briny_ear

That is because James Milner has perfected the "in off the goalie's elbow" technique of scoring penalties.

Yeh, bit of a cheat that, changing their manager to try and avoid losing to us. Shouldn't there be a transfer window for managers as well as players? On the two options presented here, I don't want either of these, thanks.

James Milner says "**** off don't read the thread then"!!In fact, James Milner wrote every post in this thread.

Oh, please... Click here

Is it the worst Villa chant ever "invented" (actually borrowed form the scum fans, apparently)? Must be up there knocking on the No 1 spot.

Was 32 once. Gave up smoking, went up to 40. Now back down to 36, still working to get that heading further south.

This is just getting silly now. You have no way of proving that the improvement in performance was BECAUSE of Carew's absence. Nor that we wouldn't have performed even better if he had remained fit and a regular member of the side. As "Thug" has said, you can "prove" anything with statistics. What you're not doing in this thread is telling us anything interesting about the real world.

I see only 13% of people so far have got the right answer of - 3rd.

Can't really see the point of spending so much time discussing JPA with all the exceitement there is going on at Villa Park at the moment...

The fact that we have done well without Carew shows that the entire squad deserves credit for carrying on without a key player. We have also played successfully without others such as Bouma and Laursen. Good news, but these statistics cannot be used to support an argument that we "don't miss" any particular player. It is absiurd to think we "don't miss" a player as good as Carew.

Interesting to see how much regard there was for Downing amongst Villatalkers in those days, also how many of the 2005 posters have red cards! I reckon Barry has made better progress over those 3-4 years than young Stewart...

I love the "other - please specify" button. Exactly how are you supposed to do that? :winkold:

Apart from when he's on the treatment bench, which is usually.

Hmm. The same number as John Gregory! But remember this was just after his first season before it all began to fall apart. I think (mostly) we all loved him that season.

Reading that thread from 2004 has just given me a panic attack.

General Can I add my concern about the bad publicity about the Poppy Day collection. The club obviously has a really good story to tell but the quote from the AVFC press office that was used in the News Of The World article didn't really explain things properly (“We are having a collection for Acorns at the Middlesbrough game and don’t want to bombard our fans with a number of collections,”). The newspaper also had negative quotes from Matt Croucher, who is a local lad and a war hero who is just about to be awarded the George Cross for bravery in Afghanistan, and Patrick Mercer MP, who is the Conservative Party spokesman for homeland security and a very big supporter of the Armed Forces in his political work. I appreciate that the club doesn't want to be seen to be boasting about its charity work but I do wonder if it would be worth trying to set the record straight on this one, possibly even by trying to involve Patrick Mercer in the work we are doing with the Armed Forces, and to get some positive publicity for that. This may all blow over and be forgotten but I worry that, once a rag like the News of the World gets onto a story like this, it won't let go for a while.

^^^The word "curmudgeon" comes to mind...

I certainly would have picked Milner over Bentley, mainly because we know what we are getting with Milner and have even had a chance to see him in action in an earlier stage of his development - when he was bloody good and worked really hard. I think the jury is still just a little bit out on whether Bentley is going to show that consistent hard work and commitment to match his skills.

I think my position is I would be very unhappy if he stayed, for a number of reasons. However, it is looking increasingly likely that he will be with Villa next season, and feeling pretty humiliated by the way he has been cast off by Liverpool having plonked all his eggs in their basket, so we are going to have to get used to managing the non-departure of Barry as one of the issues for the manager and club to handle. How well we manage all that may well have a big impact on our overall performance.

I have been thinking about the - apparently now annual - Cristiano Ronaldo saga where he says he is desperate to leave Man U, Sir Alex catches up with him and has a word, then he says he's delighted to stay and gives 100%+ for Man U in the next season. So wanting to leave a club doesn't necessarily mean you can't give a committed performance for that club. The difference is that Barry is older and should be wiser. He hasn't said he would be more than happy to stay at Villa - the idea of staying has now been mentioned as a further raising of the stakes with Liverpool, to try to force them to take him. As things stand, there is nothing to suggest he wouldn't launch another escape attempt at the earliest opportunity. I think there would need to be a major change of attitude on Barry's behalf, one that really carries conviction, for me to want him to stay. And so far it just isn't happening.

Carson vs Friedel = 2008/9 better.

Right, count me in the "don't get it" group as well. :? BTW it's now 50.93% No to 49.07% Yes but still showing 50-49. How do they do that?

Lol, the "happy" ones have just edged ahead by 3 votes. Could this be linked to the fact that it is just after lunchtime?

Having been a Villa fan since 1961, and so having seen the fans' boycott of the late sixties, the slump to the old Division 3 in the early seventies, but also the climb back to the glory days of the early eighties, I have no hesitation in voting "yes". In my list of low points for Villa over the years, the end of the O'Leary/Ellis era, with its almost complete loss of direction, players' letters, etc., actually features quite high - probably as bad as the late sixties problems.. The renewal of enthusiasm, optimism, and skillful, attacking football since Lerner/MON came on the scene has been exceptional. Last season we saw glimpses of the sort of exciting and successful football that MON will bring to Villa if he is given time to do his job and build up the squad as he wants. Just get off his back and let him get on with it. Don't forget we need him more than he needs us.