bypass him. Personally, I don't think this is his fault, he gets into some great positions in an area where he can receive the ball with little to no pressure and can then easily pass to Delph/KEA, but the defence tend to go for the easier option of playing it to a FB or up top. If we actually used him to start our attacks, I think more people would have a higher opinion of him, but currently, people think the game bypasses him because our defence doesn't utilise him. Is this Lambert's fault or the defence? Personally, I think it's both, leaning towards the players as Vlaar, the more accomplished passer, is the defender who seems to utilise him the most. 2) He isn't great defensively. He went through a spell where he started putting himself about a bit, but he's just a bit too lightweight currently. He's almost in the enforcer/DM role of our midfielder, and he doesn't suit it. If we are to get the best out of him, we need a strong DM to sit beside/behind him just to mop up opposition attacks so he can concentrate on his passing game and creating chances. I think this also affects his overall play, he seems to shy away at times, and I think this is a confidence issue of not wanting to give the ball away because he knows he might struggle to get it back. If he didn't have that worry of getting the ball back, I think we'd see him be a bit more ambitious with his passing. I really like him, he's not the sort of midfielder to go on mazy runs, score from 30 yards out or even put in some leg crunching tackles, but he can work very well as the pivot in the midfield and just control the tempo/play, a bit like Petrov did, without Petrov's defensive capabilities. I think he can go far, I definitely think he'll end up playing for a Top 8/10 side, he has the potential, hopefully it's with Villa.

Not really. The problem isn't the TBAR forum. It's the amount of 'ITK's that have appeared on there, with conflicting stories, some of which have been very far-fetched. I'm sure there are lots of lovely, clever, well-dressed Villa fans on that forum that contribute to great discussions. Unfortunately, there seems to be a lot of planks on there too. But that Admin guy has got things right in the past, I think he deserves the benefit of the doubt rather than being ridiculed and dismissed. VT is still the number one Villa forum, we should not feel threatened by another. I don't quite get why this gives the guy massive credibility. He got one thing right, which he also got wrong, and IIRC, the same info was posted on here about an hour beforehand. Then he revealed who the new owners were after a big song and dance, only to back track a few hours later. He has the same amount of credibility as any other self professed "ITK", close to zip. Just because he said we're getting taken over doesn't mean he's ITK, I could have told you that about November time, it's fairly obvious with the way the clubs been run recently that Randy wants to sell up. And I don't think people being dubious of someone claiming to be ITK is the same as "feeling threatened" by another forum.

Simple, new computer software in the admin department.

No-one has said Lambert is?

Statistically, our worst manager ever, not just under Lerner. Ever! Is this correct? Considering that we have been relegated, and have had some awful managers, bad as McLeish was, I find this hard to believe. Even Lambert has broken quite a few unwanted records in his time here. Yup, win percentage of just 21%, worse than any other manager in our history. Although, that is only just less than Billy McNeil as he had one game extra in charge.

Statistically, our worst manager ever, not just under Lerner.

Betfair Poker‏@Betfairpoker What I like about Liverpool is their ability to not conform to football's desire to win.

Everton interested apparently if he doesn't sign a new contract. Strange if true, I don't think he's anywhere near good enough for a side that almost finished 4th this season.

There must be no greater joy for a Utd fan than to dissect how Liverpool just threw away the league

This is too funny

HAHAHA! Liverpool couldn't possibly not win this could they?

Exactly. Confidence is fine. Not to mention the abuse people around me have hurled at him, good for him for giving a bit of stick back. This is something I've never gotten with football fans. They'll spend their time hurling abuse at people for 90 mins, a lot of the time over the top and vulgar, yet anyone does anything back, no matter how minor, they have a fit and can't handle it. To be fair i'd take all the verbal abuse in the world if it meant earning the kind of money these guys earn on a weekly basis lol. Oh, no doubt, it's probably partly why they get paid so much, they're professionals who can deal with it. I just don't understand why fans can dish out pathetic and disgusting abuse, but can't handle someone doing a slightly arrogant celebration or winding them up a bit.

Exactly. Confidence is fine. Not to mention the abuse people around me have hurled at him, good for him for giving a bit of stick back. This is something I've never gotten with football fans. They'll spend their time hurling abuse at people for 90 mins, a lot of the time over the top and vulgar, yet anyone does anything back, no matter how minor, they have a fit and can't handle it.

From a personal point of view the honour of wearing the shirt, playing in front of 35,000 fans and earning in a week what it would take those fans on the terraces to earn in a year would be all the motivation I would need. But you're a fan, it's not your job. No matter how much you love something, if you have to do that thing every day of your life, at some point you're going to need to be motivated to keep on going, footballers are humans after all. Not to mention the dogs bollocks abuse a lot of them get from some of those aforementioned 35,000 fans. Just because someone earns £500k+ per year doesn't automatically make them happy or even mean that they don't find playing football tedious at times and they never need to be motivated.

I find it hard to believe that you stay away due to one man and say league position doesn't matter. Its easy to say that now but if we were top you'd be there. And if we were top Lerner wouldn't be a shit owner and there would be no reason to boycott the club to get him to leave. But were not top and Lerner has kind of screwed us over these past few years and if we want to ever progress again, we need him to leave, whether Lambert goes with him or not, I dunno. I don't know what to think with Lambert, he's been dire recently, but I do like him, there have been glimpses over the last two years and I think with less restrictions in the transfer market, specifically wage wise, he could do well here, but whether it's deemed too late now or not we'll see in the summer. If Lerner was to stay though, I'd definitely keep Lambert as I don't think we'd get anyone better willing to work under the current conditions.

Because he was sacked a few weeks ago...

C'mon the Ellison link is pure fantasy. Completely ridiculous. People are losing their minds if they think there's a hint of truth to it Jesus, let people have some fun. It's fairly obvious we won't be taken over by one of the 10 richest men in the world, but it's fun to imagine what if. I'll be speculating that it's Larry Ellison until it's announced we've been taken over by whoever it is, but it won't surprise/disappoint me that it isn't Ellison just because I wanted it to be. It's just a bit of fun after the past 3/4 years to imagine what could happen if someone like Ellison did in fact takeover.

The fact that nearly everything that account has claimed has come true, everything that he says is written in a manner which indicates it is a club statement or from club personnel, and the account tweets so rarely that it seems they only tweet with concrete stuff.

Larry Ellison?

Territory will always be more important than possession, whether it's rugby or football.

Bowery won the corner for second goal as well. Were has he been all season? Not been watching the game, I thought all the comments about Bowery were sarcastic due to his OG, has he actually done something good?!