GeordieVillan

I don't have a problem with what Benteke is saying or doing. His agent is an agent, he wants to push through the deal and get paid, and he also wants other clubs to know that Benteke would like to move to a bigger club. He also knows that is other clubs are interested, then its leverage to be used to get his client a big fat pay increase. If Benteke leaves for a bigger club (and I include Liverpool in that), then I don't begrudge him that. He could easily have left 2 years ago but he stayed and signed a new contract. We have had a terrible time since MON left, I really don't see how we can expect to keep hold of our best players, especially when we lost Young and Milner when we were actually a top six team. We need to accept that we are a Southampton or a Swansea, maybe even a Spurs - our best players will leave and we will hopefully invest and still remain at the same level. I actually think we will be ok if Benteke leaves, I think we will invest in the squad and we will finish top half next season. I also don't think its nailed on that Benteke will leave this summer - it may be that no-one is prepared to match the release clause and he signs a new contract, or he keeps his existing contract and runs it down, in the knowledge that we will be under pressure to sell at Xmas or next summer.

He says the right things for me, and he tries to do the right things. I'm still behind him 100%.

I reckon he has decided to sell Benteke to fund his new acquisitions. This is why he mentioned the release clause. The timing wasn't great, but the announcement itself was deliberate. It has got the press taking about it and alerted clubs to his availability and price. I suspect that Randy will give Tim £10-15m, and Tim wants to top this up by selling Benteke and as many of the others that he doesn't want as possible. That will give him a £50m kitty at least. How far that will go, I'm not sure.

Adebayor is in his 30s now so a lot older than Benteke and blimey just look at his recent facebook posts, the bloke is in no sane state to play football at this moment. Don't touch him with a bargepole please Tim. I'm not saying he's my first choice, but I suspect if we can get him for £5m, and he can do a job for a couple of seasons, then he's the kind of player we will be be looking at. Likewise, we will probably be in for Ricky Lambert. Regardless of Benteke staying or not. Ricky Lambert looked good at Southampton but he's another in his 30s and the edge has gone off his game at Liverpool, we've signed plenty of players in recent years who've hardly played for a top 4 club and done nothing for us. I'd just go for Charlie Austin, yes he dosen't have Benteke's star quality, who does that we can realistically get but the boy scores goals. Think he could do a similar job to Dublin after Yorke left and we'll need all the goals we get next season if Benteke isn't there anymore. He's probably attainable in terms of none of the big boys being interested in him. Ings is being linked with Spurs and Liverpool, but no-one is being linked with Austin. I reckon £15m would do it, and QPR will most likely have to cash in. It would be great to get Austin and not have to sell Benteke though. Regarding Lambert and Adebayor - it will be interesting to see what Sherwood's policy is in the transfer market. Is he just going to go for young and hungry players who he can drill the winning mentality into (he has alluded to the losing mentality which we currently have), or will he be going for experience. Dont forget that Dublin was no spring chicken when we signed him - I believe he was 29 and turned 30 not long after.

If we have £30m already to spend, then obviously I would rather keep him and then spend the £30m elsewhere. If we have minimal funds, as has been the case previously, then I probably agree with you, if we can sell him for £32m and we have all of those funds available to spend, then are probably at the point where we should do it. If the latter though, I would rather we brought some of the new players in first though, because once we have £30m burning a hole in our pockets, we will end up paying inflated prices.

TBF - he would only win that header against Richardson because he's not a proper fullback. He wouldn't have beaten any of our other 3 defenders today, and I don't think he would have beaten e.g. Cissohko.

Gil? Has he been on VT? Otherwise, who's he on about? I think he might mean Gil. I also think Sinclair. Other than that, not sure who he is referring to. In general, I don't think he wants our width to always be provided by the full backs, but he hasn't really had a choice as we don't really have any genuine wide players. We've been playing Grealish and Nzogbia as no.10s as part of Xmas tree formation.

You should go back and look at the stats for how well JJ did for us. He scored a decent amount of goals, certainly more than Gabby. Obviously he wasn't the same class as Yorke, but unfortunately the sliding scale we are on is that when he lose one of our best players, we don't replace them with someone better.

Adebayor is in his 30s now so a lot older than Benteke and blimey just look at his recent facebook posts, the bloke is in no sane state to play football at this moment. Don't touch him with a bargepole please Tim. I'm not saying he's my first choice, but I suspect if we can get him for £5m, and he can do a job for a couple of seasons, then he's the kind of player we will be be looking at. Likewise, we will probably be in for Ricky Lambert. Regardless of Benteke staying or not.

I reckon he will be a squad player next season. If don't replace Benteke though, then the team will probably be built around him.

FWIW, I reckon if we sign Adebayor, which we might, then he will probably be as consistent as Benteke is. I love CB, but he is a purple patch player, like many strikers. We will not get anyone better than him, but we might be able to get close to him.

This. He's carried us at times but we need to build for life without him. What if he gets injured and we don't have as we did for much of the last 2 seasons. If we have any money, lets buy Austin - I don't see any of the big boys going for him. If we then sell Benteke, at least we already have someone ready to take up the mantle.

Exactly. It always happens. Yes N'Zogbia was awful, but so was Delph, Cleverly, Grealish, etc. N'Zogbia actually made a great run which if Hutton saw would have resulted in a break away. This. Our entire midfield were very poor today. Delph and Grealish looked slow and off the pace. Cleverly reverted back to the player he was earlier in the season. The only one who comes out of the game with any credit is Richardson, who has shown in the last couple of months that he can play a part moving forward, even if only as a backup.

