skarroki

lots of games going in our favour just need reading not to win

I don't mind fans crying if we are relegated as long as they aren't sat next to me. I won't know what to do tbh, you can try and console someone if they have lost a loved one or something but i won't be able to say "it's alright, we'll get promoted next season" to someone without feeling ridiculous. Having said that i will either sit there miserable all game and cry myself OR i will thoroughly enjoy the whole match and make my throat sore in the opening 20 minutes. I am really hoping for a good atmosphere

having looked at all the teams from 10th to 20th, i think that in no particular order, west ham, norwich, southampton, villa, wigan, QPR, reading and Stoke will all be in amoungst it at some point toward the end of this season. None of those teams are any better than us on form. i think Sunderland, Fulham and Newcastle will be fine so i am not going to worry about there results because i am sure they'll all be ok, with either a great squad (newcastle) or great managers. If i had to put a bet on it i would say that QPR, Reading and Wigan will go down, with Villa surviving above Southampton and Norwich. I am just ridiculously optimistic today and i hope that my prediction comes true, we can hit a good patch of form or our defenders can miraculously go "oh THATS what i'm supposed to be doing!" and then it will all be ok

we could do with signing another player to replace him in the january window or we could go down.... oh wait

4 weeks ago people were still adamant of a cup final and a mid-table finish. We just don't seem to improve. I think the Eveton result was promising, if you look at the whole game it's 2 points dropped but i would have taken a point before hand. We are more than capable of stringing together a run similar to how Southampton, Sunderland, Newcastle and Reading have, we just need ours to run a little longer than the teams around us. I don't think QPR will get out of it and I think Reading have worse players than us. After that, i would have thought that this could finally be the year Wigan have had it. Then there is us. 3 of those 4 is what i reckon, with Southampton also a possibility but a slim one. Not strengthening any more than they did could potentially cost them.

been out of it for a month now, so coming back and seeing we're out of both the cups, and only picked up a point, along with 2 players who are young and inexperienced in this division makes me massively nervous about this month and our survival. i think we're going down but i'm gonna stick by the team and hope for the best from here on in

what have i missed regarding Dale Stephens? Every day i came on it was a done deal, yet we are approaching our 4th game in january without him coming in. I am getting pretty fed up with Villa as a club now to be honest. Furious with the managerial appointments of recent until Lambert came in, but he's come in to effectively keep a championship team in the premiership. I do put the blame on him though, with 20 million you can easily buy some young unproven players from lower leagues, then balance it out with some experienced quality coming in. Are they actually doing anything? It seems like a massive lack of effort to bring in players is happening right now. The areas of the team that needed addressing were blindingly obvious around the start of october, the search should have started then. You can sign someone on the first day of the window, that shouldn't be when you start considering options. Exactly what are they doing?

If you weren't then fair enough but i took "peoples reactions are brilliant" to mean over-reactions, or unfounded. And there is no way they are either of those 2. Also saying that you saw an injury coming (?!) and knew we would lose to a league 2 team in an important game, just made it sound like you were putting yourself above all the frustrated fans. If that is not what you meant then, as i say, fair enough, but thats how it came across to me, hence my reaction. Yes, natural and understandable in this situation. If that's the case why are you still ok and positive? This is again the sort of future-seeing thing that i was talking about earlier. why are you so sure he will be top class? So far he's looked like a poor man's MON, the only bonus being he will go into the european market. Never heard this quote who said it? Sorry if i am being stupid

I don't know what the **** you've been taking this last month but you need to start selling it outside Villa Park. To slate fans for being disappointed at losing constantly and embarrassingly is not on. Agree with this. Something has to change and this would shake things up, if nothing else. Get the entire squad together and see what happens. Making full internationals train with the kids, whilst these no hopers are out on the pitch serving this up is abysmal. I'm not saying hutton and warnock are good, i think they are tripe too, but at least they are tripe that had to fight against relegation before. Only the winners get europa league unfortunately

I do hope people stop saying this. I don't want to seem like i'm attacking you in particular, just this mentality. "A long road" should not mean piss poor performances one after another, dragging the club through the dirt, losing to a **** league 2 team that aren't even that **** good in the 4th division. We're setting records right left and centre. I don't know how it can be changed now though, dropped us completely in the shit the last 3 seasons with no way out

do we have one of the biggest turnover of players in the league?? i am looking back now and i seem to remember that by the time MON had left the only survivor of his reign from the DOL days was Agbonlahor. Some players came and left whilst he was here. Since he's left nearly his entire squad that he left has now gone too. That's like 50 players in 7/8 years. Talk about stability and building for the future

you've all forgotten Freidel! dunno whether n'zogbia deserves a mention or not too, then there is hutton...

