M_Afro

We’re incredibly lucky to be winning at half time. Hopefully Unai can calm them down at ht. We are so open on the flanks. We need to get on the ball in the middle of the park. Luis and Boubs getting dominated at the moment. Still, we are winning and it was a lovely finish by Ollie. Hopefully we can sneak another and take some of the sting out of the game.

I love Unai. His press conferences are fantastic. I love his enthusiasm and will to win. His commitment and dedication are outstanding. He is miles ahead of any other manager we have ever had. These are such exciting times for us. I wouldn’t be surprised if we were to win something next season. He is elite in every way. Love him.

Brilliant from the women. When’s the draw for the next round? It would be unbelievable if they could win the trophy.

True. Should take a few tips from Ian Ormondroyd about not skipping leg day!

He’s not good enough. Not even close. Off loading him is likely to prove difficult. Unfortunately we may have to wait for his contract to finish.

I like Rambo. I suspect he won’t be as good as we hoped but he will be a useful, fairly low earning squad player. He will get better and his confidence will grow. He’s played way more often than he would have if we’d actually had some decent midfield players in the last few years. It’s much better having young players who care about the club as squad fillers as opposed to over rated/paid jokers like Sanson.

It’s incredible isn’t it. I’m also a big Leicester Tigers and England rugby supporter. I don’t think I’ve ever had such a positive weekend of results. I’ve just spent the day watching highlights of all the matches over and over! It would be great if Villa women could get to the final. I reckon we would take a pretty large following. I’d go for sure. The improvement that they’ve made this season is really impressive.

I totally agree with this. I’m glad that we didn’t buy too many in Jan. Emery is giving our players a fair chance. Let’s see how good they can be once they have had some quality coaching. If they still can’t do it then we will try and move them on over the next few transfer windows. I think SJM and Watkins have benefited massively from this. They both look like different players under Unai and if they can keep it up they deserve to stay. Hopefully a few more will step up to the mark. I still think that we have the skeleton of a good team that will really improve with a few well chosen signings. The summer should be really exciting.

I have noticed this too. I wonder if he is doing it because he is wary of the fans and their ability to turn quickly. I know that some people don’t like to hear it but after 10 years or so of appalling senior director management prior to NSWE, our fans are at the end of their tether. There is an impatience, that although understandable, is deeply damaging to our performance. This is why we struggle at home as our away support has always been top level. I don’t think Dean is a top coach (another unpopular opinion) but he managed to galvanise our support like no other. That created a powerful force that carried us from eleventh in the Championship to eleventh in the Premier League in two and a half seasons. At times during that run our whole club was totally united under Dean’s leadership. It was so powerful. I think a similar thing is happening at Newcastle at the moment. Sadly, although understandable, as things started to go wrong with Dean and then disastrous under SG the impatience of the fans returned. I think that Unai can see this. Whenever we play out from the back you can hear the anxiety in the crowd and there’s always a good few people shouting to get the ball forward. It just doesn’t help and the anxiety spreads through the team. It will take time for Unai to really make a sustainable difference. Most fans can see this and will remain patient but unfortunately the impatient minority often make the most noise. We just need to trust the manager and get behind the team. If we do that, then our ceiling is seriously high.

I suspect they will win and also score from a corner. Maybe 2-1. Hope to be proved wrong obviously but their good form is coinciding with our dodgy patch. If this game had been played a month ago I would have been very confident of a victory but the landscape has shifted somewhat.

This is the question that needs answering. In my view, the reason Villa have been so bad, for so long, is our total inability to operate effectively in the transfer market. In fact, since Doug departed, our transfer activity has been woeful. We’ve had a few hits of course, but how many players have we sold at a profit since 2005? Not many and we must be £100m’s in deficit. Particularly if you exclude Jack who came through our academy. Don’t get me wrong. I did not like Doug. The only thing that he really loved was of course, Doug. He did though have a pretty reasonable record when it came to buying players. We definitely seemed to have more hits than misses in those days. The problem with him was his total lack of ambition. Our owners since have all had ambition but they lacked his nous when it came to understanding a player’s value. This has massively held us back. Now though, I do think that we have a chance. Unai has serious contacts in the game. He also has history of building successful teams and improving players. If anybody can replace Emi and use any surplus funds to effectively strengthen other areas, then it’s him. In answer to the question posed, I don’t think we can upgrade Emi. No GK better than him will sign for us but without getting all Purslow about this, we could improve the overall team by selling Emi and re-investing effectively.

He did have a good game on Saturday. If he can start to string those performances together regularly then I would totally agree with you. He has generally been pretty poor though. Hopefully Saturday can be the turning point.

Maybe but to be honest it’s marginal gains. I would use Bailey at home and maybe look at other options away. For what it’s worth, I prefer Bailey to Buendia.

With our current options, he has to play but we really need better than him next season. The same is true of Emi2. We’ve managed to shift one of the Grealish three and I suspect the other two won’t be far behind. That summer was a disaster for us. Fortunately, with the sultan pulling the strings, this summer should be more productive.

Ginger, Sporty, Posh, Scary or Baby?

Imagine if we’d had a Friday night match and lost!!!!!!!! Longest weekend ever….

We will definitely be trying to make additions. I suspect that we are probably trying to go for our top choices and if we don’t get them, then we will wait. Even if we don’t get any permanent signings, I wouldn’t be surprised if we got a loan in. We just need to be patient. If nothing else, we are clearing some players out so that we have room in the summer.

I wonder if we’ll deal below the release clause but loan him back for the rest of the season as a compromise. He looks like a real player to me. I’d be delighted if we get it done.

Wednesday tomorrow bro. Keep the faith.

I’ve got a feeling that we are trying to see who we can shift before making our moves. We are waiting to see how much we have to play with in terms of wages and once we get closer to the end of the window, we will make our moves, with personal terms for the players that we want, probably already agreed. With this in mind, I would predict another out in the early part of the week, followed by 2 to 3 new signings towards the end of the week/start of next week. I think the next few days will prove to be very interesting.

He must be worth £50m already. What a player. What a signing. He is so calm and composed, I would have preferred Bissouma in the summer but I wouldn’t swap him for anyone at the moment. Total baller.

How on earth is this guy only 26? He seems to have been around for decades.

Well that escalated quickly. Time to move on. I like Danny but he was never quite right for us in my opinion. I wish him all the best and £15m plus £10m saved wages is a good deal for us……………..What’s next then!

I think we need to trust Unai on this. If he thinks we should sell Ings, then that’s good enough for me. He’s the guy who sees him every single day. He’s the guy who really understands what he needs from a striker.

Massive wages. Player in decline. Value set to plummet. I like Ings but we need pragmatism. Sell him and free up his wages.