briny_ear

this is awful. I'm so bored. We need 5 in midfield. Carew has been poor so far.

It's a strong bench again.

Is this like the Irish referendum?

You will vote and vote again until you come up with the "right" answer.

Here we go a-****-gain

Tacky as hell

EDIT

BTW my bro & sis are scum fans and are in despair about Carson Yeung, since they are not clear he actually has any money with which to buy this prestigious asset.

They are convinced Birmingham will be in administration in a year's time, languishing somewhere down the Divisions with a 10 point penalty.

Just watching MOTD2, Carew could have easily slotted it into the net with that chance he had where he broke with Milner.

Almost an open goal. Oh well, nevermind.

Wouldn't surprise me if he makes clear to the midfield/attack they should have done better. We need to get our goal count/goal difference higher.

Think you could just wave this one through. Freddie by a mile.

Quite long and off a Blues board but it had me chuckling.

Proof we don't read our own front page. Why I oughta

Brilliant! I suppose all it misses is MON marching everyone off on a pre-match visit to the Science Museum.

Guardian (which often seems to call these things right) this morning has this as the likely formation

--------------Friedel

Cuellar----Dunne---Collins----Warnock

Reo-Coker----Petrov------Sidwell

Milner--------------A. Young

--------------Gabby

Good enough for Small Heath IMO, though a scarily new back four. Hope they've been practising together..

If Young is fit and says he is ready - play him !.

Young is some way short of full match fitness

I voted Sorensen, he wasn't the best keeper but was a big part of our team for many years and although his commanding of the area was weak, he was a very good shot stopper and decent handling. Friedel will probably be better, but he's only had a season and he was fairly average last year.

EDIT

Sorensen, that is.

It sounds to me as if there is still a bit of doubt about his fitness and , for obvious reasons, quite a lot about his emotional preparedness. It would be catastrophic for him to come back before he was ready, particularly into the intensity of a Scum match.

Southgate*, again. (He should have won the first round).

(*Or, as Italian football commentators tend to call him, "Sowth-a-gart-a")

Sorensen was a decent keeper to be fair. Nowhere near as good as Friedel or James, but also nowhere near as bad as Carson or Schmeichel. To be honest, he was treated pretty shabbily by O'Neill.

Agree with that. Sorensen was a decent shot stopper most of the time who made only a couple of mistakes like most keepers do. He should have been ahead of Carson in the 07/08 season IMO.

Somehow, things were never quite as warm between them after that... 8)

I guess Laursen will win because he lives in recent memory but it has to be Southgate in terms of all round ability. We haven't ever really recovered from his departure if you ask me.

For me, David James's days were numbered from the moment he lost us the 2000 FA Cup Final.

I'm amazed that over half wanted DOL to stay in June '06. I would gladly have voted to have him deported by that stage.

I'm struggling to see the point of this poll

Yup, Delaney for me.

Is this really going to happen every week?

Ever heard of Poll Fatigue...?

I think the naysayers only roam the earth at night, so they should all have voted by now!

('Course, it's probably not night where you are, more like evening I guess, so this is a very parochial comment.)

97% - 2%: better than even anything Obama could dream of.

Experiment over for me.

Friedel by a mile!

Rino, I've been diplomatic on here up til now about Beye because he's still new to Villa and he might still improve, but from what I've seen of him, and I've watched him closely, I honestly think we have on our hands possibly the worst rightback since I've supported the club.

Woooooooaahhh woah woah.

As recently as a few years ago...Aaron Hughes, man I despised him playing for us, at least a mistake a game, so bad. Could cross, had nothing else going for him.

What about Bardsley? He has to have been the worst.

That's quite a claim of BOF's and I sincerely hope he lives to withdraw it (otherwise we are in deep trouble).

Have we really seen enough of Beye to write him off so conclusively? Do things like settling into the side, getting used to how your colleagues play, building up communication with them during the game, etc., not have any relevance to this?

Look at Bouma. He says he didn't know what he was doing until MON & co. came along and told him what they expected of him. So players can improve - and get worse - according to how they are coached.

So I don't sign up to the view that players are either utterly and irredeemably useless or forever sainted - the former can improve and the latter can lose the plot.

Even if Beye "can't defend" and has positioning that makers some "unhappy" (not that I think anyone can seriously make that judgement having seen him in a Villa shirt for a couple of games), there is the chance he will improve with some decent coaching

Milner by a distance at present.