NormandyVillan

One of the Montpellier people (not the chairman but someone sitting next to him) said they've agreed terms with two clubs for Belhanda and now it's up to the player to choose. When asked which clubs, he didn't answer directly but said "you more or less know...". So I guess the clubs concerned were whoever the French media were talking about yesterday. Was one of those Villa? Thanks for translating .... Mercato quoted al jazira and dynamo Kiev as the only two suitors left in the race. Yes, a little bit of research seems to confirm that the French media are assuming Belhanda has a choice between Al Jazira and Dynamo Kiev. The articles I saw also stated that Belhanda apparently is not keen on going to Ukraine, and that it's doubtful that he would want to go to play in an even weaker League at Al Jazira. Given his expressed wish to play in England, it sounds like Villa could have him if they wanted him and were willing/able to put up enough money.

One of the Montpellier people (not the chairman but someone sitting next to him) said they've agreed terms with two clubs for Belhanda and now it's up to the player to choose. When asked which clubs, he didn't answer directly but said "you more or less know...". So I guess the clubs concerned were whoever the French media were talking about yesterday. Was one of those Villa?

Welcome AVFCLion2013! I was interested to see that you cited the club’s name as one of the things that made it attractive to you. I’ve always thought that Aston Villa is a beautiful name, although I’ve never been in a position to compare it objectively with other football club names, because supporting Villa was “in the family” to begin with. This got me wondering what other club I would support if (hypothetically) I was going to choose a club solely on the basis of how good its name sounded. The best I can think of is Galatasaray, although I’m not quite sure why. Maybe I just like the sound of all those As... It wouldn’t be a bad choice I suppose. They are nicknamed “Aslanlar” (The Lions) and apparently hold the world record for the loudest ever recorded stadium roar, so that’s a couple of points in their favour. Does anyone else have any thoughts on this? What clubs in England / the world have the best-sounding names? Lokomotiv Plovdiv? NAC Breda? Hull City? I’m struggling to think of any that really capture the imagination...

Lost for words... I don’t understand all the derision from everyone about this. Let’s take a look at just a few of the things Honda has in common with Holman: Midfielder. Plays for a nation belonging to the Asian Football Confederation. Recently helped his country qualify for the World Cup. Name has two syllables. Name begins with “HO”. Name also contains the letters “N” and “A”. Height: 5’10” to 6’0 range. Sex: male. I’d say the word “uncanny” springs to mind here. I challenge anyone to name a player who has all these similarities to Holman.

Apparently his full official name is Antonio Manuel Luna Rodriguez, Luna being his father's surname and Rodriguez his mother's surname. For everyday purposes, Spaniards usually go by their first given name and their first (their father's) surname. So he's Antonio Luna. Shame - don't think we've ever had a single name player before - came so close with Juninho mind you. Single name players are considerably better than those with a conventional christian name and surname. We should have given some of our players Brazilian-style names to make the team more exciting under McLeish. Bulk and Hoof in defence, Lump up front...

Apparently his full official name is Antonio Manuel Luna Rodriguez, Luna being his father's surname and Rodriguez his mother's surname. For everyday purposes, Spaniards usually go by their first given name and their first (their father's) surname. So he's Antonio Luna.

Diplomatically put. Well, they did have to edit the original transcript a bit: “In Gabby Agbonlahor and Andi Weimann, for example, we have good players who have great speed and energy and a real love for playing for Villa. You can see this and you can even sometimes detect a look of mild satisfaction on Christian Benteke’s face when the fans celebrate his goals, even though he would clearly rather be earning a lot of money playing for Arsenal also see the strength and quality of Christian Benteke.”

Could also be in the running for Montpellier's Eunuchs Bell-Ender.

Sounds like Roberto Carlos is the sort of player Luna modules himself on.

"News coming from France suggest that Arsenal are preparing a bid for Montpellier midfielder Younes Belhanda" It wouldn't particularly surprise me if he ended up at Arsenal, but as grounds for locking the thread this looks a bit tenuous at this stage.

This is the dawning of the age of Helenius The age of Helenius Helenius! Helenius!

Thanks. So at around £750,000 per place, Villa will probably gain about £2.25 to 3 million (with a potential maximum of £4 million) if they can beat Wigan. As Wigan have nothing to lose or gain (they're finishing 18th whatever happens), would it be worth offering to slip them a bit of that money for not trying too hard?