On the second goal, it was a great strike. But, I think a bigger goalkeeper might have had a better chance of saving it. Given is very short for a goalkeeper, and sometimes this counts against him. Regardless, he made some good saves today and he is not really culpable for the result. I don't expect him or Guzan to be first choice next season.

Not sure what has happened since the Southampton game, other than maybe our fragile confidence took a beating. The players reverted to Lambert style - Benteke isolated and our play was slow one dimensional. The last 3 performances have been so so different from the dynamic play we have seem in the games previous, and I can't believe that the manager has instructed that change of style. Maybe the long season of struggle has caught up with the players. Noticeable, Delph and Cleverly havn't been driving into the box as they were before Saints away. In hindsight, perhaps he should have started with Gabby, as he seemed have an injection of pace when he came on. But when he picked the team, I thought he'd made the right selections, even by including by Hutton and being slightly more conservative. I don't blame Tim, he went with the right intentions - of trying to take the game to Arsenal, but we were caught horribly short, and this is definitely worse than our 2 previous cup final defeats. Despite this though, I still think the future is bright under Tim - a smash and grab victory today (or a victory similar to the semi-final) might have papered over some cracks and let to under investment in the Summer. I don't think Tim is now in any doubt as to the task in front of him and the changes required. As he has said previously, we are a horribly unbalanced squad. From today's team, I suspect Tim will keep looking to keep Benteke, Delph, Cleverly, Grealish (and Gabby and Sinclair from the subs). Add to that Clark and Baker. Everyone else I think is up for grabs. Richardson probably had his best game for us, but I suspect that Tim has been playing midfielders at fullback out of necessity rather than desire, and I would be surprised if he continued with it next season, regardless of Bacuna's attacking contribution. Fair play to him - he handled his post match interview well again. Regardless of his managerial skills, he is still very much a likeable manager, and that will stand him in good stead for the obvious rollercoaster ahead. Keep the faith Tim, you've earned yourself a summer and at least until Xmas to show us what you can do.

A bad start to the day but its turned out alright! Tim has done his job and kept us up - a job which many people didn't think he would be capable of. Ignoring today's result and performance, he's given the club a new enthusiasm and vigour, and he's made us more entertaining to watch. He's also improved the form at Villa Park, and that was massively important. A win against Burnley will give us some confidence for the cup final, and we go into that game with no expectation, as we did against Liverpool. His big decision now is Given or Guzan.

Can you give a brief recap? They almost never show post-match interviews here. First half was the only bad performance since he has taken over One bad 45 mins in the last couple of months isn't too bad in the grand scheme of things, but it was very poor He doesn't need to tell the players they were poor today, they know themselves We need to win next and need to win the cup final We feel sorry for the fans and have let them down today It is not just the defence to blame, the blame is shared between all the players and the manager - we are in this together. (not word for word)

I don't blame the manager today - the players weren't at the races. Sloppy, lazy and slow, and full of mistakes all over the field. Hopefully just tiredness from previous weeks where they havn't given a bad performance in a long time. Hull lose today, and this could be the result that wakes us up and gets us ready for the cup final.

The tactics were the same as previous games - the players have been playing out of their skins for the last 10 games, but today they looked tired and jaded. It was the players today, not the manager. Vlaar and Okore were terrible, they got bullied and look like amateurs. The midfield were sloppy and looked slow. Benteke didn't get involved in the game as he has previously. Going forward, we were just lumping it long to Benteke - none of the incisive passing from previous weeks. We slipped back into Lambert style, sideways passing, no movement. Hopefully Hull lose today and then it doesn't matter. Tim can then give everyone a free run at Burnley with no pressure, and he could literally pick any combination of players - today's game means no-one has a guaranteed place in the team (other than Benteke). Just saw Tim's interview on BT Sport - I think he handled it very well.

No way were West Brom out of it. If they lose today, and then against Newcastle next week, other results could pull them back into it.

Chris Brunt. This relegation battle is unreal. Come on United.

To be fair, we were a very good team under MON. Regardless of "style". We were a team that was never going any higher than it was because of management. Simple as that. Give me the kind of football we're seeing now with an unknown finishing position over MON football and 6th every season any day. One has a very clear ceiling, the other doesn't I know what you mean, and agree to an extent. While we were very direct under MON (and still entertaining), Sherwood has us mixing our play alot more - direct, passing through the middle, on the wings - and its great to watch. I just think that we, like most football fans, are unrealistic. We had it great under MON, and we wanted more. Look at Newcastle and Pardew - they wanted him out so badly, and now look whats happened. We've had bad times in recent years, but I have great memories of the MON years. Sherwood has us playing very well, but assuming we stay up, people's expectations next year should take into account how we have done in the past 5 years!

If he signs a new contract, it will be a massive statement for us. He could easily go play (be back up at least) for a top team inc. Man Utd, Arsenal, Chelsea. If we can keep him, and Cleverly, and Benteke (for one more year at least), and having already kept Delph, it will show the players believe we are going in the right direction.

I like that he's a Villa lad. It gives me confidence that if/when he realises his potential, that we will to spend a decent period of time playing for us, even if the big boys come calling.

To be fair, we were a very good team under MON. Regardless of "style".