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If you defend for 90 mins, your opponent gets a chance or 2. To point out individual mistakes is bollocks. That is what happens when you are so negative, you can't expect a flawless rearguard action, especially when you are talking about 2 forwards in defensive positions.

Can anyone explain what he is supposed to have achieved in his time? Attractive football? no Tactical nous? no Good in the transfer market? no Getting players to perform to the best of their abilities? no Signs of improvement? no Avoiding the worst result in our history? no Not getting outplayed in a 2 leg semi by a bottom division side? no Not getting knocked out of almost every cup by lower division sides? no reaching the heights of being the 2nd lowest scorers in Britain? no Managing to score 1 goal in a calendar month? no Getting the fans through the gates? no Creating a sense of optimism? no Providing the basis for a good atmosphere? no Showing ambition? no Not setting a record for our lowest points in a premier league season? no Hiring your personal favourite backroom staff that don't need to be sacked for gross misconduct? no His only 'success' is just avoiding relegation. And we have never had one of the 3 worst squads, the 3 lowest budgets, etc. So basically, his best characteristic is that, despite failing by almost any reasonable criteria, he could have actually failed by slightly more. And until he reaches the absolute nadir of failure we should give him time, otherwise we will never know quite to what depths he is capable of plunging to.

After we went 1 up, is there a single fan who didn't know what would happen next? Defend the edge of our area and hope the opposition don't have the guile to score with their 65+% possession and wave after wave of attacks. It's like groundhog day. We either get drubbed senseless or try to mug a draw or steal a 1 goal victory while hanging on for dear life. On top of Lambert's massive collection of 'worst ever' records, can add definitively the worst ever style of football we have played. I don't understand how anyone could stick up for him as our manager. Now I only watch out of a sense of duty, not because I want to. It's like a chore, something that you have to do even though you gain no enjoyment from it. When we are the lowest scorers in Britain, and defending for 90 mins at home to Southampton and scoring with our only shot on target after a shocking mistake by their keeper is seen as some kind of positive, what's the point? How many 'worst ever' records can one person get before our clueless board realise that he is a toxic shite of a manager who heaps misery on everyone who cares about our club? They're more likely to give him a 20 year contract and a knighthood than do the right thing though. I genuinely hate supporting us at the moment. Being a villa fan now, to quote George Orwell, is 'like a boot stamping on a human face, forever'.

Basically, for a relatively small expenditure, we have swapped KEA who was going to leave at the end of the season anyway for Cleverley who may or may not leave at the end of the season. Cleverley is better than KEA. Our team is stronger. We are less likely to get relegated. More likely to finish higher in the league and get more income as a result. Fair enough we didn't get a Delorean and 'back to the future' a prime Zico to VP. But other than this, why are folk complaining? We were using players like Bowery and Sylla last season, and people are appalled by getting an England international who got plenty of game time at MU?? Jesus wept.

It's not about 1 player's salary, overpaying leads to wage inflation throughout the squad. Players use team mates as referents, and paying sizeable wages to average players means top players want much more than that and other average players want parity. There's one thing paying Benteke a higher than average wage, but how many players in the squad would look at Albrighton and think 'he deserves a higher salary than me'? How many people are happy in the workplace when people they consider equal/less capable than them earn significantly more? Possibly a reason for the 'bomb squad' - keep those being overpaid isolated from the rest of the squad.

Much as I want him out, if we have no new owner lined up and are going to be in a 'transitory phase' for several months, I would prefer him to stay till our new owners fire him than be left with a caretaker manager.

If that was aimed at me I certainly didn't criticise Lambert for not playing him. I assumed that the only logical reason for not playing him was that he was shite, especially given the fact he was a Lambert signing and couldn't be subject to bias as someone else's player. If someone who has the ability to become a Premier league manager rates you as worse than Jordan Bowery, then you might as well pack your bags. If we went back a few years everyone would have been saying 'give Balaban a chance' and talking about the 'high hopes' for Nii Lamptey. They never played because they were shite, and almost certainly, Helenius is too. Am just surprised some people still cling to the hope that he is going to make it here. For that to be true you have to believe that our 23 year old 7th choice striker is actually a decent player, which requires a suspension of disbelief considering how shite we are.

