MessiWillSignForVilla

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26289318?r=1

 

 

I think it's a fair point. I've watched poor away games on tv and i'm not as frustrated or pissed off as the poor home games i attend.

 

So people who don't go to the games shouldn't have their views taken as seriously?

I don't think that was the original point being made.

 

It was very much what was implied.

The whole point of "it's easier to patient if you don't go to games", was very much in the manner of, if you went to games you'd be much more unhappy, which implies that if you don't go to games your patience is less valid.

It implies people are only patient because they don't/can't go to games.

I think it's a fair point. I've watched poor away games on tv and i'm not as frustrated or pissed off as the poor home games i attend.

So people who don't go to the games shouldn't have their views taken as seriously?

Just to clarify, this isn't a "better fan than you" post, but :

Can I just ask some of the lambert apologists, do you go to the games, particularly at home ? Do you shell out the dollars to watch the shite being dished up week after week, do you sacrifice hours of your weekends to trudge down to villa park in all sorts of weather , knowing in the back of your mind how inept it's going to be. Do you sit there in the cold watching 11 players going through the motions, looking to the bench for guidance, leadership and motivation and getting no return ?

Or do you watch streams , slam the laptop shut after another defeat and get straight back on GTA ? (No offence to GTA)

I think it's far easier to be patient with lambert and his cronies if it's the latter.

So because I'm a student who lives 4 hours away from Birmingham, my view are less valid? Watching on TV and streams is the only way I can watch Villa anymore, but because I don't/can't go to games, my patience means less?

I'm going this weekend as it's my first chance to got in three years, so will my patience be valid come Monday if I still believe Lambert is the right/best man for the job currently?

And just to clarify, any sentence that starts with "This isn't/I'm not, but..." usually is.

Still don't know why they sacked Laudrup.

Because they had only won 1 game in 10?

Not a great record.

Professional Dosser, aka Student.

Also, next seasons Europa League will be the first that the winners qualify for the Champions League too, another reason Utd should, and probably will, take it seriously.

If they qualify 

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/sport/sir-alex-fergusons-99-signings-4002742

I'd say at least half of these were poor signings.

Whilst I don't quite agree that only 50% of a managers signings are a success, it's quite surprising some of the terrible players Fergie signed.

Using that guy's rating system, which is obviously hugely subjective, Fergie averaged about 5.5/10 for his signings. Again, I'm surprised he signed so many duds, and quite a few recently too.

I suppose the main difference is Utd didn't have to rely on those players to play for their first team that often.

 

 

 

 

Some of you are so stupid, it makes you real life borderline special. I was making a point...

 

My posts merely reflected what I've seen day in, day out, since I came back. I wanted to show you all exactly how it looks and how droll it is.

 

"Droll" means "amusing". Glad you enjoyed it. 

 

 

I also thought that 'Droll' had a similar meaning to bleak.

 

 

It means uninteresting yet amusing, I think.

 

It's almost a perfect definition for the Boring thread.

 

 

No it doesn't. 

 

"amusing in a quaint or odd manner; comical"

 

Nothing to do with being uninteresting. 

 

Ah yes, I somehow misread unusual as uninteresting when I looked it up 

Kroos will not be leaving Bayern. Only Neuer has more starts than him, and only Lahm and Alaba have the same amount of starts.

He is way out of Utd's league, he is starting week in, week out for, imo, the best team in the world. How do a team hoping to get a Europa League spot this year have chance of getting him?

The only team you'd realistically leave Bayern for currently is Real Madrid, or maybe Barca, but definitely not Utd.

Literally is literally the most incorrectly used word.

Not anymore, the definition was changed to mean figuratively too.

 

 

Some of you are so stupid, it makes you real life borderline special. I was making a point...

 

My posts merely reflected what I've seen day in, day out, since I came back. I wanted to show you all exactly how it looks and how droll it is.

 

"Droll" means "amusing". Glad you enjoyed it. 

 

 

I also thought that 'Droll' had a similar meaning to bleak.

 

It means uninteresting yet amusing, I think.

It's almost a perfect definition for the Boring thread.

We would all like to be knocking on the door of top 8 next season but I think you will be disappointed.

That's your opinion, but I think we have enough in our squad that with a few signings we could challenge Newcastle and Southampton, as these are who I said we'll challenge with, I've not said we'll finish higher than 8th, that's too far out of our reach currently, but we could definitely finish between 10th-8th imo.

