HalfTimePost

**** off

Digne should've done better Vs Ayling. Got lucky there, he ran through us too easily

Also, fair play to Cash he ruined that with his first touch and rescued it to play a good ball immediately

Could've had 2!

Should've been 1-0 there. Very close!

Want to see it start clicking into place tonight. good signings, mini pre-season together with friendlies that other teams haven't had and a nice run of fixtures. Today's the day it needs to start coming together.

No O'Reilly as rumoured but Iroegbunam and Chrisene appear!

He played 90 mins yesterday. A slight calf issue but can't see him not being involved on the weekend

Nah Gerrard said he won't be in today, but hopefully we'll see him on the weekend. Think he'd be a great option to bring on for Coutinho as Trippier gets tired (hopefully!) Or to swap with Buendia in the right up against their LB which will probably be Paul Dummet with Targett ineligible

Glad to see McGinn is really taking it in himself to build relationships with the squad and try and make them feel at home. Feels like Leon needed a bit of love this week. https://instagram.com/stories/johnmcginn7/2769324050569484893?utm Also lol that there's ever discussions of taking £40m - £50m for SJM, he's so important to us on the pitch and behind the scenes.

True! And hope he signs. Along with Chuk it was touch and go whether he'd sign his last one or go to Leipzig though. Really hope hes as excited by the project and prospect of playing for Gerrard as he should be. Certainly appears to be applying himself for Stoke.

I reckon Ryan Kent has been mentioned more on the Villa part of Villa Talk than any other player that hasn't been a transfer target or an actual player of the club. Quite the feat in a few short months

He's going to have a year left on his deal next summer. He was making first team appearances at the start of the season and was ahead of Chuk (his best mate at the club). We'll have another Carney situation on our hands if we keep him down in the championship all through next year

Good interview with Mings in The Guardian - Felt scapegoated when dropped by Dean (but is very respectful of him and the 'journey' they had together) - Felt a weight of responsibility as a new, first time Captain to get the whole team firing. - Has taken tips on Captaincy from Gerrard but appreciates there will always be differences between them and he won't always relate to everything. - Loving life under Gerrard. Sometimes you can see Gerrard 'the Captain' and his winning mentality and joining in training Sometimes Gerrard 'the manager' and is crystal clear on how we should be playing and what he is working towards. - Young players have come through well and established players have reached new levels thanks to the limits Gerrard is pushing them to - Coutinho is a huge lift to them all that we can attract that calibre of player. He's fit in well - Finishes on a nice point about all the change he's seen here in a short space of time and where we are aiming

Nothing really. He limped off but looked precautionary, a few reports saying Leeds will review him when he's back. I think he'll play to be honest but here's hoping. I think we'd have heard in Bielsas press conference if he wasn't available

Fwiw my joint team would be Watkins Coutinho. Raphinha Ramsey. McGinn Phillips Digne Mings Konsa Cash Martinez Bench: Meslier, Ayling, Koch, Luiz, Buendia, Harrison, Ings.

If we can add Raphinha to this list if he really did get injured then we should really be trouncing them...which only means one thing will actually happen..

He didn't score many and whilst Moors were happy enough there wasn't much to write home about and given the difference in levels meant there was next to no hype about Archer on here or from the fanbase. So 'struggling' in terms of how fans would want any loans to go, ripping the league a part - he didn't do that. But that's the point, loans can be very useful for players and massively aid their development for a variety of reasons. Scoring and assisting like Prime Messi would do in the Vanarama South would be great for all players on loan, but isn't realistic

Well no, Heskey scored over 100 Premier League goals, winning 4 League Cups, an FA Cup, a UEFA Cup and a UEFA Super Cup as well as getting over 60 caps for England. But the playing styles (and deficiencies) are similar enough for a comparison imo.

Keinan is Heskey reincarnate in my mind. if he can add goals to his game he could certainly have a good career. Heskey gets an unfair amount of stick for his goal scoring prowess too but was invaluable to us in avoiding relegation and earlier in his career was an incredible team player at Liverpool. You'd imagine even if he's never going to be first name on the team sheet that Steven Gerrard would be able to understand the value of this kind of player to a squad. If he gets sold and racks his value up over 6-18 months on loans before next summer and is sold, so be it and it's probably the most likely option. But I also won't rule him out of having more of a Villa career than we're all anticipating

I agree with your post. But Lamptey and KKH would be a lovely duo to be able to rotate. I love Cash though and think he's ideal to have against the bigger sides where he puts his body on the line and gives it his all. KKH can eventually take the lesser teams where we want more attacking output

Was an unused sub in MK Dons' 2-1 win yesterday. They Play 3 at the back with wingbacks the same as Swindon so hopefully he'll slot in well there. (3-5-2 at MK Dons but 3-4-3 at Swindon). Seems like he's going to have to work to win his position there. Tennai Watson is their starter and #2 shirt. Is only 24 and an average rating of 6.7 so is playing pretty well when he plays. For Kesler to dethrone one of their actual own players who is going to start coming into their peak years is going to require him to be on his game. Fortunately Watson has only 14 starts this year and 7 sub appearances (29 games played by Dons) so appears he has had or has an issue with regular football, Kesler going to have to make the most of his opportunity when it comes to get that starting shirt. Must have been some assurances for us to not send him back to Swindon.

You literally asked what Barry had shown at 18 compared to Archer to say he's better and got a list of things. At the moment yes Archer is better but is 2 years older. At 18 Batry had accomplished a lot more. Last season Archer had a failed loan at Solihull Moors, Barry had half a failed loan at Ipswich. Obviously Archer is better at the moment but is 2 years older. That's the entire point. We'd have all written Archer for after doing nothing at Solihull, so let's not make the same mistake with Barry just because we're expecting a lot from him

Not heard much about Cole but Aaron is supposedly the 'good' one out of him and Jacob. It's weird, initially that belief amongst fans meant Jacob was written off a bit or atleast a lot of discussions of 'hes decent but the brother is even better!' so not much pressure on Jacob... Now we're talking about Jacob like a World Beater 'but the brothers even better!' going to be some interesting expectations for young Aaron