romavillan

weimann passed late fitness test so prob not a good idea to start him. still i would prefer gabby up top on his own and push ireland up more with 5 in the middle than heskey!

found it Subs: Guzan, Johnson, Carruthers, Gardner, Weimann, Stevens, Williams. alby injured then for sure. carruthers for a run out on the wing? coudl be good second half if we're still in it...

that line up could be loads of different shapes really, depending on where gabby and heskey play. bench?

4-4-2 then interesting! so is lichaj on the left. herd holding on his own is ok i spose, be interesting to see if heskey is on his own up front and gabby wide, or vice versa and we play 5 across the middle?

well hopefully the players are a bit more upbeat than you lot that said i do fear a spanking at anfield, it's almost traditional for us! still though, to mindlessly cling on to some sort of positives... hopefully a few of our kids will grow a bit more today and show what they have been producing for the ressies and the youth team before that together. it's a shit state of affairs that we are relying on them to do it, but no reason why they can't. if they can get us a point away at liverpool (regardless of their form) it's a big scalp and hopefully will give them more confidence to coem out of their shells a bit more. i'd love to see this... given lichaj baker collins warnock herd alby ireland gardner bannan/zog gabby 4-1-4-1 instead if 4-2-3-1 (or 4-3-3 as mcleish calls it?) and go for it big style. i doubt that will happen though, anyone got some insight into line ups yet?

if we turn up against liverpool we can get something there. i knwo our home form has been atrocious but you'd think a point against the mighty stoke at villa park should be doable!

is baker going to play at centre back? i thought he was a fullback?

What mental news! unbeleivable, he goes down with "flu" and the fever ends up being this. tragedy, he's a fighter though as has been said a lot here, so that's the first step to beating it. all the best Stan, get well soon.

i don't think John was being simplistic, we're in a crap situation by all accounts as things stand. i don't go in for the over the top critisicism of AM, but he is not beyond being criticised for how this season has gone. the big question mark is what John is referring to. will AM be able to build a good squad over the summer and get them playing at the level we were so recently at? i.e. the big teams coming to VP and us having grounds to beleive we can turn them over personally i'm not convinced showing him the door and getting in yet another manager right now is the answer. i'm not convinced though that AM will get us back up to where we were though either! i'm willing to be convinced though, unlike a lot of people it seems.

oh and city winning the title by 2 points

i've got us finishing on 41 points in 14th. wolves bolton and wigan for the drop. we would have to lose pretty much ALL of our remaining fixtures to go down...

yeah giggs was through first you're right. the winning with kids thing just comes from the hansen quote after they got beat with all the kids on the field. they weren't bit part players in the title thoguh that season. looks like we might be bringing through a similar number of first team quality players. the nextgen team we can count as a second batch i spose. as was said above only gardner has played in the first team from that team. carruthers has made the bench though i think? if we can have 5 or 6 senior players around their peak (28ish) to help bring them through could be exciting times ahead...

butt, beckham, g. neville, p.neville, scholes and giggs all played a part. 6 is a lot to bring through all at the same time. if we get gardner, bannan, albrighton, herd, weimann and clark all playing a part in the first team we'll have done exceptionally well. plus there's the fonz, carruthers, johnson and another winger too whose name escapes me for the mo. not saying they'll all end up as starters but if we get 5 or 6 from the 10 or so knocking on the door we'll have done amazingly well. any more than that and the academy has completely excelled itself beyond any kind of reasonable expectations!

ah soz, ginger clearing in the woods, mcleish out, lerner out, we deserve to win the champions league and these muppets are stopping that happening. holman rubbish, free signings will end up costing us money. um. something bad. ah. bannan is woefull, as are all the kids. um. that's about it isn't it? or do i need to say something about rodgers and lambert? i forgot faulkner. sorry. must do better.

just gone off, put in a good shift, i'll have a look out for more streams with him in

i like what i've seen, looks like a trequartista as they say over here, would fit a 4-2-3-1 as part of the three that can swap left and right and up the middle. can't knock it for free!

yeah that was a nice pass, seems to be popping up on both flanks, not sure if down to 10 men though. he looks quite tidy

playing, number 27, AZ a bit shellshocked by going down to 10 men i reckon. he's a trier is all i can say so far...