i am interested in a villatalk league as soon as i have a TV, a PS3 and FIFA13. so basically if i can join in a little later then i would want to be part of it

i think this console has the potential to have some must-buy games, but unfortunately, as with all nintendo consoles it seems these days, we have to wait many years for these games to actually come out once the console is released, and so by the time the games are actually taking full advantage of the capabilities of the console, the next generation of consoles is well on the way and sales are starting to wain, which is a shame. The only real reason i still go with nintendo is for the games series that are exclusive to them, without those they would be well behind the market. Pokemon/Zelda/Mario and then newcomers like Prof. Layton, in my opinion, are the only things keeping them in it

This is Villa's 14th participation in the semi-finals. They have never progressed to the final after failing to win the first leg of a semi-final (D2, L3). This is the second time they have faced a fourth-tier club in the League Cup semi-finals: in 1975 they drew 2-2 away to Chester in the first leg and won 3-2 at Villa Park in the second leg. So they are saying that we never progress when we don't win the 1st leg, then give an example of us progessing after not winning the 1st leg as the next fact???? is there something i am missing?

jesus christ can people stop saying how much he is worth? technically he is worth $0, we didn't buy him as he came through the academy, we haven't publicly put a price tag on him, and no-one has put in a bid for him. Football players cannot be accurately priced, people using the logic of 35mil Carroll, what about comparing him to Michu? he's worth less than Michu. I think he's a great talent and i am enjoying watching him play for villa, long may it continue. looks like he is happy playing, and getting along with all the other lads too so happy off the pitch, i'm not gonna worry about 2 years down the line because he is awesome and playing for us as it stands

I think he should be starting against Bradford, may not be his level anymore but it's what he is used to, and i think he would cause big problems to the bradford defence. also giving him a couple of starts to give him some time to show what he can do, can't be a bad idea surely? He has the physical build to make it by the looks of it, it's up to him to show if he has the attitude, talent and potential now.

i am pretty sure that is exactly what i said? Thanks for the response Con, and fair play in that case. I really like Bannan and think better players around him will show him to be even better than the potential he's showing at the moment. I just wanted to check as you were posting the same statistics from the same site over and over and i didn't know whether the stats were clouding your judgement of the guy from just watching him.

willing to believe this guy, mainly because he's saying what i'm thinking , I would really like to see someone like Cavanda at the club, i think he would adjust well to the prem with his playing style and his abundance in pace. Also, he's a young Belgian who gets on well with Benteke so we already have bait at the club, and maybe that's how we've heard about him? Would be a good way of getting inside knowledge on him, having a friend of his at the club already But i really feel that if we went for Aubameyang then a bigger club would come in and convince him to go somewhere else. Also, i don't like the links with players that we were interested in during the summer, obviously there is a chance of us going back for someone, but Lambert doesn't like being mucked about, so unless the deal wasn't completed because we ran out of time (Stephens) then i feel like it is more likely lazy journalism (Gouffran)

Con, i understand why you back him now because you've stated all the statistics you have to back up your opinion. But what was your opinion of him and what did you think were his best attributes before finding all of that out? What did you think of him after watching him play and nothing more?

I agree with those prices in principal, but it would be convincing the players to join our side. These are players that other teams will already know a lot about and will want as well, and most of them will be better placed than us. Coutinho is at Inter! i realise he may want to leave for more games but to go to an english relegation candidate just doesn't seem likely. I would love it to happen, i just can't see it so i don't want to get my hopes up. There is also the chance that if you are buying a good young player from abroad then they will have to adjust to playing in a new league, learn the language as they wont be able to communicate with a lot of the players, and they will need time to adjust living in a new country away from home. We can't expect them to come in and hit the ground running is what i am saying. I wouldn't mind Chris McCann in, i mentioned him along with a few others 4-5 weeks back, but i am not sure whether he would be that big a step up from what we currently have, although his age and experience may help the team more than his ability.

loving the positivity but unfortunately all the options you want in this window are unlikely to happen on FM. Little sense of realism required right now

if he could do something along these lines on a more regular basis that would be great. Great technique and control. I really rate the guy but i think he should be used in a rotating midfield, with Westwood, 2 other CM's and an Attacking midfielder. However until we have those options i think it's ridiculous to want him out the team. who do you want to play instead of him? he really isn't that bad, and i feel he is improving slightly as the season goes on. Let him play regularly until we have someone better. Selling him would be madness, the squad is wafer thin and our other options in the middle are poor

is my memory bad or did Barry come through as a Left-Back, then got moved up to LM before being pushed into the middle? I don't think Westwood is a bad player at all, but i don't think he's that good. A lot of people raved about him so i tried to watch him closer in games and he just never did anything which i thought was particularly good. He does the simple well, and i understand he isn't there to get people off there seats, but even the simple looks a bit... simple, with him. If he keeps improving then he could be good, but for me he needs to do just a bit more.

100% agree with everything written here. Olof was my favourite player and a hero when i first started watching villa growing up.