romavillan

the bookies had us at 3s, but we were very good today in patches. still very very rough around the edges but clark, bannan, vlaar, guzan, benteke, westwood and gabby all had a good game. such a shame weimann couldn't have scored on 75mins after a great move, we would have really jumped in confidence then as a team and him especially. good to see the arm round him from PL when he was subbed, he didn't have a great day but you could see he was giving it his best. lots of positives today but still a work i progress and was massively important we won today to keep tabs on the half dozen or so clubs immediatly above us, a loss today would have put us right in the shit. if we can get 4 points from the next 3 games (big ask) then i think we'll be fine for the rest of the season. great to see academy products put in a really good positive shift for us (gabby, clark and bannan especially). UTV

the "something" must have been the reason why he got the captaincy taken off him, or his reaction to it maybe. it's odd because they all seem to be much more together than under AM or houllier. there's a bit more of a sense of a team togetherness about the place at least. the one question mark is this bent thing. personally i hope he doesn't get sold, i'd like to see him scoring for us rather than anyone else in the prem. if he can't adapt to what PL is trying to do though then he has to go and the money has to be re-invested in players that can do what PL wants on the pitch.

yeah, you have no idea how much i'd love to see a side of ours with a core of local lads being successfull. that would make me so happy, let's face it a lot of kids born in and around brum don't have much to look forward to in terms of material success in life. to see local lads winning in the claret and blue shirt gives me the most satisfaction as a fan. there's always this idea around too that if they don't make it at the highest level then they are a failure, avfc as a club are playing against some of the best squads currently playing the game worldwide (well at lest 5 or 6 times a year ) the level is VERY high. giving kids stick for not making it here after having promise is a bit wrong really, if they earn their corn even playing league 1 or 2 then in personal terms they've made it for me, in terms of academy success then we need to sell them at champs level or to a club top half of league 1 in order to get some money back to continue the investment in the youth. specifically on graham, he'd be worth throwing on for the last 10 mins of a couple of games, even if it's just to give more competition to zog. same goes for giving carruthers time on the pitch, more competition in the "creative" areas of the team might just spur the more established names on to give us a bit more week in, week out.

yeah can't see that happening, and you're right if we bought all the players who had a good game against us we'd have an ever big wage problem than we had at the end of MON's reign...

houllier without the health probs might have had a decent second season, at least i'm pretty sure he'd have done better than AM, I wasn't massively against him, even though he would offer far less in the long term than even a mildly successfull stint by PL. AM i was prepared to give time to once he was appointed and swam against the tide a bit in that respect. once he'd totally destroyed my will to live and proved that he wasn't even going ot be able to sort the defence out let alone turn us into a decent team i was amongst the vast majority that wanted him out. i thought it was ridiculous callin gfor him to go after 8 or 9 games though, and was against sacking him at xmas before the jan window too. in my view it's even more ridiculous even contemplating sacking PL, albeit we've had a horrible start to the league campaign in terms of results, i've already seen more plus points in the game so far as i did in a full season of AM. he will turn the tide in terms of results sooner rather than later. i'd back us to pull off a shock result or two in the tough run we have coming up and hopefully pick up the confidence to go from there and be safe from relegation with quite a few games to go.

right, i was thinking more of how we played in the second half of last season. we were absolutely shocking, unwatchable rubbish. compared to that it's not like we've fallen anywhere,

as compared to last season? are you joking?

most definitely. you're saying you'd sack him and hire redknapp? then try and buy clint dempsey & berbatov i suppose too?

most definitely. you're saying you'd sack him and hire redknapp? then try and buy clint dempsey & berbatov i suppose too?

