Jenko#4

Could it be Kounde? I saw a link to him a couple of days back, but….

-He was playing for Sevilla when Monchi was there (he may have signed him)

-We need RB/CB reinforcements next season

-He has played with Diaby, Kamara at international level and Carlos and Lenglet at club level

-Barca want to raise funds for Cancelo and Felix

5 minutes ago, TomC said:

We have only three senior midfielders healthy: McGinn, Doug, Rogers. We're missing Buendia, JJ, Kamara, Tielemans, Zaniolo. The first three are definitely gone for the season. We don't know how long the latter two are out. Assuming none of the 5 are ready for the next few matches, what do you do?

Play both Bailey and Diaby? That got us overrun in midfield against Chelsea. Yes, I know, Unai has played Bailey in midfield in the 4-4-2 many times this season, but almost always with McGinn or Tielemans as the second "forward," so you still had a 4th midfielder on the pitch who could move back if needed.

Start Tim? High stakes point in the season to rely on a youngster.

I suppose you have to play both Bailey and Diaby and somehow adjust tactically...

 

Could we see the midfield three you mentioned, with Watkins left, Bailey right, and Duran through the middle at some point?  It gives us the long ball target man option from the off to take the pressure off Olsen. From what I remember we’ve ended the last few games with Watkins moving out left.

I don’t think it is overthinking at all from Emery’s side, he is just running out of options to change things and there are too many times where we are  putting square pegs in round holes, or in some cases ran out of pegs completely. 
 

The plan is as working, but when Tielemans got injured he had two options, Diaby who is much more attacking, and Tim who is much more defensive. Whichever one he picked was going to change the game plan significantly.

Kamara/Ramsey/Buendia/Zaniolo  all would have been better in that scenario I think.

3 minutes ago, jayEm said:

I think it's different to McGinn and Cash -- Emi wasn't mentioned by the commentators as amongst the players who needed to avoid a booking (I'm fairly sure), and they certainly didn't mention that he was now suspended when he got his yellow card in the first half. McGinn, Cash and the others were facing suspensions because they had accumulated multiple yellows, I assumed??

It is three bookings in the last 16/last 8 games combined for a suspension I think. The ones mentioned were already on two before the game, but Emi was only on one (from the first leg). The two tonight  took him over the limit.

The moment is finally here for ‘The Worlds Number 2’  to make himself a cult hero. 

Is he now suspended for the semi first leg? He technically got two yellows so should it be a one match ban? 

With the injuries at the back tonight, United will struggle to finish 6th now, let alone catch us. They are closer to Fulham in 13th than they are to us. 

For £20 million quid a season they can leave a massive skid mark on the front of the shirt for all I care, if it means we don’t have to sell Dougie/JJ/anyone else for FFP. 

1 hour ago, Follyfoot said:

There’s a massive argument to roll the dice and sign him. I’ve got a feeling we might regret not doing so.

I’m thinking the same now.
 

If you look at the deal on paper, where else are we going to sign a regular international for a top ten nation, 24 y/o and coming into his prime, who understands the way we play and is getting much better at influencing games, for 30m euros? 

Im sure people will name similar players out there, but if we get Champions League we no longer have the games like Hibs or Mostar to blood these new players. They need to hit the ground running. 

11 minutes ago, Villan_of_oz said:

He also managed Australia when we won the Asian cup in 2015, also without looking deeper into the story you miss the influence he has had on every single club he has been at...

You don't have to like him but to think he is the most overrated gaffer on that list is a misguided opinion...

I actually do like him, and he isn’t a bad manager by any stretch, but you cannot deny that the media love-in and praise he receives is far, far beyond what managers with similar trophy histories receive (Unai or Roy Hodgson, for example) and that is the definition of over rated in my book.  

Ange for me.

The amount of positive press he gets for a guy who’s won 2x Scottish titles in a one team league,  1x A-League and 1x J-League title, does not add up.

