Harry

Can we get Gollini back?

Best post of the night, laughed out loud.

$64m question. Is he now going to make sure we do that?

Utterly utterly dreadful display. As I said in the match thread I will cut the players a little slack because they have so little playing time together but having said that the individual performances were dire to a man. How come we drag decent players down to our level of abject shiteness? Added to that what was Bruce doing? Sign a decent midfield, we hope, so if plan A fails after 10 minutes we hoof it over them to a lone striker....pub team tactics IMO. As for Johnstone is goal? He makes Gollini look like Buffon. A complete liability.

He can't and won't.

I bet Hogan has just stuck his unsigned contract in the shredder at BMH, jumped in his car is heading for the motorway.

Bruce has had the backing big time this window. Now I accept that it takes time for a team to gel but its all basic schoolboy errors and poor judgement coupled with piss poor tactics. Things that should and desperately need to be addressed by the manager.

Come on mate this is VT. The decision has been made. The only issue is to now decide who the next Westwood is and give him dogs abuse for the next few years.

Defensive confidence starts with the keeper, who has none.....enough said.

Sad to say but how many times this season have we been outsmarted by a well organized bang average side?

Tush and no Westwood to blame. What will we do.

Just turned off as its another ground hog day. New midfield so we lump the ball over the top? FFS? Usual calamitous defending and a goalkeeper who is clearly worse than Gollini. Not signing someone experienced is going to cost us

Hmm... maybe but he also got a bit of the 'Westwood Treatment' on VT too. I won't name and shame but I have just pasted in one comment from his thread after Lowton left for Burnley: 'He cannot and never could defend at premier league level - he gets beaten too easily one on one and is all over the place in terms of positioning. And unlike say Bacuna, he hasn't got the physical attributes, in particular pace, to make up for it. I think he will do very well at Championship level, and good luck to him, but another one in an increasingly long list of players we have signed in recent years who simply cannot cut it in the Premier League.' I shall be interested to see how Westwood gets on.

Really top post Trent and a fair assessment of his time with us. The outrageous and frankly childish abuse he often received on this thread was never justified

Unless our on the pitch performances dramatically improve and we are back in the PL I can't see us needing a 61k stadium any time soon...sadly.

You re just showing your age. Mind you I can remember that game too.

Absolutely right. The club should help him as his employer as I hope they are. From a more selfish perspective they have an investment to protect.

Calm down mate. Last time I checked you were allowed to post your opinions on VT. Very strange response.

11 points off now. I have now given up hope. We are way too inconsistent.

Agreed but when do the facts prevent him from being the Villa fans pantomime villain?

Agreed - net effect was we had a raw kid on the bench as our only option.

Agreed - apparently (yet again) the opposition can just kick the sh*t our of our flair players with minimum sanction. Oh and completely ignore the linesman flagging for fouls

Just got back and what a game of two halves. At half time we should realistically been 4-0 up, we had ripped them apart. Second half we looked like a pub team and TBH we could have very easily lost. Once it was 2-2 it was the usual buttock clenching last 10 minutes as they always looked like they could nick it. Although we did put a few decent moves together second half we largely descended into the usual 'hit and hope' mode. Gabby to be fair worked his socks off and had a decent game as did Hutton going forward. Our biggest problem was that we really had no decent options on the bench, taking off Lansbury took all the bite out of midfield so that made matters worse. Ultimately we were punished for our very poor finishing in both halves.

Agreed he is not the long term solution but he does a job for us at this level. My biggest gripe is we seem to see him as an attacking outlet on the right which he is not. Sorting the midfield is way more important and we have an injured first choice RB who will return at some point but maybe not this season. I am actually more concerned about left back now that we are down to seemingly just Amavi.

You need to check the facts and stats mate. Amount of inward investment, ranking as a travel destination, choice of location to relocate too, actual regeneration, etc, etc. Birmingham blows Manchester away on every single one of them. The only thing Manchester has got is more successful football clubs whose fans largely have never been anywhere near Manchester. Oh and just for a bit of balance my Mum's family were all from Manchester but I am a proud Brummie born and bred.