sidcow

Surely £40k per week is now £20k pw thought with relegation clauses? Said on here before he is one of the reasons we are where we are. . Was OK as a cheap stopgap when we were trying to rein it in but is not good enough and should have been moved on and with the money we got added to for an upgrade. Instead we keep him and sign another midfielder who is not good enough ending up with 2 midfielders who are not good enough instead of one really good midfielder supported by a youth player or eg Gary Gardner. If he wants to go fine, it's 2 years too late but if we get £6m we only need to spend £3m to get a £9m player which gains us a lot and loses us a little., just too late.

God that list is depressing. Southampton blinking Southampton have been spending money over the last 3 years that we we could only dream of. It has shocked me though as I thought they were put together at a bit of a budget but they could put out an entire team of £8m + players and almost a team of £10m + players. They have spent 3 years putting together a proper Premier League team. I know they have made a lot of money from sales to fund a lot of this but it shows the differing fortunes between them and us with how player sales have been reinvested. All our big money sales have ended in disastrous replacements.

I literally didn't understand anything you said there. . I clearly don't watch enough telly!

This is what I mean. It's often crucial to the actual functioning of the product which is useless without it. Some zippers are so so bad they actually don't even hold together at all, the price difference to the manufacturer must be almost nil. I just don't get it. It's a modern phenomena I think, I don't recall totally useless zippers in years gone by, probably coincides with the rise of China.

Cheap zippers are really pissing me off. . The number of bags, holdalls, covers, clothes I buy or more to the point don't buy which are perfectly good quality and totally serviceable otherwise that have a really nasty cheap zipper. How much do the manufacturers really save by not putting on a decent zipper, like 2p or something yet cheapens the overall product by a huge amount.

Not only that but to further confuse matters they make each one in different lengths and widths the stupid bar stewards.

I honestly think it's like I said on previous page. . They have stopped being that Gung ho totally together getting through it all with sheer damn hard work and good organization. They have started to believe they are good and are now acting like "normal" football players who are just not as good as they think they are. . Portugal really have not been that good but Wales have done none of the stuff which got them here. Probably just thought they had to turn up and the magic would happen.

It was always going to be a problem when they started to believe they were good. Fans were full of confidence thinking this might be their year etc. Sure fire way to be brought down to earth with a BUMP. It's like when Villa beat Chelsea or go on a bit of a run or get a couple of 6th place finishes. You know a fall is around the corner.

The problem with Wales is they have absolutely nothing up front. It's got to be Bale doing something brilliant. . I know Robson-Kanu done the ball in the net goodest last time but he is no international class striker. Ironic when you think of the probably world class strikers they have had in the past who never got a chance at this level.

If he gets a hattrick to win 3-2 I will expect him to be blubbing like a baby

This is why I didn't understand everyone getting so excited about £50m being the highest ever summer spend in the Aston Villa founded football league. It's all relative, this year that might only get you 3-4 players and we need a shed load. Things have changed and decidedly average players will be going for around £10m and towards £15m for top players in this league.

Actually you might be right. Looking back it seems Lee Hendrie replaced him as ambassador on the 2014 pre season tour because Lambert was unhappy about something he wrote. Maybe he has been back in since Lambert left though I can't recall seeing him on the O/S much.

I think stan started out poor for us, like a lot of players took time to adjust to the Premier League but once he got to grips with it was a very decent player, not as good as Barry for sure but one hell of a lot better than what we have had the last few years. It is hard to believe at his age after his terrible illness that he will be physically able to get back to good enough but I applaud him for trying and the club for giving the opportunity. I pray it does work out for him even if not here he might get back to a standard where he can do a job somewhere else. When you look at the overpaid and overrated Footballer's who effectively give up on their careers way earlier than they need to because they have earned so much money (I'm looking at you zog) it's a delight to see someone who still has the hunger, passion and desire to carry on, like he really appreciates the privilege he has of being good enough to be a top class professional footballer, like millions and millions of other people would love to have but never will.

A kind of clearing in the woods

Yep should have done this year's ago then we'd be reaping the rewards from those young and hungry players

Feel kinda ambarassed that I have posted a few on here already yet neglected this band who were unduspitedly MY band in the 80's so after much deliberation and unquestionably ignoring Vienna which would be WELL down the list :

Haha you dirty old dog talking about Dutch Caps

A guy I used to work with was an avid Villa fan for years but fell out of love with it in the Premier League years, like a lot of people I guess, so he started going to see his home town team Tamworth and now is a fanatic. Travels to games with the team sometimes and seems to personally know all the players and staff. I can see how this interpersonal relationship with your team can be attractive when you see the disconnect most PL players and clubs have with the fans now. Personally I ain't there yet and despite an emotionless 12 months just gone I think next season I will be back living and breathing the mighty Villa once again, got loads of away days planned, .just not on the team coach.

My great grandad was apparently chairman of Moor green years ago. I lived in hall green for years and used to hear the crowd if the wind was right. Always meant to go there but never made it.

Well that's your opinion but it's not mine.

Who suck up a load of our money whilst also generating a load of money and none of this by gambling with the entire future of the nation and my kids future. Also they are not facilitating racism...... Err .. OK Exept for Philip.

Aaaaaggghhh. They don't LOSE our trade, their goods just become a little more expensive to us. A lot of German stuff is (incorrectly because of good branding) seen as premium. 10% on an audi or Beemer will reduce sales but not kill them because people are willing to pay a premium already. Also there is a MASSIVE amount of production machinery the UK manufacturing industry relies on which can ONLY be bought in Germany which will now cost our companies more to buy service and maintain reducing our competivity. Also what we make here, and regardless of what the press leave you to think we still do make an awful lot of stuff here relies on a global (and very European) supply chain so we have to buy massive amounts of raw materials and components as disadvantaged prices and then try to sell the end product at massively disadvantaged prices which is a disaster Who gains the most if our manufacturing base declines? And don't listen to Bamford at JCB they are one of the few large British manufacturerers who sell the majority of their machinery outside of the UK or EU. People are WELL over playing the they need us more than we need them card. The truth is we need them FAR more than they need us and unless we are utter maniacs (Farage style) we blimmin well better blink first or we are on the road to OBLIVION BROMMY I am not going to continue to argue with you as we are obviously on different sides of the spectrum on this. You will not convince me and I will not convince you. I don't know where your convictions come from but mine are from my job working with many manufacturers all buying and making and selling and servicing throughout the world. . All in know is outside of the FTSE 250 which is where the vast majority of real people trade and work and get paid the overwhelming majority of wages in this country are generated from the EU. They buy and sell goods services machines raw materials and components and I honestly don't believe the average man in the street has any idea what this means. Also the number of our industries (mainly but not exclusively farming ) which rely. On foreign Labour which in NOT and I don't apologize for shouting going to be replaced by British employees will surprise a lot of people.

Ok everything is fine then, nothing to worry about rather like Borris said yesterday.

Not without massively uncompetitive terms.