briny_ear

It's perhaps a bit early to pronounce on his managerial after only 11 league games but I reckon I can provide 2 names who were worse than him: Graham Taylor MkII and Gerard Houllier. In addition, time alone will tell if O'Leary was better or worse than McLeish.

That's not really how I saw that game. I thought we came back strongly in the 2nd half and bossed quite a lot of it, after a 1st half in which each side was equally poor. That's what made the last minute goal so galling, although it was not at all a surprise given the state of our defence at that time. It was the first time I thought I detected that our midfield could get a grip of a game, something they seem to be getting better at (in a gradual and rather bumpy fashion).

If you can explain how 5 goals and 6 assists in 11 games adds up to "1 in every 5 games", people might start t0 take your outpourings seriously. :evil:

Not sure why, but that conjured up an image that made me feel distinctly queasy.

3-1 now. Things looking brighter for Wolves! Wigan play lots of fancy football but have very little bite in front of goal. Also their defensive play is interesting. They seem to think the role of defenders is to stand around watching the Wolves forwards taking potshots at the goalkeeper.

Just shows how much we still rely on Petrov. We have no-one to replace him properly when he has to go off as yesterday.

He's still not really getting many starts for Olympiakos - basically coming on as sub in the 2nd half in most matches. And I don't think the Greek league is that hot to be frank. He never really established himself in the Premier League and I am doubtful if there is a very strong case for bringing him back.

It has been covered quite a bit in the "Exciting Youth" thread.

Good to hear he can still afford one of lifes essentials. Indeed. It's only like me owning a car to pursue my work. Has he gone for the new Falcon800? bargain at $50m Nope, the new Falcon 7X is the 'top of the range' Probably somewhere between $40m and $50m fitted out..... That's probably just about the Young and Downing fees spent with N'Zog from the spare change.

Quite soon by the look of things

Well we were for much of last season and we've lost two CL level players since then.

Nobody said it was good - although I guess it may be seen as better than last season's romance with relegation. It's just what McLeish will do and I'm sure it's why he was appointed because it's what Lerner wants for the club.

Ugh.

He played under Houllier at Lyon if I'm not mistaken.' edited for accuracy I'm not a big stato on French football but I think Houllier left Lyon in May 2007 and Makoun joined (indeed, from Lille) in June 2008?

Quite. On a 1 to 4 ratio, he owes us 3 good games. I wouldn't count the Sunderland game as a good performance, just a bit better than normal.

Considering Makoun only managed to get 8 starts under Houllier, and only played 4 full games, it's hard to imagine that he developed some deep attachment to Gerard that would mean he just had to leave when GH was gone. Also, call me a sceptic, but I find the "Cabaye didn't come to Villa because Houllier wasn't staying" story a bit hard to take when you read on to the bit where he says that no-one in the Premier League made an offer until he got a phone call from Alan Pardew, who he didn't know at all but sounded nice on the phone, so he went to Newcastle. Doesn't sound he was as definite as people are making out over which coaches he would or wouldn't play for!

Wonder how he's getting in to Bodymoor?

Likewise, I'm not sure Olympiakos would take too kindly to the idea of us just "bringing Makoun back" since that is also a season-long loan. Such things don't happen in the real world.

Looking at the reasons Hughes gave for leaving Fulham, I doubt very much if he would have come to Villa in its current financial state. The reality is probably that McLeish was one of the few managers who would have accepted the remit on offer in summer 2011.

Just got this gloomy feeling it won't happen again.

Does that mean we souldn't let him take free kicks at 85 minutes?

Surreal thread!

Good to see that as soon as a young player comes through from the youth set up & shows a bit of promise, people are lining up to write him down. :?