dire shit compared to mcleish's football? i seriously considered self harm whilst watching us under AM quite a few times, a constant stream of just giving the ball away and standing in neat lines on the edge of the area shitting their shorts. just totally disgusting anti football really (and that comes from someone who was prepared to give AM time), just no will to actually play the game for fear of losing. if we were trying it against barcelona in a CL semi-final i could stand it but i wouldn't like it. now we are actually playing the game, moving the ball, playing out from the back, keeping possession and yes, creating chances. we've had a fairly poor game against fulham (but even then we could have won it and played some good possession football) a terrible half against southampton. we've also played some of the best football i've seen us play for ages at times, granted not consistently for 90 mins but after years of direct effective conter attack under MON, which was exciting at times and very very hard to watch against he best clubs who could keep it and defend well. then a failed attempt under houllier to play decent footy (apart from a few games), then the horrors of last season, it really is a sight for sore eyes to see us actually trying to play properly. "I think it is important to win a match, but I think what is even more important is the manner in which you win." "The most pleasure any manager can get is seeing everyday boys joining the Club as youngsters and growing into men and giving themselves a better social standing than they could ever have dreamed of previously." "There is not a prouder man on God's Earth than me at this moment. Winning was important, aye, but it was the way that we have won that has filled me with satisfaction. We did it by playing football. Pure, beautiful, inventive football. There was not a negative thought in our heads. Inter played right into our hands; it's so sad to see such gifted players shackled by a system that restricts their freedom to think and to act. Our fans would never accept that sort of sterile approach. Our objective is always to try to win with style." Jock Stein

so true!!! you have to go back to the 90s for some decent footy from us to be honest, and even then it didn't really last long!

so you are blind to the difference in football being played? or you genuinely think there is no difference keeping PL over mcleish after a hypothetical relegation? i'm sure if you think really hard you could see why some people (me included) would want to keep PL even if we went down. think past redknapp, dempsey and berbatov for a minute and try and arrive somewhere close enough to reality to see it makes sense Jol was a done deal to fulham a year before he went. just no chance of him coming, when we hired AM maybe he was gettable, after that no chance.

redknapp is an old man now, he woudl have been worth a punt when we hired MON but he's way too old now to offer us anything long term. he would never come to villa and especially not with the current restraints on wages etc. i've got faith in PL to nto only turn this season around so we aren't worried by relegation but also to be with us for a good few years and build a legacy.

yeah, yank rocket polisher just throwing millions and millions of pounds at our club!! what a clearing in the woods for trying to break the top 4 by backing MON with easily enough money to acheive that goal!! total muppet for then trying to turn us into something that can sustain itself!! he was a bit of a dick for hiring mcleish i'll admit. apart from that though can't see much to complain about really. back on the PL topic, keep the faith this lad will turn us around.

let's come back to vlaar towards the end of the season shall we? because i reckon you'll both be changing your tune there, and on KEA and on lambert.

nobody knows how he has been training, but he would be an option at the top of the diamond, in a 4-2-3-1 as any part of the 3 and wide or in the hole. we haven't seen him play this season though, even if he did look a prospect when we saw him last year. i'd give him a go to be honest, even if just to shake a few feathers and get more competition for places going.

knackers. vlaar will become a villa legend.

as has been said elsewhere, the stats say differently, jol himself said he felt releived to come away with all 3 points.

8 games. poor return in 5 points is true. no argument there. starting to see some people who were positive towards the possession style now chiming in with the negative voices. we can and will turn this around though, it might take us till after christmas to find some sort of consistent form, but we'll get there.

either bent and benteke have missed sitters or we aren't creating chances, can't be both. as for clearly not working, depends what you are lookign for i reckon. in terms of quality of football, this season with a lambert side or last with a mcleish side there's just no contest as to what is the better football. give it time, we've got a tough november comign up but i'm pretty sure we have the capacity to cause an upset if we keep trying to play good football.

totally, he sounds confident that if we stick to our guns in terms of what he's tryign to do with the playing staff then we'll start to turn this around. i'd go along with that, results have been really disappointing but we've shown signs that we could turn in to a good footballing side, which after last season is a **** miracle.

martin jol sounded pretty scared by it, listen to his post match interviews. he felt he was forced into what coulg be considered a negative change to combat the numbers we had in midfield and especially ireland "always looking for space". he said he felt releived to get a win out of todays game too. doesn't sound that ridiculous to me to be honest, sounds like a massive improvement on last years woefull ineptitude in keeping the ball for more than 2 consecutive passes.

looks like you have no confidence already to me. there would have been zero value in going for established prem players, we tried that or have you forgotten? in order to attract them to villa you have to pay over the odds wages, especially now we aren't pushing for european places etc. give PL and his new signings some time to actually play a bit. westwood has palyed 45 mins or so ffs!

he's not listed on physio room, but i don't know if they're always accurate with what htey have online.

jan would be a good time to movehim on when hopefully the buying club are a bit more desperate and we can get some better value.