HKP90

1 hour ago, TreeVillan said:

Not quite as bad as that but I saw a lad in full man city kit (socks and all) with Doku on the back, in Northfield. 

FKW

4 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

Rice has been good for arsenal

the problem is with the way England set up he'll be looking to get 80+ touches of the ball and he's not great at it, I still don't think he shows for the ball enough, Maguire and Stones will have the ball at their feet and rice wont be picking up the positions he'll be needed in to actually get us forward

wont help that harry kane will be playing alongside him trying to do the same 

To be fair, he had the 3rd best progressive pass distance of any Midfielder in the PL this year, and got 8 assists from DM. I think he's a shoe-in to start for us tbh.  

19 hours ago, Teale's 'tache said:

Thought I'd try something, came out a wee bit too Scottish...

That would be the best away kit in my lifetime. 

1 minute ago, Muller Yogurt Long Sleever said:

Will do you one better than that. If the speculation is true about it being connected to a player, probably McGinn (but in truth, McGregor), but possibly Emi, this is a pretty solid bet for the new home kit

 

We laugh, but that shirt is f***ing mint. 

18 minutes ago, VillaChris said:

As said look in the pre season predictions thread that got bumped two days ago and pretty much everyone had Spurs 7th-10th. Can't recall anyone even placing them 6th.

Compared to last 15 years not like they were even 4th for long spells of the season and then lost that, that was us so in reality take out the first 10 games and 5th is pretty much their level and they still had enough to finish above Newcastle and Chelsea who had good last two months of the season. 13 home wins out of 19 was also better than us and only marginally worse than Liverpool.

No way he can stay there now though. He's burned more bridges than the 3rd Panzer Division. 

2 hours ago, MarkLillis said:

I have very a very tenuous link to someone who works for Chelsea.

The little snippets I've heard are:

1.Jhon Duran is a real target they like him a lot. He fits the profile of the type of player they want to bring to the club as he is young with a very high ceiling.

2. Last year they seriously put forward Ollie Watkins as a signing but no bid was made because he was considered to old.

Hahahaha. Idiots. He's only 28. This is why they play like lunatics chasing after an ice cream van. 

4 minutes ago, PaulC said:

He's been in a final of a euros and semi final of a world cup. He's not a weakness. 

I will be honest, whenever I've seen him (admittedly infrequently in league matches), Rice has been brilliant. 

4 minutes ago, PaulC said:

This is Southgates last chance  of winning a major international tournament. I hope and think he will be more attacking than he has in previous tournaments.

I hope that too, but honestly I don't think he has it in him to change like that. I would be delighted to be proved wrong and we win the final 4 nil, but I just cannot see it. 

1 hour ago, _AA_786 said:

All pointless now and might not be a consensus view but if it wasn't Unai then I'd have gone for Dyche next as manager of the year. I'm not a fan of his as he plays cr@p old school football but to cobble that team together and get them to 40 points (with the deductions).... is a hell of an achievement

Winning 4 in a row is an amazing feat but I'd argue taking a treble winning team and adding Gvardiol (70m), Doku (50-60m) and Kovacic (30m) makes it an easier 1 season task than what Unai or Dyche did

I am one of Dyche's biggest critics (as a manager not a person), but I have to agree wholeheartedly. Will he take them to the next level, no. Will they get into Europe under Dyche, highly unlikely. But he's done a tremendous job with them this year, especially with all of the uncertainty over points deductions. 

Just now, PaulC said:

I don't think Rice has been found out at all he's now a very experienced player for England. There are problems at cb and left back but the rest of the squad is very strong. Maybe backup keeper to Pickford.  France must be struggling in that dept bringing a has been back into the squad.

That's the thing about international management. Most international sides have an inherent weakness somewhere that is dictated by the players available. 

The trick is to minimise these weaknesses by keeping the ball in areas of strength. In England's case, we should be set up to be the most attacking side in world football. No-one would be able to handle or outscore us. Instead we are set up defensively, and the ball is recycled along our back line- giving most possession to the weakest element of our team. It's bonkers. 

29 minutes ago, AndyM3000 said:

Trippier off injured. Brilliant.

12 minutes ago, Rds1983 said:

Chelsea.

They're a complete mess.