And also if I'm going to be disappointed with expecting that, how have I got "Low expectations"? (I know you've not said this, just making a point )

 

 

To do that would take major investment and I don't believe Lerner will provide that. I also now have doubts whether Lambert is the right man to take us forward. There is no doubt a lack of finances hasn't helped but there is no excuse for the tripe we have been served up this season and the horrendous home form during his tenure.

You're right, there is no excuse for some of the performances this season, on the whole it's not been great.

I believe we'll get £20m again in the summer, I see no reason why we shouldn't, it's roughly the same Lambert's had to spend the last 2 seasons and the wage bill should be sorted by now. I think if it goes on 3/4 players instead of 8/9 we can really improve the squad, and put us on a similar level to Newcastle and Southampton.

Maybe you don't have faith in Lambert, but I'd like to see what he can do now our wage bill should be sorted, and I still have faith we can do well under him. When we appointed him, I wanted stability, he was the 6th person to take charge of our first team in just over 3 years, and that's not good enough. I think he should at least see out his contract.

 

 

In terms of players this current squad is nowhere near good enough to get into the top 8 and needs a total over haul for us to do so. We are totally reliant on four players being fit and in form in Vlaar, Delph, Gabby and Benteke. As much as I rate Delph, Gabby and Ron they would certainly not be the first names on the team sheets of a top 8 side.

I don't think it would take an overhaul, I think Guzan, Vlaar, Okore, Delph, Gabby, Bertrand*, Benteke and even Weimann and Westwood could all get into Newcastle and Southampton's teams, even some higher up, if played in the right system. There's been a lot of criticism of Gabby recently and it seems people are forgetting he was one of our more important players under MON, when we finished 6th 3 seasons in a row, and I don't think he's gotten much worse since then, so I think it's unfair to say he's not a top 8 player.

What we need is the right signings for the rest of our team to excel, we need someone who can do the dirty work instead of Westwood, we need someone who can be relied upon for when Vlaar is injured, and we need someone to provide chances for Benteke/Gabby.

As for relying on 4 players, don't most teams? That's the point of building a spine, so you can build a team around it. How many teams would do badly without there "spine"? All but the very best. We have a spine of Guzan, Vlaar, Delph and Benteke/Gabby. Now we need to flesh out the team around it so we can improve.

*Assuming we try buy him in the summer.

 

 

I expect it to be much of the same next season. Sitting anywhere between 10th and 15th for most of the season and at times crossing our fingers that there are three worse teams than us.

Your opinion, but I think you're wrong, I think with the right signings we will not be anywhere near the relegation spots.

 

 

I also wouldn’t become too transfixed on where we finish this season as much of a marker as to whether we have progressed or gone backwards. There is a chance that we could finish on less points but a place or two higher than we did last season. That to me shouldn’t be in anyway considered progress. We may also finish on a couple more points but again it would be straw clutching of the highest order to state that we have made progress and we would be kidding ourselves. For me regardless of if we finish on 38 points or 44 points, so 3 points more or less than last season, we will have stood still this season. In terms of performances however as things stand now we have gone backwards.

 

This season has been a huge disappointment given the promise we showed at the back end of last season.

I see progression as higher up the table with more points, and nothing less. Even if you don't see it that way, there is progression if that happens, no matter how small. I think if you compare us to last season there has been improvement in some areas. Our defence is much better, we have more goals and points than this point last season, and I still expect us to go on a run similar to last seasons. It has come at the expense of how we play, which is disappointing and frustrating, but I do see progression no matter how small.

The season has been disappointing, but then again, I thought we'd finish between 10th-13th, so I can't really be too unhappy, as I didn't really expect more. I'd have hoped we would have had some more good performances this season, but it hasn't happened, and that is very disappointing and frustrating.

 

He was leading us in the right direction as far as I'm concerned

Until he was far away from the players we were heading lower and lower in the league.

 

Which is just not true, after we signed Bent and Makoun, Houllier's first proper signings, and up until GMac took over, we won 5, drew 4 and lost only 3, which is the form that undoubtedly saved us that season.

We may have technically and mathematically only been safe with 1 or 2 games to go, but we reached the total we needed to stay up with Houllier's last win, then GMac "saved" us.

John, I'll ask this again, how is expecting a team, who almost got relegated last season, to finish this season between 10th-14th anything other than realistic? How is it lowered expectations? Should we be finishing 8th+?

