AndyHowell

We should be happy with a point. That was a good West Ham team we were up about, solid, street wise and defended well especially when down to 10 men.

My worry is that we are easy to predict. We want to play on the break and haven't got enough skill and guile to break down defences that sit back — I thought that as well right at the end of last season.

El Gazi looks out of his depth to me and we seem to have a problem getting around the defence and to the byeline. We will simply not get enough goals out of Grealish and McGinn. Marvellous looks a better option than Luiz who did very little when he came on. Conor needs to be back in that midfield if we can get him in.

Wesley is discovering that he won't get a rest in the game and that he has to fight for 90 minutes. I think we will regret not getting in an extra forward and winger.

I'm not sure that we did spend that well in the summer! A lot fo work to do if we are not to look like Fulham by Christmas.

It is easy to underestimate any PL team that has been there for a while.

This will be a long and hard season. We need players to grow very quickly.

Arguably we should have drawn with Bournemouth and Palace and only have ourselves to blame.

I think he was unlucky but he should try and stay on his feet more.

1 hour ago, blandy said:

To me that would be extraordinarily unlikely, (but it's not impossible) . No one with an iota of sense of business savvy would invest any notable amout of money before ascertaining via DD the actual sate of the club (business). Mike Ashley bought Newcastle without doing due dilligence, I suppose, but that was monumnetally foolish. It would be even more foolish to invest in AVFC without having complete transparency of the financial state of the club, seeing the full ownership arrangements and being assured that Chinese financial opacity and complexity wouldn't see your money simply vanish. Even to agree to buy in prinicple, you'd want an agreed price, and again, to work out if any figure was acceptable or not, you'd need the full picture.

 

Business is business and this is the weirdest business of all. Loads of buyers seem to all be focussed on the eventual exploitation of individual TV right a la USA but which I doubt will ever happen — I guess the Sky investments makes a second best. An agent explained to me a few years ago that the business model was to buy a club and then see a return in your original investment over 7 years — the crash put a bit of a hold on that. I suspect most owners are much the same. Ironically, you could argue that Ashley has been a good owner of Newcastle — they re solvent, are back in the Premiership and have a top manager.  He reminds me a bit of Doug. Despite all of his faults Doug knew the score — the buck stopped with him and it he was a little conservative at times he knew the case.I remember talking to Doug in the close season before Leeds imploded. He said if Leeds didn't make the CHampion's League that year they were completely screwed. They didn't, they were and Doug was right!  I doubt Xia will be around for long.

1 hour ago, KHV said:

Xia is a fraud of a man IMO.

Gambled everything on getting promoted in two years and failed big time.

That is a distinct possibility and in many ways he is not much different to Lerner. There are always two major points of interest for people looking to buy these clubs. The first is the notion that TV rights may change and or keep accelerating madly. Secondly, in villa's case, there is always interest in the club's landholding and the idea of expanding a leisure operation towards the A38M — Xia was/is certainly interested in this as were previous consortia who looked at buy-in the Villa. Realistically, there are no 'good owners' out there but people looking for business opportunities. Xia gambled in the same way Bruce gambled with older and experienced players. If Xia can add stability then fair enough but it is a long haul back for us now and the club has to build for the future and accept this is a medium term project.

I guess the main issue is to focus on what changed in the second half as the first half was excellent.

Whelan tired which is not surprising given the amount of work had to do. We were a man short in midfield until the changes — should have been made earlier. Lansbury faded badly, especially after he went down. Bacon was very poor — he offers virtually nothing when we are having to chase the game. Bacuna would not be my first choice on the team sheet. 

We have an outstanding finisher in Hogan but seem to have problems finding him with the right, early, ball.

Still, it was the first game of the season. I'd like to see Bacuna replaced by Hourahane.

Since when did it make sense to play a youngster without a first team start a day after assigning?

Johnstone

Hutton, Chester, Terry and Taylor

Wheelan, Lansbury

Elmo, Lansbury, Houlehan, Green

Hogan

I suspect Bacuna will come in for Houlehan (a big season for him - I like him a lot but has to deliver from the off)

Resilience is a major problem. Our midfield has the beginnings of something really decent about it.  Aside from confidence at th back we have some more serious problems against decent opposition — Barnsley are decent opposition as the League Table shows.

Amardi. If I was he opposition manager I would tell my team to run at him all day. He's not a defender, is not quick enough and most importantly no strong enough. He also knows someone will take him in the summer. I can see why Taylor was signed but like last night there are times he will be injured.

Grealish. It is getting to the point where I don't think he is going to make it in the game. Sure he has skill and he can sometimes pick a great pass but he can't think on his feet and alter his game. If he can't play consistently he probably shouldn't be playing at all, at least not at the moment.

Kodj. An enigma. How can you criticise your amor goalscorer? He has a lot to learn, particularly about tam playing and awareness of his colleagues. As has been pointed out last night we dominated possession but we also created chances. We need strikers who know when not to be selfish.

