VILLAMARV

If Unai had rocked up at his first press conference last season and said we'd be playing in our first European QF since Collymore came on against Athletico Madrid next year we'd have thought he was mental. It's been a long wait. Was it really 26 years ago? Jeebus, I was a young man! Memories like that, Inter and Athletico, and for the older guys the proper European nights at Villa Park. Barca in the Super Cup. This is what it's all about, exciting innit. Hope the lads do themselves proud tonight. UTV

What's wrong with them?

I'm definitely in the 'thinks there's a player in there worth finding' camp. And I don't think the reported fee's all that much in the grand scheme of things, but the bottom line for me is he just hasn't shown us enough yet to warrant a permanent investment. I think that the intensity and the speed of the Premier League has been hard to adjust to and I'm not sure if he fancies being a cog in the machine either and after years of injuries and lack of minutes for various reasons I wouldn't blame him for wanting to go somewhere where he'd be more the main man than squad filler. Hard not to like his endeavour though and I hope he has a storming end to the season. The wall thing is hard to come back from really but I get why the Italian VTers seem to like him. I like him. But remember when Mings walked in the door and put in great performance after great performance and it was the start of something undeniably beautiful? - it's kind of been more of the opposite of that really so far with Nico.

Can't see my mind being focussed on work all that much today.

My mum always remebers it fondly because of basically how bonkers me and my brother would go, over excitedly jumping all over the sofa and all that, trying to do flying kicks n that, calling our own cloud I have very scratched, obviously a kenneth, but much loved 7" BBC single amongst the 7"'s. Gandara on the b side plays just fine. Born from an egg... not so much anymore

I'd say it's pretty awful and only worth it in a "this is an Aussie show for kids but my love for Monkey is strong and I'll still watch it" type of way. A far cry from the amazingly mental 70's one though.

I was down in Devon-by-the-Sea. I very much remember all the flashes going off around the coastline as everyone took a picture of the darkness or something

I'm sure I haven't perfected this one to land right but if we can look past the real men bit and understand my intended use of speech marks there's a rather funny inadvertant " 'Real men that do real work' ARE woke shocker" headline from the heil

Honestly, and I get that flippancy might be more fun, but I wouldn't hold your breath on that one. The powers that be have been attempting to clamp down on our collective freedom of expression by writing into Law things around 'offensive' or 'insulting' speech and actions for the best part of my 40 something years now. If not much longer. Isn't this just more of the same? It seems to me the same nonsensical playbook as served us up such wondeful ideas as Section 5 of the Public Order Act or the new Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act. What is always fascinating to me is that many of the people I meet with 'a team' or who feel allied to one group identity agree/disagree with this Orwellian approach when it suits them. i.e. the people up in arms about this clamping down on free expression in this poorly written legislation in Scotland are not all seemingly as concerned with the clamping down on free expression in the poorly written legislation around speech and assembly in England and Wales, or whether prosecutions would be justified for calling police horses gay and so on. Fascinating, but in a sadly not at all surprising way. While these examples are still things that divide us, isntead of concepts we rally around, I can't see much appetite for anything different. Mind you I'm an emotion discussing builder who once eat an avocado for brekkie so I should perhaps consider getting back in my box.

I think it's the club in the qualifying/playoff rounds with the highest club coefficient wiki This year I think the Ukrainian Champions went straight into the group stages instead of the qualifying rounds because Man City had already qualified and won it. Presumably someone in round 1 qualifying gets a bye.

No, there are no qualifying games for the new Champions League format for any English teams, either the top 4 or the extra coefficient places or potential Europa League winners https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024–25_UEFA_Champions_League#League_stage

Oh I dunno, Edgar Davids wasn't a bad player. None out of Mascherano, Deschamps, Dunga, Makelele and Matthaus were more than 5'9" Not that I know the lad from Cov or have an opinion on him, but there have been some truly great DMC's that were about the same height.

I wouldn't swap our remaining fixture list for Spurs's.

No place for factoring in all the recent history, another team we haven't got the best record against and all that but ultimately for a team chasing the top 4 we should be picking up 3 points against the sides in the bottom half. Hook or crook I'm not bothered. 3 points please.

Gutting news though, although I'd rather they try and sort it out properly than throw him back in and end up with a longer problem.

Some of us have got this at least

I've had a variation of this chat with some friends of mine who were asserting that "gender shouldn't be self determined". I argued that surely gender can only be self determined - but that we agreed if what they really meant was that the Law should not be self affirming though. Despite accusations of engaging in a semantic argument, I think there's a massive difference. Their suggestion that gender can be determined externally is rather silly to my mind. How people identify and what the Law should do about that are very different questions that are unlikely to be answered with a simple catch-all statement.

This is what I was wondering - Occasionally there'll be someone suggesting I can't put 4 x 5's on a 7 or somthing like that - we grew up playing them as a de facto 10. MrsVM thinks I have to show my bottom cards if I can't play them - which I assume was born out of youthful exuberance when turning them over. It's not a game I've ever read rules to though, it's just learnt behaviour. There's already a couple of variations I've never encountered listed in these two posts, namely the red threes and the extra card higher than a 5

Which festival's that Xann? - asking for a friend obviously

We moved back to the middle of nowhere a while ago now. I've been trying to convince MrsVM that the local surgery is not all officious and nasty to you when you phone them up like the one in Cardiff. Anyway, I got MrsVM to fill in all the registration forms and all that back before xmas and I personally hand delivered them to reception (I think in November IIRC). She has been spoken to appallingly in the past by receptionists in Cardiff and is rather nervous about speaking with them as a result at the best of times. Whereas some of us don't blink at having to phone the doctors up, It's a bit of an understandable thing, given her past experiences, that she has to psych herself up for. Today was the first time she had reason to call them and they had no record of her at my current address whatsoever. So they've lost the previous form and presumably the confidential medical information attached, they couldn't/wouldn't book her an appointment or a phone call (despite being on their records previously as a temporary patient, so existing on their database) and obviously - as a speedy resolution is not an option - speed is kind of of the essence medically in this instance too. Just an annoying time to have internal proceedure quoted back to her when it's their error. It's one of those unfortunate errors that is not that hard to rectify but the damage, mentally, is hard to either explain or to quantify. I love my local surgery, I find them friendly, helpful and I can usually speak to a doctor within 24 hours of contacting them. I'm gutted for her that the first time she's reached out to them for help has been a beurocratic clusterfunk. I know it will probably stop her reaching out for help in the future and it just further reinforces some of the negative outcomes she was worried about in the first place.

While we're chatting Utd's remaining games the rearranged game at home to Sheff Utd is midweek between Cov in the semi and Burnley at home, Other than that they have Bournemouth and Palace, same as we do, With a game to rearrange against Newcastle and Arsenal and Brighton. I'm not worried about Utd personally.

And Newcastle to rearrange from FA Cup Semifinal weekend. Chelsea and Liverpool are this week 3 days apart too. (Thur/Sun)

The shortlist internally for player of the season this year is insane really. Bailey, Luiz, Watkins and Konsa in particular are having real stand out seasons. Konsa's answered everything we asked about him when Mings got injured and then some. He's having a great season.