AVFCAM

Agreed, my mention of poor form was not mean to include Benteke, Delph, Guzan and Vlaar...

Periods of bad form aren't exclusive to lower league players. That's the point I made...I'm not sure this is a period of poor form, I think it may just be that this is how good the players actually are...

I'm glad to not lose, we weren't full strength, we kept a clean sheet... Still not enthusiastic about this season, we've been awful for the main part. Our good days have been overtaken by our poor days. Most of our players are 'under performing'...but the consistence of this under performing makes me think a lot of them are just playing at their actual level. This is problem with buying young players from lower leagues, they're a huge gamble and even when the gamble pays off (Westwood and Lowton last season) it's unlikely that they keep it up. We need to pick up at least 5 wins between now and New Year, when considering our opponents. Anything less and we will be struggling come May. We are unlucky that Benteke is out of form at the same time as Wiemann...

I love the solutions people come up with on here... The answer to Luna not playing his best, is to 'bring back Bennett', who was atrocious last season. 'We miss Lowton going forward'...we don't miss the terrible defending he had shown before he was dropped. I'm just waiting for the 'Samir Carruthers and Gary Gardner need to play' comments...or maybe 'give Bowery another shot' even though e has shown nothing so far. By all means try to think of solutions, but don't try and fix a problem with another problem. 'Bring back Bennett'?! You couldn't write comedy this good...by pretty much all accounts last season he was woefully out of his depth.

For 60 odd minutes, we were by far th better side. 2 'Villa' moments cost us, which was a shame, the defence were brilliant in the main. Howard penalty save excellent. Guzan excellent (although beaten on the near post twice...due wrong footing). Delph MoTM again, by a huge distance. Tonev looked better. Wiemann low on confidence. Westwood was very poor. Honestly not sure what Helenius does, wasn't on for long by didn't jump once...one of the tallest players on the pitch. If we can pull out a performance like that consistently, ten ok, but if we just fall back to shit and lose again next week we are in trouble.

Nice to know you didn't bother watching the team you 'support' Oh give it a break with the 'I'm a better fan then you' bollocks. Enough times Villa are playing and I don't watch either, because there are actually other things going on in my life, Aston Villa fc does not rule it. This. 1 million times this. And, after wasting money as time watching years of crap, you earn a right to choose to switch off.

Hang on...what's happened to GarethRDR?!

To be honest, I finished work early. I got the train from New Street to Gravelly Hill at 1915. My wife called me and said she had lots of marking to do. I contemplated getting off at Aston to go to the game with all the fans around me...but truthfully, I had no desire to waste my time an money watching another dire performance. I gave up having a season ticket this year, the decision killed me, but my choice thus far has been validated. I miss watching Villa every week, but as per previous post, I haven't enjoyed watching Villa for a long time

People will speak of over reactions. I'm just bored of wasting my time watching something that isn't enjoyable. Put as positive a spin on it, it doesn't make a difference, there has probably been 5-10 times I've enjoyed watching Villa since MON left. The rest has just been awful. I'm not saying we were better off then, we had a team full of overpaid, overpriced cloggers. We also didn't have Cit£h and Spuds spunking money everywhere too...I'm just saying, I'd love to go back to the days of singing for John Carew, as slow as he was. Our shit defence of Curtis Davis and Zat Knight, or even Collins and Dunne at the beginning of their spell. James Milner and Stan bossing the midfield (we still haven't ever replaced Milner)...just because I loved going to every game, even when we dropped a bolluck or lost games we had no way of losing. We've never been the same since that 3-1 agains West Ham...Milner's last game. Sorry to be negative, but after 4 years of crap, I'm really running out of emotions for this... Praying I am made to look like a clearing in the woods when we demolish City (or even squeak a draw/1-0 out of it)

I'm surprised that people weren't expecting this. I don't ever expect us to play well at home...the last time was Sunderland last year and that was one of the only times I've not spent most of the 90 minutes with my head in my head for years

As expected

Citeh will destroy us. You just have to hope we pick up a win at Norwich. If not it's back to the relegation zone for us again... So much promise...I hope it wasn't just a flash in the pan