Surely lowered expectations would be accepting that we are relegation fodder and expecting to finish around 16th-17th again. The fact is, we have a bit of a shit team, so it is unrealistic to expect us to finish much higher than 10th.

Are fans happy that last season we were in a relegation battle? Hell no. Are fans happy with this season? No, it's been very disappointing. Are the fans happy that some players haven't shown the improvement we thought they would? No.

But if going through a few years of shite means that when we get back to where we "should" be we are there for longer than 3 seasons, then I'm fine to battle through for a few rough years.

I expect us to be back in and around the top 5/6 within the next 4/5 years, depending where we finish this season, I expect us to be in Southampton's position next season, knocking on the door of the top 8 but likely to not finish higher than 8th.

I don't watch that programme but I'm led to believe Mr Lemon is not a real person.

Yup, just one of Leigh Francis' characters like Avid Merrion.

It's a shit character though.

I thought the rest of the Arctic Monkeys did very well to not burst out laughing during that speech, I thought it was brilliant 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26267220

Just checked the stats for the Arsenal game on BBC Sport 

Safe to say Bayern might be dicking them then?

Started a new Villa save using the unofficial update.

Just lost 4-0 at home to Palace...

They had 3 shots on target, 4 overall, with an OG where Vlaar walked up to my goal line from 25 yards out, turned around and booted it into Guzan's back    I also had 27 shots myself, with about 15 on target, no surprise Speroni played like he was better than Banks.

Sometimes this game just pisses me off...

I was hoping against all hope that that fire might have been real then

Gonna watch it for the Arctic Monkey performance, and then switch off almost immediately.

Music shouldn't have award ceremonies, it's not a competition. Also it's hugely subjective, so you'll never get the right "best band" or whatever.

 

Baker and Weimann.

Both may have been given there debuts under different managers, but they hardly featured during those seasons, Baker only played 8 times and Weimann 14 under McLeish and not many of those appearances were starts, last season they got 26 and 30 respectively, with both starting 25.

You could argue for both Clark and Bannan too, who both started a considerable more amount of games than the seasons beforehand.

I wouldn't class lambert as bringing those players into the team.

Baker had played under Houllier and McLeish but got suspended and injured so didn't get more appearances.

14 games for Weimann is a decent amount in his breakthrough season.

Clark and Bannan (more so Clark, who lets not forget is has the scond highest villa appearances behind gabby) had had ample opportunities within the first team prior to Lambert.

Hell Carruthers himself even got a couple of run outs for mcLeish.

So far Lambert has only given Williams and Burke game time, and that has only been in minuscule amounts.

 

Baker started 6 games under McLeish, had been loaned out for the first half of the season and only made his first appearance of the season in January. Last season he started 25 times, more than 4x the amount from McLeish's season.

Weimann started 5 under McLeish and was loaned out to Watford, only to be brought back as back up when injuries hit. Again, 25 starts last season, 5x more than 11-12.

The fact is these two were players that were back ups to the first team before Lambert came and have been semi-permanent first teamers since. If that isn't playing our academy players, I don't know what is.

As for Clark and Bannan, I only said you could argue a case for them too, as Clark almost doubled the amount of Villa appearances he had in the previous 3 seasons in just one, and Bannan started double the amount of games than the season before.

The assertion wasn't that Lambert doesn't give our academy players debut's and chances, it was that he doesn't play them, but there are at least 4 players that he has played considerably more than they had previously been played before he came.

Of course people have lowered there expectations of where we should currently​ be, as I'm sure you've noticed we've been in 2 - arguably 3, it depends how you see Houllier's season - relegation battles in the last 3 seasons and could be heading for another.

But that doesn't change where people think we should eventually be or where we want to be.

I fail to see how thinking that a year after a relegation battle that expecting to finish between 10-14th is anything other than realistic, and how that is defending Lerner or Lambert is baffling. It's called being patient, seeing that it is better off for the club in the long term to build slowly towards getting back to the top, instead of chucking money at it, which I think is the only way for a quick fix at this point of time and in our situation.

Every Villa fan out there wants us to be at the top again, but we should be aiming to get there sustain-ably so that we stay there and don't fall back on our arses when the bubbles bursts. 

Baker and Weimann.

Both may have been given there debuts under different managers, but they hardly featured during those seasons, Baker only played 8 times and Weimann 14 under McLeish and not many of those appearances were starts, last season they got 26 and 30 respectively, with both starting 25.

You could argue for both Clark and Bannan too, who both started a considerable more amount of games than the seasons beforehand.