Enda

Nah, this is wrong. The religion of the Arab world wasn't even founded "thousands of years ago", and Jews and Muslims mostly got on very well (notable exceptions aside) until after WWII. Throwing in a "Oh a Jew would never sell to an Arab"-type comment is off-topic, bigoted, and historically stupid. Stupid? Well I think they deserved to be called on it. But your point is fair enough, so I'll shut up about it.

You're both **** tools. Why am I a Tool? For thinking Jewish people are usually better with money? its true most of the time though. RL's religious beliefs have absolutely zero to do with AVFC. The performance and management of our club is embarrassing because we've made terrible choices that have us flirting with relegation. It's embarrassing that Bolton at home is the biggest game of the season for us. These have absolutely nothing to do with Randy's religion. Bringing religion into it is as stupid as bringing race into it.

You're both **** tools.

I'm needing to get to cork from dublin, i'm sure it's easy but what's the best cheapest way? Have to search the family roots..dad lived there most his growing up life, moved from dublin. Assuming you're going from Cork city, the best way is the Aircoach. It's about e20, doesn't stop at every third house so is fairly quick, and is comfortable. The train is about an hour faster but is twice the price unless you can get a good deal.

In case anyone is thinking of travelling across from England to the Chicago game, have a check at the prices from Dublin. I'm a poor student going across the Atlantic a couple of times a year, and I've always found Dublin cheaper than London or Frankfurt or Paris. And Aer Lingus have the nicest planes, too. (PS Expedia is yer only man.) scottb51 and usvilla - how do matches in America work? Will the Villa fans be in a certain section? Basically, am I better off buying tickets from AVFC than Ticketmaster?

Birmingham Mail I'm living in Michigan, so Chicago is a five-hour bus away. Definitely going to this.

Not half-bad for a kid who "literally can't run."

------------------Given---------------- Stevens--Dunne--Williams---Devine Coleman--------Clark----Carruthers -----------------Ireland---------------- ---------Drennan------Burke---------- Could happen. Some day.

Hi General, My new kit that I ordered off the official website arrived here in the States this morning. $72.50 including shipping. As noted by a few fans on the New Kit thread the shirts this year are a size larger than in previous years. These are both "Medium". It's the same with my Medium neon-blue kit from a couple of years back, others have reported the same thing relative to last year's kit. If I want to exchange my shirt for a smaller size - the size I thought I was getting based on previous AVFC shirts by Nike - I will have to pay another $15 in shipping (i.e. send shirt back to B6 AND pay for shipping out the exchange shirt.) I appreciate that this is not a huge issue for the Club but from my point of view this is pretty crappy. I buy the new kit almost every season and they're always Medium. This year Nike (or someone else) has gone and changed the sizes and now I'm out an extra $15 as a result of it. I would not have had this problem had I bought from a high-street store but I wanted to buy directly from Villa to give them the extra profit. This exchange policy really discourages fans from doing that. Could you look into sorting something out on the official site's exchange policy or, at least, ensure that size changes are clearly highlighted for future years please? Best, Enda

Around February I told myself I'd stop complaining once we stayed up. This season is easier to accept that way. I'm writing this season off.

Understand that nobody likes renewing their ST after a poor performance, but I have to completely disagree with the bolded bit. Do you remember what things were like with David O'Leary and Doug Ellis? Doug Ellis who chased two very good managers away from the club and was so tight our players feared we'd miss matches because our bus would break down. In contrast under Randy Lerner, off the top of my head, we've had: 1. The return of European football to Villa Park 2. Ashley Young, £9.6m 3. The restoration of some of the club's tradition with the mosaic and the Holte 4. Proper interaction with the fans 5. Sponsorship by acorns 6. James Milner, £12m 7. Stewart Downing, £12m 8. Darren Bent, £24m None of the above would have happened under Ellis. Fair enough we sold Milner but we wouldn't have signed him at all under Ellis. We've had a shit season, no question about it, but it's certainly not Randy Lerner's fault.

You're forgetting that it's not just Wigan below us. To go down, we'd also need Brum to beat Fulham and get a point at Spurs, and Blackburn to beat Man Utd but lose to Wolves (or something weird like that) and Blackpool to beat United as well. Not going to happen.

Apologies - I know this is going massively off topic but I don't understand why the IFA (who are the Northern Ireland Association - right?) would reject this proposal when it appears to readjust things in their favour? I imagine they realised that it a compromise with no benefit to them. About 50% of the population of the North feel Irish so might want to switch allegiances. FIFA offered the compromise that people from the south could play up there too. But approximately 0% of the south feel British so nobody would take the offer up.

Off-topic again here but BOF I don't think the current scenario is all that unfair on the North. Irish people are Irish; British people are British; it just happens that there's a mix of them in the North. So the Good Friday Agreement said "Right, if you want to be British you can have a British passport and if you want to be Irish you can have an Irish passport." Fair compromise, democratically endorsed. Nordies who feel Irish (and who object to claims that they're British) can play for ROI. Nordies who feel British (and who object to claims that they're Irish) can play for NI. I think that's a fairer outcome, particularly from the unionist stand-point, than the rugby scenario where nordie Brits can only play for Ireland.

Oh I don’t know. A quick trip to a club might be in order... Although I agree that a good stint at a top Championship club will do him good, we are lacking in the CM department and he will get games here if he can play like he did in the second half of tonight. I think you missed the ironing.

We could have done with the Fonz for the last 20 minutes.

FFS Marc.

Why? He thinks we are a 7th=12th place side. This must have been what he was expecting. Lost in translation and you know it, Trent. He didn't say we "belong" there. Give the man a **** chance.

Carlos Cuellar, not a full back.

Luke Young has made some incredible blocks today.

Delighted for Clark. Did himself and the Villa proud. Think it might be a little early to have him replacing Carlos or Collins just yet though. I fear that the likes of Drogba would tear him a new arse. Should definitely start in all cup/Europa matches though.

Agreed. Carew was unplayable today. A couple of wasted chances, which he of course should have converted, but overall he was immense. Did Heskey's job ten times better than Emily ever did. And that was with the ref giving him nothing, including a dead-on penalty when he hit the post.

Hiiiiiii Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!! Classic!

General, I am proud that Aston Villa has such an honourable history of showing compassion and a sense of charity to the wider community. I know of a young man who lives in Birmingham and things have not gone very well for him this past year. I don't want to get into all the details but it really is quite a sad story the way things have turned out. Would it be possible to organise for the first-team to all sign a home shirt and send it to: Mr. Craig Gardner St. Andrew's Stadium Birmingham B9 4RL I'm sure it would do him the world of good. Best, Enda

Yep, I've said in the middle of the thread to all the people who posted rubbish like "we just won at Old Trafford, we can't possibly discuss the past" that this thread isn't a MON bashing festival. I'm absolutely delighted with our form, with the last transfer window and that with Downing it looks like we're passing the ball more. But that does not mean that MON has never made a mistake. Nor does it mean we can't look back and learn from previous decisions. FWIW, I think it'd be much more negative/cynical to have made this thread during a bad run of form. Up the Villa.