PompeyVillan

Going to a football stadium is never going to be like sitting in your favourite CAMRA pub. Bottled conditioned real ale and carbonated cask ales are probably as good as you will get? I don't know I don't visit that many stadia so I don't know what the golden standard is.

Yes, that's a flipping excellent partnership. Purity beer is lovely, I've always got a bottle in my fridge. Makes going to VP even more exciting on Saturday.

I've noticed that he won't ever get drawn into saying "It's a dream come true to manage Villa" or "It's an honour to be here". I don't know whether it is his dream or not to be honest. I like that, it shows that being here isn't enough, he doesn't just want to do the job. He wants to do it well. He isn't just a fan having a go as a manager, he's a good manager that wants to win.

Mourinhob talking about football principals, trying to explain to viewers about the phases of play. Good stuff.

I've got a lot of time for Raheen Sterling actually.

I started this new topic because I'm desperate for Tammy Abraham and Axel Tuenzebe to do well in their careers after their contribution to Villa's promotion last season. I also absolutely love Jadon Sancho, what a player. I'd like to see Sheffield United do well because I really like Chris Wilder. Who do you want to do well?

What is this stupid national obsession with fishing? Is it because we're an island? Anyone (/ Brexiteer may mistakenly) have thought that fishing is a big, economy saving industry. Something that could tilt a no deal Brexit in our favour. "Don't worry about all the financial institutions and large conglomerate businesses leaving the UK, because we've got fish." Don't get me wrong, I love fish and I want British fishing interests to be protected. Is it something worth leaving the EU over? The answer is no. Currently fishing equates for a zero point percentage of GDP, a best case scenario after leaving the EU is that fishing equates to a zero point percentage of GDP. But yaaaarrr, British fish for British people! Apologies for the irrelevant rant.

He was alright defensively, but he's so limited with the ball, he's a bit of a worry. Although I can understand playing him away against a team in the top 4 I very much see him as a player we need to replace..

Not a wind up, I thought he was poor when he came on. Is that a problem? I'm not stupid, I understand that Luiz is new to the team and the Premier League. That doesn't detract from the fact that he looked off the pace and let Sissoko skip past him for Spurs third goal.

I'm with Under A GasLamp, Mings and Engels should be known as "Mingels." They look a good partnership already. Personally, I see him getting caps for Belgium sooner or later. He was nothing short of excellent tonight and a snip at the price we paid for him. All aboard the Mingels train!

It is mate, I thought Luiz was cack when he came on. Admittedly, the circumstances were against him and it is very early on in his Villa career. Hourihane has made a career out of proving people wrong, and I think he will continue to do so. I see his role now as a squad rotation player who will be pushing the others for a place. He's not an automatic starter, he wasn't last season, but he will make sure Luiz, Nakamba, Lansbury, Grealish or McGinn are working blinking hard to be in the first 11. An invaluable player, a top pro, thought of highly and essential to our success this season.

He was good today. He did give the ball away cheaply a few times, but his work rate and passing ability are of this league. Write Connor off at your peril, Douglas Luiz will be gunning for him, but Douglas will have to be some player to replace Connor.

Rightly so, no need to be bitter. With respect, the only clubs looking at Glen are well below Premier League level. If she thinks that her husband is good enough to play for us in the Premier League then she's obviously be on the coffee liqueur.

I have to agree, you can't be comfortable with any defeat, but you can put it into context. For us as fans, if any individual expected us to go to Spurs and win, then perhaps they are lacking a bit of perspective. I don't actually think that is the case, I think the dissapoinmtent stems from the fact that we were ahead for so long, and blew it in part because of a few individual errors and a bit of bad luck. Spurs are where we would like to be, and they gave us a bit of a lesson today. No worry though, it's a long season and there is so much much to happen between now and May. Staying up would be nice.

I just had a look at that thread, it's still hilarious. They give the Villa fan on thee some right stick, I'm not quite sure why he bothers to honest, it's a pretty poorly behaved forum, nobody is bothered with actually discussing anything with him they just want to hurl abuse at him and mock Villa. Anyway, good luck to them. I hope they enjoy their Europa League run, which will wear them out for when we play them in the league. That forum will probably actually explode if we beat them. Not that we ever could of course, Wolves are inherently better than Villa in every way, don't you know?

His lack of physical prowess shows when under the pressure. I think Smith was hoping that he would help us hold onto the ball, but the midfield were knackered and couldn't get the ball anywhere near him.

I thought he was excellent today, got in the end of everything in the second half. Ultimately he was overused. A bit of an odd movement for the first goal on the slow motion replay he looked as if he was desperate to not handball it and moved out of the way of the ball and a bit unlucky for the second.

I thought he was partly culpable for the third, he was a bit soft and let the Spurs midfielder past him a bit too easily. He's not quite up to speed yet and will definitely get better. He'll be gunning for Hourihane.

We were given a good hiding today. But we showed fight and guts, and ultimately decent defensive organisation. We're light years away from Spurs, and we'll work towards trying to do what they're doing, but today was a stark reminder of how far away from that we are. But from what I have seen, we won't give up, our players will work their hearts out and they will want to learn and improve and they can improve. A sobering experience back in the top division today. But next week we have a game we can be more positive in, let's see where we are after that.

I get that one too.. On a similar theme, my Mrs can't load a dishwasher to save her life. Or at least she refuses to put any thought into doing it. Every evening I have to take everything out and put it back in again in order to clean more than a handful of things.

I hope they stay up, they had the gumption to have have a go at Liverpool at Anfield. It wasn't a million miles off working if you ask me.

Could this be out the club at the next supporters meeting? I think the club has a responsibility to pay a living wage. I know we now think of football as a business and it is, however the roots of our club are in the community and the people that support that community. I'm with DDID, pass the cost onto fans if needs be, although I'm not sure this would be popular across the board with the fanbase. You hear it often, but the football staff at clubs really care about the teams around them, the cleaners, caterers, office staff. Because these people are the lifeblood of the club, often they do their job for with a passion not seen in other industries. To steal a phrase, I want to be romantically nourished by my football club. I still think of the club as a community, and I'm encouraged to do so by club marketing by 'being part of the pride'. Well the ladies and gents that serve the food and drink, clean the toilets, sell programs, whatever, they're part of the pride too. I do also understand that much of this sort of work is done temporarily or through an agency. That doesn't really matter to me let's look after them if we can.

He's 21 the same age as Douglas Luiz. He's perhaps not developed as quickly as we might have liked.

I think Douglas Luis was bought as someone that could do the same job as Fernandinho. Rodri, trust me, is better than Fernandinho and better than Douglas Luis. He'll be an absolute revelation at City, which is probably why they're happy to sell Douglas to us. As well as the permit issues. We obviously don't know the terms of the buyback deal, my feeling is that it is there in case City think they can make some serious money on buying him back and as an insurance policy. Probably not a buyback clause to bring him into their first 11, and I don't see Luiz becoming as good as Rodri.

I've been cooking a lot this week. Good use of the freezer and store cupboard for this one. Thai red curry with cod.