skarroki

This and Newcastle last season are huge statement wins. I think if we can follow this up with a midweek win I'll be very happy. Currently I'm still a bit worried about how patchy we are as soon as 2 or 3 of our best players get 45 mins rest.

Tbf the guy is probably absolutely raging, it's one of the worst moments in his professional career and someone who inflicted that on him is yelling consolation in English with a heavy accent over a loud PA system and a roaring crowd. I think most managers the response would be "I can't hear you and I don't give a **** what you have to say right now" I'm sure they spoke after. Emery and De Zerbi are very complimentary of each other and I don't think that thumping involved any dirty tactics from either or anything that would make them dislike the other. At least he was more dismissive than outright confrontational or just a complete blank. He came over to shake hands.

Think Dali is in her kit sat in the stands?! Fair play for supporting the side when not in the squad

Van Domselaar is better than Olsen by a country mile.

Is Dali injured? And I was under the impression Pacheco was first choice left back. Nice to see the strength on the bench.

Lot to be said for stability now. He has been moved around every 6 months the last 2 years and he's commented on that. Was in 4 different youth set ups too. Just let this kid shine for a year at a good club flying top of the table and if they go up he can stay put for another season and tear up league one too.

Agree with this 100% Had some great games this season and been absolutely solid today. You don't get international teams looking into where your grandparents are from if you're not good enough for a certain level. He can do both and he's in my opinion the defensive version of Watkins. Works tirelessly, does the job the manager wants week in, week out. Not sure why so many people dislike him.

I've come to accept the general toxic atmosphere around this game. I do enjoy playing and building a squad on ultimate team now, especially with the women added this time round and the removal of positional change consumables. I'm hoping to create a Villa men's/ Women's hybrid to use most the time and accept I will be slapped every few games by people who spend more time or put money into the game. Although there's a lot of hatred for it I don't mind the squad battles either so can use that squad offline. Hopefully some good performances from our players gets a few nice special cards. It's road to the knockouts tomorrow at 6pm for Europe so there's every chance Villa will get a good card for that.

These women are dreading their shirts going see through and being publicly humiliated, got my front row seat to oggle at them! Hubba Hubba! Hahaha good joke.

There's talk that Arsenal women will be one of the first WSL teams to wear different shirts to the men's side this season. My hope is that if this is resolved, we follow suit. I think it's poor form regardless of the shirt quality, to keep putting out women's kits with white shorts. There's been enough reported on this for me to not go into detail, I just think there are other colours we can pick for the shorts and other materials for the shirts to make the women feel as comfortable and happy as possible in their kit on the day. The teams can be knitted together as closely as possible without forcing both teams to go out in the same kits. Bizarre it takes something as embarrassing as this to get a discussion going on it.

This is what I wanted to say but much better written haha. I had zero doubts about anything last year, the performances and off field theatrics are enough inconsequential issues to build up to something consequential. Honestly as crazy as it sounds I think Emery's number one wish currently will be that the shirts are replaced ASAP and the marketing team make a huge deal of it to push out the narrative that we are fixing issues.

Want to start this by saying I am behind Emery fully and would never entertain any idea of dissent on him, even if our record starts to tail off. However... Something is not quite right this season and has just not clicked. I've been trying to work it out and at the moment I think it is simply that Emery doesn't know who his starting XI is. It hit me when the teams were announced last night that I looked at Everton's side and thought they really want this, they're taking it seriously. I look at our team and I have no idea which players are reserves and which are starters for certain. I know this seems to be the idea. I know there was talk about us needing strength in depth, strong bench, long season, rotation etc. etc. etc. However, you do regularly get comments like Ten Hag recently where managers come out and say things like "I can't start our strongest XI" whether that's issues or injuries or whatever. I reckon Pep is the only successful manager currently in the league who doesn't have a definitely XI in his head for his side. I think we really need to work out who our best team is and get minutes in with them to get them to gel. If one of our best XI players is injured, fine, stick someone else in. The fact is that currently, we've lost to Everton, Liverpool and Newcastle and I didn't feel like we'd win those games from the first 10 minutes onwards. I thought the game was over at Palace and I don't think we won due to tactics or formation or a good plan, even Emery admitted that. Got lucky that they took a player out in the box for a soft pen and a moment of magic from Duran to start it off. Chelsea probably one of the best performances in recent weeks but I dunno if we'd have beaten a poor Chelsea with 10 men if the ball doesn't deflect back to Watkins so that he has no time to overthink the shot, and even then Sanchez could do much better and Martinez was on a different level all game. It's frustrating a team we absolutely decimated a few weeks ago is the same team we just can't muster the energy to try and beat a few weeks later. Maybe the best XI thing is a red herring I'm completely overthinking but I don't know what it is at all currently. I feel like we're either guaranteed to win as we're gonna blow the other team away, or look like we have no fight within 10 minutes of a game, every match this month. Just something that's a recent trend that I hope won't set in. For me, I'd be happy with Duran, Watkins, Zaniolo, Bailey, Diaby, McGinn and Ramsey starting in more advanced positions but max 4 will start and I don't know who the best 4 are or what combo works best. If we had a big cup game tomorrow I wouldn't know who I'd want on the pitch for the game, maybe Watkins with Diaby and then Ramsey and Zaniolo the 10s but can't really take McGinn out the side and Bailey adds extra pace that can hurt teams.