So what’s at stake here? Barring absolute freak scores: If we lose: We finish 16th or 17th (more likely 16th) If we draw: We finish 12th to 17th (probably around 15th; 12th would require Man City to beat Norwich by 4 goals plus all other results going our way, so is very unlikely) If we win: We finish 11th to 15th (probably 12th or 13th) So by my reckoning there’s probably about three or four places at stake for us here, with a potential maximum of six places (11th if we win, 17th if we lose). Does anyone know how much money each place is worth?

I second that. But we should be in no doubts about the task facing our adopted team tonight. Plucky little Arsenal, trophyless for many seasons, take on the might of FA Cup winners Wigan at the time of year when they are at their most formidable: the annual relegation struggle. Never perhaps in football history has a team faced such a daunting challenge. However, I am confident that with 110% effort from each and every one of the players, and with the usual tremendous support for Arsenal from Villa fans in Internet forums, living rooms and bars all over the world, we can get the right result.

Wigan play better against 10 men Great insight. This is unusual. On the other hand, they can be rather poor and ineffective when they only have 9 men themselves. I noticed this in a game at Old Trafford a while ago.

That would be the preferred scenario and would make for relaxing viewing. If Arsenal take the lead, I expect them to go for more goals. This is a must-win and they will want to make sure it's won before the closing stages. Also, they still have a chance of getting third and an automatic place in the Champions League, and goals could be important for that. If Chelsea draw their last game at home to Everton (which would quite a typical result for Everton), Arsenal would need to win their last two games and improve their goal difference by 5. So a win by 4 goals against Wigan would give them the maximum chance of finishing third.

I don't know much about how bookies work out their odds, but the discrepancy seems logical to me: The odds quoted on Villa going down should reflect the probability of Wigan beating Arsenal multiplied by the probability (IF WIGAN BEAT ARSENAL) of WIgan beating Villa multiplied by the probability (IF WIGAN BEAT ARSENAL) of Spurs not beating Sunderland. I say "reflect" rather than "be" because the bookies would obviously quote odds a bit shorter than what they see as the real probability. The individual odds quoted now for the games concerned would reflect the probability of the results as considered now, and (in the case of the games on the final day) would take into account the fact that Wigan are probably going to be relegated tomorrow. I don't know if WIgan would be more likely to beat Villa in what would be more or less a dead rubber (WIgan 18th and relegated v. Villa already safe and just playing for League places) or in an important relegation decider. That's maybe debatable. But the probability of Spurs beating Sunderland would surely be higher if Sunderland are safe from relegation (as they probably will be) than if they are still in a relegation fight. Thus the odds on Villa being relegated are shorter than what you would work out from the odds on the individual events that would lead to it happening. I hope that makes sense.

Haha no way mate if it's 1-1 say arsenal are not gonna be thinking that. Arsenals only thoughts at this moment is beat Wigan and Newcastle and their getting champions league. I do worry what winger said that he wish arsenal had played at weekend that the break was unwelcomed but there's no way in their last prem league home game 2 points behind their nearest rivals that they will let Wigan win if it's drawing in the last few mins You're right of course that they won't deliberately let a goal in under any circumstances. But I can imagine the commentator picking up on what I've been talking about if Arsenal do let in a late winner. "Ironically, the situation at both ends of the table means that controversial last-gasp goal for Wigan might just prove to be a blessing in disguise for Arsenal..." None of us would be amused by the irony, of course.

I know Arsenal badly need to win against Wigan, and probably will, but has anyone considered the following curious fact about that game: If Arsenal are unable to win, from their point of view it’s probably BETTER FOR THEM TO LOSE THAN TO DRAW. How come? IF ARSENAL DRAW, they will be one point behind Spurs going into the last day. To qualify for the Champions League, they must try to win at Newcastle and hope Spurs fail to beat Sunderland. The problem with this is that, BECAUSE ARSENAL HAVE DRAWN, SUNDERLAND WILL BE ALREADY SAFE (barring an almost inconceivable 11-goal swing in goal difference between them and Wigan). So how much hope do Arsenal have that Spurs (chasing Champions League) will fail to beat Sunderland (already safe barring freak results)? Not much. Spurs winning by a goal or two against a team who (at most) just need to avoid losing about 8-0 would seem to be very likely. IF ARSENAL LOSE, they will be two points behind Spurs, but because of their better goal difference they can still finish above Spurs if they win their last game and Spurs fail to beat Sunderland. However, the big difference is that BECAUSE ARSENAL HAVE LOST, SUNDERLAND WILL BADLY NEED A POINT AT SPURS. A 3-way relegation fight will be on and Sunderland will have to pray for Villa to get a result at Wigan if they lose at Spurs. SPURS WOULD THUS HAVE A MUCH HARDER GAME. The only way a draw could turn out to be of any use to Arsenal would be if they then drew their last game and Spurs lost at home to Sunderland (who wouldn’t need anything), which seems rather unlikely So... if Arsenal are drawing with Wigan with seconds to go, and Wigan’s last desperate attack has ended in a free kick to Arsenal on their edge of their own penalty area, what do they do? Do they lump the ball forward with the referee preparing to blow the final whistle and virtually end their hopes, or do they put the ball in their own net to give themselves a bit more hope on the last day (thereby landing Sunderland and Villa in the do-do?). OK, I know that’s not a very likely scenario... But all the same, if the scores are level going into added time in a game that both teams are desperate to win, the fact that a draw is probably LESS THAN USELESS for Arsenal would make me fear the worst.

