MarkLillis

I think we have to accept it is a tough league and we only a mid table side in it. Of course we shouldn’t accept the poor performances which are putting us there...or should we because our job is to support through good and bad times? Is that the issue here? We have a poor squad of players and we know that performances aren’t going to be pretty...but yet we still get upset. so should we be upset or shouldn’t we? Its all too confusing

Interesting! I have always though of them as a provincial club that had occasional periods of success...but try voicing that opinion and most football fans will say how much of a big club they are!

There is still a lot of football left to play this season. But we have created a situation where we have to play like champions to get 6th place Whilst I wont rule out a change in form when our injury's start to clear up. I am now more interested in seeing some evidence of a more long term plan. I think this will Saturday will be interesting at Stoke because we go in without Jack Grealish or John McGinn. I wonder what the plan is?

The ONLY thing that will fix the problems is better results on the pitch. The fans can not get on the pitch and play so it has to come from Dean Smith and the players. I could go something like this..... 1.Players show commitment and small improvements to all round game but results are still bad =most fans will notice this and have some hope therefore a better atmosphere 2.The improved commitment and better performances mean slightly better results = even more fans notice the improvement and now fans have real hope and there is louder atmosphere with anticipation in the air. 3. Players are confident playing well and getting results - full houses,loud proud support and the kind of Nirvana that some fans in this thread think should be a given! Please tell me how else this can happen?

I was thinking about the treatment he got from us...the supporters!

We have got to tough this one out. I don’t know if Dean Smith is the man for the job,how can anybody yet? Of course it looks bad now and the fact that we have not reacted to the loss of Jack in any obvious(to me...) way has sown the first seeds of doubt in my mind. We should haves started to rebuild when we went down,now it’s upto Dean and I hope he’s not treated like Paul Lambert was!

I agree, he seems to be a very good judge of a player and how they fit into his team. Norwich are impressive as a whole, not sure about the same players if they were scattered around at different clubs though? This type of team building works well at the lower levels I think. In a similar way to Wagner at Huddersfield, the premier league may well be his undoing...

Yes agreed. But they replaced him with Emi Buendía I wonder how their season pans out if he was injured for 3 months?

11 minutes is more than enough time.....most players are written of before they kick a ball. Why should Tom be any different?

The question I’m trying to ask is why be so down in your own team? How do you enjoy the game when you have no hope before the start? As Villa fans we recently supported a side that was beaten before it started (2015) it was horrible....now we are in a lower division agreed but this team is far from hopeless. Despite your arguments to the contrary we have a very good chance of promotion along with around 10 other teams...some of whom have a better chance than us and some of whom don’t but there are 17 games left...so the facts are not decided!

Agree. Lets say in ten games time we could have gained 6 points on the top two.....never mind the top 6! We would be 6 points of automatic with 7 games to go....that's really not to much of a leap for the imagination is it? What I find hard is how easily people want to give up hope. Why does it happen? As football fans we cant influence anything so how much fun can you have without hope?

I'm going to look on the up side. We have two very good players coming back from injury in the next month. We have signed three new out field players if one of these turns out to be a success then I think the team will improved enough for a good run in. A very average Hull side went to the best side in this division and won whilst creating a run of 6 straight wins. There is absolutely NO reason why Villa cannot do the same at anytime.

He's a natural......ain't ya Tyrone?

So its a future fact..... That's not a fact now..... But could be a fact..... Just like a " we could win all our games and get 93 points" type fact?

As above. I agree with WakefieldVillan. Confidence is massive for a footballer and he has little to none at present! I always thought he would be like a Christmas present that was underwhelming at first then one day you start to use it and find out that it is very useful and well thought out gift. It’s a shame it hasn’t worked out for both Villa and Scott.

I always used to say that you can't blame the fans for a bad atmosphere. The players have to set the tone with an upbeat performance, and to a certain extent I still believe that. However some people don't even seem to be watching the games when the start moaning about a certain player or tsituation When the atmosphere is generated by a general feeling that....we should be playing 442 or that Whelan is playing crap (when neither point is actually valid) Then what can the players do to affect the situation?

Hence we were relegated in complete and utter disarray. But this discussion should be in another thread I guess

Really? The team that got relegated was one of the worst to grace the Premier League. Wheras Newcastle had a side that was poorly managed but full of quality.

How is it possible to enjoy your football with an outlook like that? Right up until we couldn’t mathematically catch Cardiff last year I was walking to my seat with hope. The lads around me thought it was funny but I did genuinely think we still had a chance,I was wrong as it turned out but it made it more enjoyable for me anyway!

Another supporter who uses that fact that we have been almost run into ground by poor management over the last ten years to validate how well their club is doing... Wouldn’t you much rather be unbeaten against us when we are in our usual position of top half Premier?

This is a great post. I really hope that we are embarking on own long term strategy. I can see that the majority of the clubs mentioned in your list were small-ish (with two obvious exceptions). I think any long term vision will have set backs along the way, progress will not be Linear. Smaller clubs fans seem to be more content with their lot and react better to setbacks. How on earth do we manage the expectations of our already dis-heartened support? We have already shown glimpses of what it may be like when it works which was great whilst it lasted. But the atmosphere just before Chester's goal on Saturday showed that the home support on mass are not ready to support a stumbling side finding their way....

The last bit I agree with. Winning one in 9 on a regular basis will get any Villa manager sacked.On a similar note it would most probably get any teams manager the heave ho... But clubs have plans though...none of them are running around like Sunday league clubs from week to week.So are we saying just because the manager is sacked the club that sacked him don’t have a long term vision?

This a very good summary of the situation right now!

Yes I have to agree. Never thought he was a bad player myself, but didn't really see much of him. Maybe Dean Smith isn't sure so he is actually going to watch him play in close quarters before he makes a call?

That would make sense. Losing the ball is an individual error. It should be taken personally. At the moment John McGinn is the only player who seems to take it personally......