well, rodgers is definitely an interesting manager. no doubt about it. lambert a bit less so for my tastes (i like possession football and good basic technical stuff, have done ever since starting to watch serie a in 1989 ). however, rodgers has just signed a new contract and seems very committed to swansea. lambert i'm not sure about, but one thing is for sure that he is contracted to work at carrow road, not villa park. i'd like a magic wand and turn us into the next barcelona, with a 120,000 seater stadium that's full every week too. fact is we have a manager, who it seems is going to be given the time to build a squad of his own over the summer. he's already signed a winger to that end. further to that it seems that 2 things are certain, he's going to be our manager and a lot of keyboard warriors on VT are going to spout a loud of vicous over the top rubbish in his direction until he either fails and gets the sack or he turns it around.

rodgers has done some great work at swansea, he works at swansea though, not at villa park. if AM doesn't manage to sort it out he'd be a great shout if he'd come. we've yet to see whether AM can sort it out though, so it's a moot point.

this could well be his last chance to fulfill his ambitions, which seeing as he's tasted winning in european competition as a player i reckon are high. he's over 50 and if he doesn't manage to turn things around here he's not going to walk into a job at a bigger club. there's ups and downs in his managerial career so far. he's won stuff, he nearly got scotland into the euro's in 2008 and he got relegated a couple of times! so far this season there's been some horrible moments (spurs the worst for me) and some signs that he's not just about 11 behind the ball, backs to the wall, anti-football (chelsea, qpr and the first half against fulham prob the highlights). i can see where the negative criticisms come from in that he's all about not giving goals away, but we've also played some really nice stuff going forward. it's just not so black and white as he's shite antifootball and that's it. as i've said before, big summer coming up. one in which we will finally get shot of some over paid and underperforming players and AM will get the chance to build a side based on the fruits of what is coming through from the academy. if he doesn't manage to make that work, then he'll have blown his big chance to make it and will be fired and someone else will have a go. either way, constantly hurling abuse at him even when there ARE signs that he can get us playing decent football is a waste of time.

yeah the anti mcleish stuff has been a tad overboard at times. i don't think anyone is saying he's suddenly our holy saviour come down from gingerland on a magic carpet to take us to the champions league trophy... seems anything that isn't a personal insult to him means you are pro AM and are a fool. it's been a shit season by anyone's standards but we sold two very good players in the summer, have players on stupid wages bought for big money that for 2 seasons on the bounce haven't come anywhere close to giving value. on the plus side it looks like we could have produced at least half a dozen first teamers from our own academy and we need to make some big changes in the summer and then see what that brings. if it's more of the same then AM will have been a failure and he will be sacked. if it's pushing for the top 6 again, then i'm all for AM continuing in the job. comign on here to write "ginger clearing in the woods" every second sentence every single day is a waste of time and energy.

Bannan, Albrighton are woefull? when did that happen? Albrighton isn't massively consistent i'll grant you and he overhit crosses in the fulham game nearly every time. doesn't make him woefull. he's been our motm on a coupel of occasions this season. as for Bannan, his quick feet are what set up the shot for Gardner which Weimann scored from. i've seen him come on a few times and try too hard for the hollywood ball. i've also seen him use the ball really really well and look to retain possession and pass and move well. woefull is just so far off the mark from what i've seen. why would you want to criticise them as harshly as this so early in their careers? the other comments about saying you can't say we have a good academy until we are constantly churning out stars is a bit crazy for me. a successful academy is one that turns out players who can have a decent career at a decent level (championship and above) so that it is self sustaining and hopefull makes a profit. the fact that we have Gabby, Albrighton, Bannan, Herd, Clark, Gardner, Weimann, Carruthers, Johnson and the Fonz all in and around the first team is exceptional work from our academy. there's Baker and Lichaj too, Stevens and more where they came from too come on, look at the collective value of that lot! all home grown! how is that not a good thing for the club? anyone branding our youth set up a failure because we don't produce a messi or a wilshere or something every couple of years is badly deluding themselves. no academy does that consistently for years. ajax had their turn, barca have the best now. but neither of them have churned out world class players consistently for 15-20 years at a time...

much needed win, as has been mentioned 3 academy players in the move for the goal was fantastic to watch. lovely footwork from bannan, gardner made room for the shot well and hit it sweetly enough for the keeper to **** it up. then a proper poacher's goal from weimann. lovely jubbly. we should have been 2 up at half time though. the stats say we battered them but the second half was nervy to say the least! ireleand motm for me too if we beat bolton i want to see more of the academy players playing together for 90 minutes till the end of the season. big decisions ahead this summer and some good performances from the kids would be very handy for us to get them right.

someone needs to get it into him that this time either he does it now till the end of the season, or he has to go. might wake him up some. i'd hate for him to go and then start showing good form at another club...