Sean0 Just a few things... 1. Guzan not keeping a clean sheet is more to do with how porous our defence is, rather than his ability...he saved another of Ben Arfa's bullet shots, only for Gouffran to he allowed in unchallenged to score. 2. Okore. He was on for maybe 20 minutes, at which point it was still 0-0 I believe. Did little wrong, in a team that were pretty dire...so not quite sure where your negative assessment comes from, better than Clark AND Baker if you ask me. 3. Delph has played many games without getting a booking, possibly one of our best performers all season. 4. Kodak. Joined the game when we look awful, we score from the confusion he caused with his height at the resultant corner. The game then continued in the same awful fashion as it had been all game, he didn't do much else, like pretty much anybody else...but no, let's never see him in a villa shirt again. Look, I get it, yesterday was awful, it was my first game this year having not renewed my season ticket. I feel like I wasted £75 (wife had ticket too). Lets not over react though, today was made worse because our usual good performers (Lowton, Westwood, Benteke) didn't really have a good day. Newcastle were just as poor, they just put the ball in the net more than we did, hence why then won. They had 1 excellent performer an were against a defence that just seems to part 'Moses' style. We are at a crossroads, 50% of our season has been us playing well, but 50% (Chelsea first half, Liverpool first half and today) have been poor, today being the worst of it...we need to make sure this doesn't become a season like last year, our brilliant start is now just what we would have expected, 3 points from 4 games. Oh and KEA shouldn't be in the team, really don't rate him, Sylla all the way for me

I do hope that now he has signed a new contract, this thread will no longer be flooded with huge amounts of multi quote posts!!!

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The problem with pretty much anybody decent in te Spuds squad is that they earn far more than most of our current squad...Wiemann, Guzan and Gabby were among our top performers last year, with our current plan, I don't think we should be paying any new comer more than them...

Having read today's Sun, it make me laugh that Spurs are offering us the Asso-Ekoto, Parker, Livermore or Huddlestone...they are all the players Spurs don't want... We shouldn't even consider swapping one of our star players for a player who a team say 'isn't good enough' for them... The only player I would consider is Dempsey, but his age/wages make me think I would still turn it down... All te players Spurs are offering don't fit our model, perhaps Livermore aside...they're all on pretty big contracts and they're not spring chickens either.... I'd be happier if Villa just come out and say 'you have until x day to bid, Christian knows this, now everyone knows it, if no bid comes in by then, he WILL NOT be sold at any price'...mainly just to avoid a summer of bullcrap!

No quotes, just going on what we do every time we have a good player... Follow Spurs example, price him high and stick to it!!!

And so it begins... 'Villa say Benteke not for sale...' then 'Villa place £40m price tag on Benteke to put off bidders...' now 'Villa place a £25m price tag on Benteke...' (In the mirror today) We're so obvious. We try to sound tough and stubborn about keeping him, then we put a silly price on him, just incase someone pays it, if not we keep him...until...nobody makes a bid, so we drop the price, encouraging people to bid for him. Is £25m his value? Yes. Is £25m his value to us? No. Do we need to sell him? No. I get bored of football. Whenever a team finds a gem that they can build around, the big 4/5 swarm in, flash the cash and take him. Leaving them stronger and the rest weaker...probably not playing him in the process. I've already taken the choice not to renew this year (due to funding next house purchase/bored of spending £600 a year to watch crap every week/out of principle that te club hasn't adopted the Bayern Munich approach even though the PL now brings them about £20m more money) but I have been doubting myself every day...if we sell Benteke for less than £30m (not including player exchanges) then my choice will be totally validated...we will have learned nothing from losing Milner, which for me, was when everything started falling apart...

Have to be honest, both kits look nice to me. Pleased with Macron's designs. I'll reserve judgement on the quality as a few shots in the video did look a bit suspect, although the players do wear different shirts to fans and they may just have been prototypes. I expected a whole lot worse to be honest!

Okay. Hysterical...again...

The fact that they published pictures of Movk ups showing acorns does make me think its possible it may be acorns again...although, I didn't get chance to see all of the mock ups they used to not sure if they had any fiat ones or not

The mock ups of the home look good, but the collar looks too low...Benteke's collar looks quite high up the neck line!

I think people are forgetting we already have cheaper prices than most of the league. This German model of charging £90 a year for a season ticket is something I would love to happen, especially as my wife is not happy with my spending £500+ again this year to buy a season ticket when 85% of games are awful...but, as much as the German way makes sense, it will not happen! Also, yes, people are right, our last 5 games were higher attendances, so were our top 6 days, but once MON left, the attendances plummeted, then fell more when Eck was in charge...even with him gone, they didn't really rocket up until we were playing well again. Football fans are fickle, we could fill 50k...when times are good, but as soon as they start looking bleak, they drop like a stone... I acknowledge that cost is an issue for people as well, but not as much as people say...

I wouldn't be too sure they are far wrong though, the do look very 'Rugby' like...