‘Angeball’ is not a new fangled philosophy, it’s just a normal football played at 1.5x speed until the players break, and there is no Plan B. 

But all he has to do is call everyone ‘mate’ and they are eating out of the palm of his hand.

I am aware that this could come back to bite me on Sunday, so I apologise now…..

2 minutes ago, MotoMkali said:

I just don't understand how our wage bill increased by 57 million in the span of 1 year?

Like I get we signed Kamara, Digne, Coutinho and we probably had to pay some European bonuses. By 57 million? That's crazy. 

There were new deals for Luiz and Martinez as well, plus Gerrard and his motley crew of backroom morons were probably on significantly more than Dean Smith and his team. 

Reminds me a bit of Dele Alli when he first came through, in the way he moves and his stature. he is a lot taller than you think, and has a great touch for a big man. 

It’s always one excuse after the other with them-

-Glazers

-Recruitment

-Manager

-Leaky Stadium

rinse and repeat……

They overspend massively on garbage who no one will take of their hands, as they are on ridiculous wages and make Donald Trump look professional. Then they go and do it again!

Top tier players who are coming into their prime now were not old enough to remember the good times, and have grown up in an era when City/Chelsea/Pool are winning, so want to play for them, leaving them shopping in a pool with Tier 2 players, mercenaries, or ones looking for their last big pay day.

The only way they get out of this is to cut a few losses, take a few mid/lower mid table finishes, and rebuild the football side from scratch, similar to how Liverpool and even us have done it. The problem is that it will destroy the share price and devalue the club, so they can’t do it. 

1 hour ago, Risso said:

Nice one!

I can't speak for anybody else, but personally I find running outside ten times easier than on a treadmill, so if you've got used to the absolute monotonous drudgery of treadmill running, you'll love running outside and will find it really liberating!

There are advantages to treadmill running, ie you can do it in any weather, you can control your pace more easily, and it's relatively easy on the joints. You can also keep a bottle of water on the machine so you don't have to cart anything around. However as I said, I just find it boring beyond belief, and struggle to do more than 2K before I'm ready to kill myself. Having the coordination of a pissed giraffe on ice, I also find it takes a bit of concentration, and if I look away for a few seconds I start to lose my balance and feel disoriented. I much prefer the fresh air of outdoor running, and the feeling you're actually going somewhere rather than staring at the same screen.

Me and my daughter did a 14K long run round Rutland Water today. A lovely spring day, albeit with a bugger of a wind. It was nice to do it around some beautiful scenery and to see other runners out doing the same. We live in the middle of nowhere as well, where I wouldn't run at night due to the dark, narrow country lanes, and dickhead farmers speeding round in their pickups. So instead we bought a couple of head torches and ran around the nearest town which we drove to in the evening.

Have you got an official parkrun near where you live? They're every Saturday morning at 9am, and there are hundreds all over the country. Free to race, and a really good atmosphere where there will be people at the same level as you who you can run alongside. (Just realised I said that abovem but it bears repeating. parkruns are ace.

Thanks Risso, hopefully the leap from treadmill to road won’t be too bad then, when I eventually get there. 

The closest Parkrun to me is around 5-6 miles away, and I did it a few times a long time ago. The problem with the training plan that I’m following is that the weekend is my scheduled long run, so 5k  wouldn’t be enough going forward. I’m not quite at the stage where I could run there, do the Parkrun, and then run back (maybe one day!) 

I’ve recently started running again and I’m currently training for my first half marathon in May. Since January I’ve followed a plan and gone from struggling to run for more than 5 minutes, to being able to run 3 times a week and up to 5 miles without stopping.

The problem is that all of my training so far has been done on the treadmill. I live in a small village that gets flooded easily and is not safe to run in the dark before or after work at the moment, as street lights are limited.
 

My question for my fellow Villa runners is, have any of you ever trained for a longish run mainly on a treadmill, and if so, how did it go?  I know I’ll be able to get outside soon, but I’m worried that if I build up to say 6-7 miles on the treadmill, then go outside, I won’t be able to get anywhere near that distance when I start running ‘properly’ and it’ll put me behind with my training plan. 

