Lerner's Driver

The only vague, probably entirety unfounded hope I am hanging on to here is that we have randomly managed to conjure one or two cosmic upsets at Anfield in the not too distant past, so who knows? Oh yeah, okay, I know.

Imagine scoring three goals!

Well done West Ham, I've no idea if they deserved it, but if they have beaten Chelsea, they probably do. They are showing the spirit and belief Villa are yet to to show, so currently, they deserve to stay up and we very much deserve to go down.

Do you think it is laughably wrong that Fat Sam knows how to build a team that gets results? His football may be ugly and he may be an arrogant twa*t, but I think his pragmatism is the one thing everyone accepts is true about him.

He's pragmatic and knows how to build a team that gets results. Admittedly, that is the limit of his capabilities, but the fact we clearly lack the basics in our current form, is the reason why people want him. Rodgers, although he has always been out of our reach, is the kind of manager who can be pragmatic and then adapt to a more ambitious style.

We've been getting heart transplants since the nineties. It's not a recipe for success.

We are so predictably inadequate it has stopped being painful now, the players have accepted their fate. They know they aren't good enough.

It'll happen half way through the second half, mark my words.

We don't look dangerous, but not do they, yet and for now we appear to have a better shape than we have for some time. Two up top gives them something to think about. Luis showing his natural ability now.

It was inevitable. He's a clinical striker. Ours aren't.

Booooo

You knew that was coming. We are a disgustingly shit team.

We are weeeeeeeaaaaaak

6/10, so better in the sense that we are at least trying to attack in this match, but we will probably pay for missing the chances we have created. Want to be proved wrong, but I can't help feeling that all too familiar sense of impending doom is likely to manifest in our defence at some point today.

Hello darkness my old friend, I've come to spend some time with you again.

Agreed, you can see Villa thinking when they have the ball. We were more instinctive and looked like we may still push on earlier in the season when there was less at stake, but too many mistakes and losses makes a team fragile, so they slow down because they are thinking more. Smith's shite about being unlucky doesn't wash either because for all our first half defensive resilience, you can't invite pressure for the whole match against a superior opponent as concentration will drop eventually while the brain is a muscle that also gets tired. We are not talented enough individually, Smith is struggling to set the team up to get results and all round, we are not a coherent outfit.

Same, I'm seriously considering not bothering with the rest of the season given the inevitability.

Sums Villa up this year. Spells of good disciplined defensive play, before going in front unexpectedly and then failing to capitalise on the advantage after being outplayed by quicker, stronger, more inventive opponents. We are basically just not good enough and at no stage have we looked like we deserve to be in this League. In a word, we are weak. At least we should win some games in the Championship next year. Spud is going to do is on Wednesday as well, you just know it.

I really want it to be true that when the first one goes in that his performance has deserved he then goes on a run. He's so likeable.

The guy has one good touch in him during any one move, but rarely anything more. All too often he briefly flatters to deceive. The number of times the ball bounces off him, he runs into trouble, or his pass is misplaced, tell a damning story of predictable poor end product. I'm afraid Anwar just isn't going to make it.

He's just as likely as anyone else to in that role!

I think we have benefited from a solid performance, a massive dollop of luck, the weirdness of no crowd and a more conscious/less instinctive footballing experience. As ever, such a shame Keinan didn't score because he was our man of the match. Our defence played well, but all of them have a critical mistake in them. Hope lives on, just about.

Are you doing a Piers Morgan?

That might be a slightly over emotional reaction.

Which was always a risk when you had to sign so many in a short space of time. End of circular debate.