MarkLillis

We have to make a particular way of traveling to and from VIlla Park so obviously easier that much less people choose other ways.

Extra carriages at trains stopping at both stations seems a no brainer but I’m sure there are reasons why it’s not done.

Buses to town that can use a match day route which maybe is unavailable to other traffic (like bus lane) for an hour after the match.

A specific walking route to down that is clearly signposted and maybe stewarded (overkill maybe)

4 hours ago, imavillan said:

one of the things with the trains from both Witton and Aston is as easy as clicking your fingers to fix.

At match times the trains that are scheduled to pass through both stations and take fans away/back home.....

put more carriages on the trains !!!!

Bingo, everybody gets on the same train, job done.

I have never understood why this can’t be done.

1 hour ago, The Fun Factory said:

Well if you judge it like that then Leceister, Portsmouth, and Wigan are bigger clubs than us.

Since 1910

Wigan - one FA Cup = 1

Portsmouth - two leagues two Fa Cups = 4

Leicester - Three league cups one FA cup and one Premier League = 5

Aston Villa - one league title one FA Cup five league cups = 7

…and of course 1982

if we can’t get it right how can we expect the media to bother?

2 hours ago, Hank Scorpio said:

Facts. And I have no idea what it's based on. We haven't won **** all for nearly 30 years. And have been shit for most of it.

Any big city club with a large fans base thinks they "should" be winning things. Examples below

Newcastle

Everton

Villa

Spurs

Even Wolves ffs and they've only recovered over the last 5 years or so.

The tin pot clubs know who they are and are very grateful when they are in a run of form and accept more readily when it goes away

Brentford 

Brighton

Luton

Forest (borderline with these guys as i think they might have a few fans who still live in the 1970/80s similar to us)

Palace

They really don't like this......

"Get yower oowon academy yow vile b@stards"

16 hours ago, nick76 said:

A number of people I know who never leave early did leave at the 90th minute because the M6 Southbound was going to be closed at 11pm as per the announcements which would affect their journey home quite a lot if they got caught out.

There was also an overtime ban for trains staff which caused later trains especially to be cancelled.

Now whilst i would of definitely stayed and got an Uber home if we were pressing at the end, by 85mins it was clear that there was only one winner.

Villa Park is notoriously bad to travel to/from - combine bad result/motorway problems/train problems/and stupidly late kick off times and you get empty seats at the end.

In fact you may well of seen similar scenes if we were winning comfortably at 85mins.

This is the truth.

With the exception of a couple of duds (and even they had their moments) we’ve been signing good players for years.

unlike previous regimes

I feel completely relaxed about our signings.

2 hours ago, est1874 said:

Are we that short-term that we decide to pay £13.5m more than we could have 6 months ago based on a handful of good performances

No I don’t think we are.

The extra add ons will only be paid after his performances have more than paid us back.

Some of the £7.5m is payback to Citeh for his original cheap fee in the summer when he moved to Boro.

Finally Boro have to make some profit over and above the £1.5m they paid for him.

if you look at it like that it’s a great deal….one we have to make.

Small risk big upside 

1 hour ago, AvonVillain said:

If Aston Villa were forced to sell Jacob Ramsey for some BS FFP abomination, I would step away from football for a while.

Any decision this version of Aston Villa make will not be forced.

4 minutes ago, tinker said:

When did we announce we have to sell players? 

Nowhere,but there is some speculation in the media that we may have too.

Hence the conversation 

The profit and sustainability rules mean all clubs are sell to buy.Some just have higher bar and are able to operate at a higher level.

Even without the rules you would suggest that most clubs would still be sell to buy as it’s always been.

We sold Jack and others to get where we are now.

Just like the sale of  Andy Gray funded the purchase of Peter Withe..

Sell to buy is a common sense way to run a football club but in this crazy age of state ownership it has to be enforced.

If I was in charge of the club I wouldn’t have sacked Dean Smith……ever.

The consequences of that are obvious.

P.S I was a big fan of Lambert and he wouldn’t have gone either.

44 minutes ago, Delphinho123 said:

It is what it is. I don’t doubt we’re doing well in the league but if we continue our current form, we’ll drop away significantly. We’ve been poor since the 15th minute of the Arsenal match. 