Van Domselaar outrageous save against England. Think we've got two of the best keepers in world football at the club right now. Can't find a thread for her?

But I have an idea and it's better than anything else and I'm sure it's also what all fans want and any fan that disagrees with me doesn't understand marketing or history or culture.

2-0 win. Think Duran will score if he touches grass. The guy is in danger of becoming a key player for us

Special event card Bailey from totw

It's definitely not Castore and it's the manufacturer because Castore make lots of good looking and good quality shirts. Personally I think Castore will be as keen to get out this deal as we are, it's awful for their PR if people are running around in awful shirts soaked through. Whoever is making the kits needs to be replaced immediately.

I think we need Zaniolo up to full speed and more familiar with the squad. He strikes me as a similar character in terms of a complete need to win, that permeates through people around him. Mings had a lot of physical attributes that helped him become a top defender, but it's his intelligence and character that define him. I do think that on paper you'd be replacing him in the defence with Carlos or Torres in terms of raw ability, especially with Mings having a mistake leading to a goal in him every two or three games before Emery. I feel like those errors were becoming fewer, but I did wonder if he was going to phase out of the side by the end of the season, especially with age not on his side. Happy to admit that was naïve now though, definitely missing him. Although obviously the transition has been instant instead of gradual over a season. As a side note I'm curious to see what he's up to in his time off. I heard he has a couple of his own businesses and a youth football training centre. I hope he's studying for his badges as I can see him becoming a top coach one day.

Did I miss something an Ndidi isn't good anymore? How is he still at Leicester?

Relieved to see he wasn't in the squad last night that got tonked 9-0 But also curious why he didn't even make the bench? Exeter such a good example of how fan ownership can work and been great following them this season so far, proven a lot of people wrong so far. Hope they put this behind them quick.

I assume him starting and scoring against Sutton last night means he won't feature in the squad at all for the Warsaw game?

Maybe the wrong answer but reading the comments on this page, I know it's a cliché now, but it's a squad game. I think he should start every game he's fit but we will play a lot and he will pick up niggles, suspensions and generally get tired from the fixture congestion. I really think it's best to ease him back in and once he's up to speed he can play regularly in the Prem. But I don't think that means someone else will spend the rest of the season benched behind him now he's fit

It's just weird behaviour but if I get on my soapbox about it I'll be redirected to off-topic These are the top 3 comments on the picture they used after the 3-3 draw. To give you context, Lehmann is facing away from the camera.

It doesn't have to be either or but I do think you can tell how serious someone is taking the women's team when they bring up Lehmann instead of say Daly for example. I've had people genuinely discuss how well we did last season and how good some of Daly's goals were, Hampton being a good keeper etc. Which was refreshing. Then I've had "the ladies have that Lehmann don't they - phworrrr" kind of 'conversation' at which point it's difficult to explain to them she's a great player and a good brand ambassador because those things get batted back with the exact kind of archaic banter you'd expect.

Am I right in saying it's just Afoka to Bradford, Bogarde back to Bristol Rovers and Revan to Rotherham that went through? If so, I'm thinking whether Hause and Davis are included in the list of players who we had loan offers in the championship for. Davis we managed to sell instead, Hause didn't happen and Revan we let go. Not sure if there's anyone else who looked destined to leave on loan. Disappointed we didn't get a loan for Marschall in the lower leagues, also Chrisene I thought was heading back to Exeter but I might have dreamed that (?!). Caleb Chukwuemeka we need to get off our books now surely? Side note, might have to get a Plymouth shirt with KKH or Azaz on the back because they are stunning kits.