Agent Carney infiltrated them and initiated 'Project Headless Chicken'. They are at least 2 years ahead of schedule on that one.  

They might consider buying our players to weaken their league rivals next year 

Can we just analyse the Pep manager of the season thing again. 

I will preface this by saying that I thing Pep is a very good manager. He does not play the football I would want to watch, but if the objective of a manager is to win games, then he is up there. 

But...

This year he took a squad from 22/23 that was easily the most expensively assembled side in the league, which had won the Champions League, FA cup and the PL, added £260M of talent including high profile players such as Gvardiol, Nunes, Doku, and Kovacic. For this investment he achieved 2 more Premier League points, and beat the 2nd place team by 2 points (the year before they were 5 clear). I know MOTS is a Premier League award, but this year there was no Champions League (out at quarter finals), no league cup (3rd round exit against Newcastle). They may still win the FA Cup, admittedly, but the UEFA Supercup is like an international Charity Shield. 

Given the squad they have, that is the absolute minimum they should be expecting. Minimum. 

Emery took a side that was 7th the previous season, that had virtually the same players as when we were in a relegation battle, added £80M of talent, taking us up to the 9th most expensive squad in the league (£100M of which have barely played this season, and £32M of which were on loan elsewhere), with the 6th biggest wage bill, and he got 4th in the league.

I'm not even saying that Emery was a shoe-in for the award, but I know Pep should not have been given it. 

5 minutes ago, villa89 said:

According to people who've seen all three kits they are all very nice. 

Ngggg. My eyes are getting impatient. I want to be one of those people.

2 minutes ago, Designer1 said:

So strange. Genuinely not my experience at all (came across all of that on the OG version though )

See that's weird, cos I never had any of those on the original when I played it for like 100 hrs on PS4, haha. 

2 minutes ago, DaoDeMings said:

I didn't realise football had made it to Ludlow

Quite the opposite, it's where all the footballers from the 1950's live now.

I'm representin' the Villa Massiv on the other side of Clee Hill. 

2 minutes ago, Designer1 said:

What platform are you on? I can only remember one glitch (NPC stuck in floor) in my whole 80hr playthrough on the PS5.

PS5 also. I'm getting texture glitches, people disappearing, objects vibrating continuously on the ground. And that's only just after getting to Concord for the first time. 

It also didn't register that I'd already obtained a mission component before I was asked to complete it (i was exploring) so I had to go back to the place it was and then back to clear the glitch. It's a f***ing mess. I might just (ironically) give up and go back to playing Cyberpunk. 

Just started replaying this on next gen. I don't remember it being this janky. Graphical bugs absolutely everywhere. 

44 minutes ago, Spoony said:

 

Deep, deep sigh. Football really is over. 

Wait til I tell you about the kid I saw in Ludlow yesterday wearing an Al Nassr shirt. 

13 hours ago, T-Dog said:

I don't get that. I'm still bitter about how he left us and his conduct when he left, but he's still a very good footballer. It wouldn't take long for Unai to get him firing again, train the Pep out of him. 

See I worry about that, because that flair he had, the mercurial thing, it's not something you can give or train into someone. It's natural, but like all creativity if you don't use it, or if it's beaten out of you, you might never get it back. The question is, does it still lurk in there somewhere?

Jack's next move is unquestionably the most important in his career. I hope he gets it right for his sake, and for mine because watching him before he became cog No.2365 in the City machine was pure joy.

On 20/05/2024 at 16:46, GarethRDR said:

Last trip over to Eindhoven, I decided to pop my head in the PSV club shop.  They had a dedicated display for copies of Luc Nilis' biography, and I thought I'd have a quick gander.  I think the Villa section was about two paragraphs long, the first of which was the Dutch author just banging on about how the move was a "surprising step down" (or words to that effect).

I mean, playing devil's advocate here, he played the same number of games for us that Omari Kellyman has so far. 

Not much in the way of material.

Jack is in.

Why are they confirming rumours one player at a time? Surely to know this the whole squad must have leaked? 

10 minutes ago, VillaAlex said:

Wharton and Eze in provisional with Branthwaite and Curtis Jones.

No Henderson, Chilwell or Sterling. That's good. 

Where is this being reported, I've missed this.