Whilst I don’t disagree with the general message here i personally don’t like use of the poor.

Aston Villa are not a “poor” team and neither have the performances been since the 15th minute of the Arsenal game either.

Whilst we haven’t performed to our potential we have clearly been missing important cogs in our team.

Poor!

Please say it again and then compare some of the performances that have been genuinely poor in our recent history.

3 hours ago, bobzy said:

If we’re calling that cheating then every single slight advantage taken on a football pitch (taking a throw in from a different position to where the ball goes out, going down when there’s contact if you’re able to stay up, moving the ball forward when taking a free kick in your own half, the defensive wall stealing a yard or so by shuffling forward) is cheating. If that’s your view, then cool. Players cheat multiple times in every game. 

Cheating is a bit strong I agree….however the effort he’s goes to to cover it up is dare I say unprecedented.

I don’t think I’ve seen a player do that before.

Its sort of against the grain don’t you think?

42 minutes ago, Leeroy said:

Meanwhile Morgan Rogers has 2 goals in 25 Championship games 

There’s a quite intriguing theory that promising young players can be coached to become very good players.

I wonder if this is part of our plan?

“It all started with the lunge into Martinez's chest early on.”

It did.

I noticed the narrative from the pundits was a very dated response.

Basically describing it as Emis fault for playing out from the back,almost like he deserved to get kicked for doing it.He then played a short pass out to Bouba with the resulting freekick which was met by cries of “he’s done it again!”

The way football strategy has developed  has left many people in football behind and I wonder if the ref on Sunday was one of them….

Did he think we deserved to get kicked for playing risky tippy tippy football?

48 minutes ago, duke313 said:

I love how everyone thinks Spurs, United, Newcastle are going to all go on big unbeaten winning runs, but think we aren't or couldn't 

We are Villa fans with burnt fingers.

I like watching Spurs.

There I’ve said it.

Not as much as I like watching Villa but still…..

3 hours ago, villarule123 said:

If they've broken the rules again, they should get the same or a bigger punishment as they did before. 

I have a feeling it will pan out like this:

They will get another points deduction.

The blue half of Merseyside will go into meltdown and loads of others in football too.

The appeal tribunal will conveniently award them back the points they lost in  the first deduction.

It will feel a little like a win and the fallout from the second deduction won’t be as bad.

1 minute ago, Stevo985 said:

We’re in the title race by definition. 
 

That’s not the same as thinking we’ll actually win it

If pundits want to talk about a title race in January then yes we are in it.Although they only reason they actually mention us in the conversation is to rule us out!

However the title race doesn’t really begin until the last six matches.

Unai knows this hence his “come back in week 32” remark.

15 hours ago, oishiiniku_uk said:

I think the fans still like him a lot - he's pretty much a 1 in 2 striker when fit. But he's made of glass. And Isak is unreliable too. And both are getting more injuries than normal due to Newcastle's playing style. So they need someone like Solanke, but not sure that FFP will allow them to spend in Jan. 

I think Wilson is a good player when fit.

However attitude wise he seems to be living in a Sunday morning football world of aggression and banter.

If you are going to talk the talk I guess you have to walk the walk….

For more than half a season at a time anyway.

Just now, Jas10 said:

I just don’t envisage us chasing players like this and wasting time and money like that…

I don't know what his fitness levels are or his form.

However a fully fit Zaha playing well for 6 months is a no brainer to me

Always liked Zaha apart from when he was playing against us.

The type of player that's hated by the opposition. 

I would like this move but am aware its highly unlikely.

17 minutes ago, The_Steve said:

We are an international club with fan chapters in various countries, we live in a multicultural country and Birmingham is multicultural also - why single out Chinese and African fans like that? Everyone is welcome to support us. 

Although I did single them out it was not the intention of the post.

The intention of the post was to point out the type of things that happen when a club becomes successful in what is a globally era.

I don’t suggest anywhere that new fans are not welcome.

It will be different to what we have been used too if we become successful in the way we assume that the club wants to be.

20 minutes ago, Captain_Townsend said:

We already have a global fan base. I am not British and many others here aren't either.

I understand this.