Finally, we need penetration down the flanks. I'm not surprised Albert was back last night. And I reckon Green will soon be ahead of Grealish in the pecking order.

Bruce only now has his squad and I wouldn't mind betting he was hoping for a new goalkeeper.

I suspect we will end the season strongly without getting to play offs. He inherited a terrible mess and a pretty gutless bunch of professionals.

On 05/02/2017 at 17:08, VillanousOne said:

The first booking was pathetic though, he didn't hoof it away petulantly he literally just passed it forward to our player, I have seen the ball kicked away after the whistle has gone a thousand times without a booking.

We want a player that gets stuck in, the second tackle was reckless because of the booking but he is no doubt being coached to track back and tackle more, this time he got it all wrong.

I don't think his performances have been good enough, but I don't see what happened yesterday as a reflection on his youth and attitude, as it could have happened to any of our team.

 

Everybody knows you don't kick the ball away. He kicked the ball away. The ball didn't need to go anywhere else — it was in the right place.

He needs a good end to the season otherwise there will be a taking stock of talent and value!

It will take time for this team to get but we saw enough from the midfield to know that they are going to be a force. The thing I worry about is Bruce's comments about discipline that were not exclusively focussed on McCormack. Grealish worries me. Everyone knows not to kick the ball away at a free kick. we will look more balanced when Jedinack returns.

No play offs this year but this side can establish itself as a major force by the end of the season.

I'm sure he will want to hit the ground running but he will soon realise we have no midfield!

The problem with Big Sam is that he could well be banned from the game for a period. You can imagine us signing him and then 2 weeks later loosing him. well, I can imagine it anyway.

I suspect we need a good old fashioned, tried and tested English manager. I suspect that means Steve Bruce which I wouldn't mind too much.

3 hours ago, Stratvillan said:

Hi all, first post.

going for a narrow win, IF we play an extra midfielder. Though I rate both McCormack and Ayew, at the moment I think Ayew is hot and cold, and McCormack isn't fit enough. I'd even be tempted to play Amavi as the midfielder (if Jedinak isn't available), and move Grealish behind Gestede and either Ayew or McCormack.

This Ayew blowing hot and cold worries me a little. Can we really expect him and Grealish to thrive in the same team?  I'm not really convinced and in some ways not surprised that nobody has made a serious move for Ayew.

This team has been desperately short of organisers and leaders which is why the Jedinak signing is important, coupled with Elphick at the back.  From what I have seen this year our biggest challenge is getting quality balls into Gestede from wide positions.

I fear the potentially decent French players will leave s I suspect they will have options at home. For example, I can see Veretout being rather decent in good team.

there are few of them who I think will be up for the battles of the Championship.

Next year worried me profoundly. just who is itch is preparing for next year? Who is it scouting the players with attitude and a bit of skills? Who is it who will be searching of another manager?

Westwood is indeed a neat and tidy player. But he never appears against good teams. He is not somebody who takes games by the scruff of the neck. I would suggest the last three seasons suggest that he is not good enough for the top half of the table. Nice lad, never shirks responsibility but is what I would call a Norwich City type of player. He seems to have grown up with Butch Wilkins as his hero!  Since they have come together his sideways tendencies have grown and grown!

At this moment in time we need real authority in midfield.

I agree with this. He looks desperate to do well, runs for 90 minutes and has the potential to give defences a hard time.

To be honest, he doesn't look good enough in the central defensive position. And paired with Lescott is simply ridiculous.

Be careful when reading statements carefully crafted by PR and Press people. They mean very little in reality!

I suspect the club as at the point of sale. There are lots of rumours about an announcement on May 3rd.

To avoid relegation you might have considered sacking Lambert and team and bringing Sid in which would have got everyone buzzing and maybe secured a few more points. But, if Lerner is selling, he's probably happy to let the new owners deal with the compensation of a sacked management team. This way we get a bit of the Sid bounce, there are at least grounds to suspend the two and, well, we'll let time take care of Lambert ..

.. I might be wrong though!

Ultimately the Manager is in charge. This whole thing is looking quite bizarre. The idea that somehow the coaches are responsible for this disaster on their own is even more bizarre!

Don't know where people get the clean sheet idea from. I bet Carroll has been looking forward to this game all week!

I doubt we will ever see Dunne play a decent run of games for us ever again. We may not even see him play once!

If we stay up it will just be by a whisker. And then what next year? More of the same? Even fewer season tickets sold? The structure of the management of this club is all wrong and that is down to the owners. Do they have the imagination to really re-invent the club?

OUr prospects I fear are bleak!

Is Lambert better than the last two managers? I would like to think so but the league table would suggest otherwise. Lambert has had investment to put into the team, maybe not as much as we would like but he has bought for the future when I'm not sure he has that luxury.

I'm beginning to think that no manager would do well with this ownership. Nevertheless, we can't claim that Lambert is simply a victim of circumstances other than those that he has contributed to himself!

We might hope he is given a proper chance but I doubt he will. But I can't see Di Matteo or his like doing any better!