The Fun Factory

Berson was the strangest. Apparently O'Leary had been tracking him for about a year- and then hardly played him.

Yep me too.

Didier Agathe

Non. Villa should never hire Scottish managers or buy French players. Those are 2 things I have learnt in 20 odd years of closely watching Villa.

Next week it will be out due to a bizarre gardening accident. Wouldn't surprise me if he left on loan in January. Looks like he has never settled.

A few months ago Paul Doyle was raving about us so they have changed their tune. Most of the outside footballing opinion was that we had a 'good' transfer window, I would if this will be revised downwards if we keep losing. For as long as I can remember we have struggled against big, tall physical sides.

Roger Taylor of Duran Duran fame is predicting a 2-1 win (Lawro going 1-1) There is a nice piece on the bbc website about why he is a fan- "It goes back generations really," he told BBC Sport. "I remember my grandad being a massive Villa fan like my dad, and there was never any possibility of me supporting any other team. "My dad started taking me to Villa Park when I was four or five years old. I still remember he used to sit me on the crush barrier on the Holte End terrace and stand behind me so I wouldn't get knocked off in the rush forward when we scored. "It just kind of gets in your blood, doesn't it? Their colours, everything. They are my team and they have been in my DNA ever since, through thick and thin. "Villa Park has changed a lot down the years, but it still has that beautiful Victorian frontage that takes you back to the early days. They have managed to develop it while still keeping the character of the ground. "Players seem to like playing there, and I love going back. It's me who takes my dad now, which is always great - he is coming up to his 86th birthday. We are going to the West Ham game together on Sunday, hopefully to see a win."

That's pure and simple

No I meant the quality of the football. Its a good ground. I expect for a big european night it would be rocking.

I still can't quite get my head round how quickly west ham have turned it around under Moyes. Wasn't that long ago they were all moaning and hating the London stadium. Now they are expanding it to 62,0000 and gold and sullivan must be licking their lips over which dubious oil backed billionaire they can flog the club too.

Had a weekend in Glasgow last week and went to see Celtic St Johnstone as a football tourist. No i didn't buy a half and half scarf. Celtic Park is a great stadium. I would put the standard as about lower table Champonship level. It was very much attack v defence as I cannot remember Joe Hart making a single save all match. Was a regulation 2 nil win and you could tell most of the fans are bored with this and loads left before the game. I think they live for the old firm and european games, the rest of the matches are fairly low key. The game certainly wasn't a sell out and I managed to get my ticket with no problems at all. The gap between rangers and celtic and the rest of the teams is huge even teams like Hearts or Hibs are fairly small. They are trapped in a small league and I can't see the premier league inviting them anytime soon which makes the money gap getting bigger each year. It is fairly mad that Scotland have over 40 league clubs (though some are part time) in a population of about 5 million. It would be the equivalent of England having about 400 league clubs.

Ashley Westwood. The quantum wave theory of Villa players.

We also lost Laursen though with his glass knees

Well maybe but it was hardly long term bringing in players like Dunne and Collins. We could have just kept on with Cahill instead of flogging him to Bolton for example.

That was when O'Neill bought a defence, and then a year later basically bought an entirely new one which was only slightly better and cost loads of money. I think that is when Lerner realised just how much money MON would spend unless he put the brakes on.

As Jimmy Hill famously didn't say remember to put your clocks back for this one.

A 29.6% win percentage for nearly three years work suggest that it was largely utter garbage with brief respites of occasional good play. I still have flashbacks on Bradford after doing both home and away matches. We got it back to 2-1 and then gave a goal away at Valley Parade. I don' think I have ever been so angry after a match. Then at home as soon as Bradford got a goal apart we lost the plot. By the end we had about 5 forwards but never looked liked scoring the 2 goals to get through. To get completely outplayed and outfought by a League Two side over 2 games was unacceptable and he should have been sacked there and then. We probably would have lost to Swansea in the final but still. Yes his hands were tied but his track record since Villa hardly suggests he was a genius manager or even coach. I still believe under post MON era Lerner we had a mid table prem budget so you could say he underachieved. If it wasn't for Benteke we would have got relegated far earlier.

What about ' he is a baller'? Apparently that is what the young folk say nowadays.

Wasn't he involved with the teardrop explodes?

A battling draw would be a decent result. Just need something to steady the ship.

Just compare to any of our ceo's/ general head honchos since Steve Stride left and its no contest. The guy knows his onions and I would want him to stay for a while longer yet as there is still so much more to do both on and off the pitch.

They were going to stay in the domestic cups and have a promotion/relegation to each of the leagues. Sounds like a good idea to me, how else can they compete. Anyway going dangerously off-topic here. I just hope big wes can get some game time soon.

Slightly off-topic but what has happened to the plan of merging the top divisions of the Netherlands and Belgium? Would be quite tasty Ajax v Anderlecht, Brugge v Feyenoord etc.

I agree with his tantrum. We were utterly shite on Friday especially in the middle of the park. If he couldn't come on then when will he play? He has nearly wasted a year of his footballing career by barely playing.

'Purgatory's kind of like the in-betweeny one. You weren't really shit, but you weren't all that great either. Like Tottenham.'