We have fairly clear evidence that both of them are shite. Lambert is self evident, Bowery getting a start while Helenius can't get on the bench ahead of some academy players, is also pretty clear cut. Lambert signed him, he has a vested interest in proving his managerial skills by demonstrating the value of his transfers, especially considering how shite most of his signings have been. Why would he deliberately hold him back when he is fighting for his job for any other reason than he is absolutely rank?

More likely he joined with the wrong amount of footballing skill and is just rank awful. Cardiff binned his more highly rated compatriot pretty swiftly. You can't really believe he is a quality prospect who rips it up in training but the stubborn and incompetent manager just doesn't realise and sticks with a 'jobs for the boys' strategy (or 'jobs for the real men' for Holt). We all wanted him to be a hidden gem when we signed him, in reality he isn't even a cubic zirconia.

Why don't you buy Villa then? Am sure one of the financial institutions out there would love to lend you the money given the amazing potential of the business. You could further persuade them with your facts and knowledge of brand values.

Forbes values Chelsea at under 600m. Abramovich has spent more than 1 billion on the club. If he sells, he loses money overall. Even if they run in a debt free manner for the next 10 years and the value keeps going up and up at an amazing rate and he actually somehow manages to make a small profit (which is highly unlikely), it would still be the worst return on investment imaginable. If you want to make money off a football team, you do a Glazer, not a Mansour or Abramovic. If Villa is worth 200m, we would need to become as successful as Chelsea over a decade or more on a net owner spend of under 400m for an investor to even have a chance of breaking even. Football is a very high risk investment, with a very low potential return on investment. If you think that is good from a purely financial perspective, I've got some magic beans you might like. As for the Man City/Man Utd comparison, it isn't surprising that Man Utd get so much for training kit sponsorship. Man Utd are one of the world's biggest brands, Man City are not. You are paying for your association with the brand and the ability to use them in your worldwide marketing campaigns, not just to have your name on their training kit.

Abramovic and Mansur will never make a profit off their investments, they will never get their money back. You might be able to make a club sustainable after a while, but that is only after a vast investment that far outweighs any increase in the value of the club. And missing out on CL for a couple of seasons makes you very unsustainable again. To use Man utd revenue as an example is not a valid comparison, Man utd and even Liverpool have a following that far outweighs teams like Chelsea and Man City, it would take a generation to change this. No jonny come lately clubs have anything close to this sponsorship potential without their owners paying vastly over the odds . Merchandising worldwide is not the potential cash cow you seem to think, few countries will sell more than a few thousand Man City shirts a season. Most people can't afford them. City will get a few promotional gigs, but the main ones all go to Utd, Barca and Real, etc. I live in Indonesia, and there is probably 1 Chelsea fan for every 40 Man Utd fans. For Man City it probably 1 in 100. Yes, people here choose the successful teams to support or teams with popular players, but this is also very fickle, a few poor seasons and they won't stick around or a few transfers of the popular players can have the same effect. You used to see Leeds and Blackburn shirts in Asia, not so much now. Man Utd and Liverpool are the 2 exceptions to the fickle fan. Man Utd probably have 30 'corporate partners' here, Man City promote an energy drink for manual labourers. There is no business model in investing in an English Premiership football club and throwing cash around. A few titles will never give you the clout of Man Utd. It won't even make you Liverpool. A few years of success doesn't make you an elite worldwide brand, and unless you are one of the brand name clubs, you only get left with their crumbs.

People need to stop being so precious. Man posts pic of him drinking beer with workmates after work. It's not like he posted a pic of himself wearing a blues strip and buggering a kitten. Some people seem to think he should spend the next 3 months scourging himself to atone for the team's ineptitude. His form hasn't been great, but he does tend to put a shift in on the pitch, which gives people even less reason to manufacture some kind of faux-outrage. No reason for a grown adult to take offence at something so innocuous.

A little patronising. I assure you that I and a fair few others can tell the difference between that and 'sit back and hope' football. Anyway I'm done. You believe we've been unlucky, I believe luck has evened out and just glad to still be in this division. Were there any games this season we were particularly unlucky not to win? Can't think of any off the top of my head, but have wiped most of the season from my memory.

Magnum?