Slight exaggeration there. Those results got us 9th place and "saved" us from finishing 15th if we'd lost them both. We already had enough points to stay up after 33 games that season.

A lot of surprising results and a massive 13-goal swing in goal difference between Wigan and Stoke. The most "plausible" scenario would involve (among other things) Villa beating Chelsea but then getting thrashed by Wigan, so it would mean the season ending on a bit of a downer for us. Anyway, it's basically not going to happen. .

Why are some people saying they hope Norwich, Newcastle, Sunderland, etc. are relegated? This would almost certainly involve something bad for us: if we fail to beat Chelsea, Wigan staying up would at best mean Wigan beating Arsenal and thus causing us relegation stress until beating Wigan on the final day (but them still staying up on goal difference); it would most likely mean Wigan taking points off us. Even if we beat Chelsea (meaning we are safe), Wigan surviving would still very probably mean them beating us. The only "Newcastle/Norwich/Sunderland are relegated" scenario we can actually wish for is: * Villa beat Chelsea (we are finally mathematically safe). * Wigan win at Arsenal (makes no difference to us any more) * Villa win at Wigan, but Wigan survive on goal difference ahead of, say, Newcastle (preferably with Arsenal's fifth goal in the 94th minute sending Newcastle down despite Villa doing everything they could for them with a thumping win at Wigan: thus Geordies weep, Villa fans are quietly satisfied with their respectable 10th place finish at the end of a traumatic season, while plucky little Wigan wildly celebrate their 6-0 defeat). Now that would be an enjoyable scenario. But it's an extremely unlikely one (even without the big scores). Given that we should basically always want Villa to win, and by as many goals as possible, it's now hard to reconcile that with wanting any team other than Wigan to go down.

This will certainly be a big one for us if things go against us in the next two games (Wigan win tonight and Villa lose on Saturday). Southampton don't actually HAVE to win to avoid relegation (they have Stoke at home on the last day), but they will definitely want to win to be safe before that last day, or at least get a draw to be nearly safe. They are also as far as I can see a better side than Sunderland. They were the better team at Spurs last Saturday and unlucky to lose. A win for them would be great for us*. Sunderland needing to win at Spurs on the last day to relegate us would be a welcome safety net if we fail to do the business ourselves.

Not necessarily. If we lose both our games by a single goal and Newcastle draw both theirs, we will be tied with them on points AND goal difference. It would then come down to goals scored. We have currently scored one more goal than them, so for example: Two 1-1 draws for Newcastle and two 1-2 defeats for us means we finish above them. Two 1-1 draws for Newcastle and 0-1 and 1-2 defeats for us means we are tied on points, goal difference AND goals scored. In the second case, IF Wigan, Sunderland, Norwich and Southampton have all overtaken us, meaning we are tied for a relegation place, we will then have to PLAY OFF AGAINST NEWCASTLE! Now that would be fun...

You would have thought so, but the worrying thing is that if... Sunderland beat Stoke, Wigan beat Swansea, Stoke beat Spurs, Norwich beat WBA; Newcastle win at QPR; Southampton win or draw at Sunderland; Wigan win at Arsenal, Norwich win at Man City, Newcastle beat Arsenal, Southampton beat Stoke, Sunderland win at Spurs, Fulham get 3 points or more off Liverpool and Swansea, and Wigan beat Villa we could still be relegated on goal difference even if we beat Chelsea 8-0. I’m an absolute nervous wreck just thinking about how easily this could happen... Easily? Seriously? I reckon the odds could be as short as about 150,000 to 1. That's easily enough to be worried about.