With no defensive midfielder and limited centre backs, I’d go the opposite of what most have suggested on here, load up with attacking pace, high press, and try and keep the ball as far away from our goal as possible. I’d fancy Lenglet and Pau to deal with aimless balls lumped from deep much better than people running at them. Turns Fulham around and gives them something different to think about….

Martinez

Cash Lenglet Pau Moreno

Luiz Mcginn

Bailey Diaby Rogers

Watkins

Disclaimer- I’m not Unai Emery, this has the potential to be an absolute car crash, however I reckon it’d be a fun watch.

2 minutes ago, MaVilla said:

any reason he isnt in their squad tonight?

I think you can only play in a FA Cup replay if you were registered at the club when the first tie took place. 

2 hours ago, MWARLEY2 said:

Watching last night. Why dont players run back to where the away fans are to celebrate with them

If they all run back into their own half to celebrate, then the other team can technically kick off straight away while we are still celebrating.
 

I remember the noses trying to do it once when we were celebrating, and fortunately one player (can’t remember who) had the presence of mind to stay in the opposition half. 

29 minutes ago, villan95 said:

We need homegrown players

Reyna was born in Sunderland, so could he potentially be classed as homegrown? 

Do you think there is potentially another Serbian transfer further down the line?  We seem to accumulate players in pairs or groups based on their region/nationality to help them settle in and acclimatise, but Kosta doesn’t seem to have a pal yet…. 

8 hours ago, StefanAVFC said:

The Reading owner wants them to go bust as he stands to make money from it, or I read something similar. That if they go bust he makes no losses, but he can sell some of the assets for pure profit.

He has previously been involved with two other clubs, one in China and one in Belgium. Guess what happened to both of them? Yep, they went bust…..

How the ‘fit and proper’ guys let him get anywhere near Reading is a travesty. If you read his wiki page the writing has been on the wall at Reading since day one, he is an absolute crook. 

6 hours ago, omariqy said:

In a bit of a predicament. Sold (STC) our house initially for just over asking price (c£2.5k over) in August. The market is so slow that it took us ages to find anything and we pulled out of one because of some issues that came about during the searches. Anyway we found another property which is perfect in late November. Towards the end of December the people buying our house suddenly went quiet and pulled out. We put the house back on the market just before Xmas and we've managed to get two offers in but they are well below asking (c£12k below). Therefore, we are now £14k worse off than we were in August in terms of cash in the bank. Not sure whether to accept this offer or wait it out. The issue is that we will probably end up losing the property we have had an offer accepted on. It's perfect for us in terms of location and size etc. However, we plan to spend c£70k to £90k on it and the hit on the finances will mean we probably have to extend our timeline to another year before we can finish/start the work. 

Two things stand out here>
 

Firstly, you describe the property you are looking to buy as ‘perfect’ They don’t come around too often…

Secondly, you say that because of the finances, any work will be delayed by 12 months. Based on past experience, and without knowing what work is required , I would say that is a good thing. You will regret going into a house on day 1 and gutting it without getting a feel for living there first. You now have time to learn how the light falls, where the sockets/switches need to be, warm/cold spots etc. That 12 months may save you a lot of time and money in the long-term, particularly if it is a house for life. And if it is a house for life, what is 12 months anyway? 
 

When we moved into our house it looked like a crack den. We rode it out for 12 months before doing anything significant, and then did the heating, plumbing, electrics, replaced the kitchen and took the entire downstairs back to plaster. We now have everything where we need it, and it was worth the wait. We will then do the same to the upstairs in a couple of years time as we are not planning on moving. 

Littler’s composure is something else. Whenever he is under any sort of oncoming pressure, he seems to sort it out within three darts, every time. Love that he’s got a bit of the showman/cocky teenager in him as well, and is not just a darts robot.