AvonVillain

Come on Pep, bring on the even bigger guns...!

1 minute ago, BleedClaretAndBlue said:

Norwich didnt beat Arsenal

Hmmm, okay. Listening to 5Live, and it was said on there.

Ooh, like this stat: Arsenal have lost away at both the other promoted clubs this season!

There's no way Arsenal will want to go into the cup final on the back of 2 straight defeats...!

Apparently the Watford board, quite arrogantly (or correctly!?), think a point is all they'll need from the last 2 games. So yes, why not play for a point.

6 minutes ago, nick76 said:

It's a dump mate.  I'm born and bred Brummie, lived in different places around the city and it's a dive.  I've been lucky to travel throughout my life and have lived abroad and I only come back to Birmingham for my family, friends and the Villa.  The hamlets, villages and towns outside of Birmingham are fantastic but the city itself is a dump and as the years go by it is getting worse.

Similarly, I only go back to Birmingham for family, friends & Villa, but I disagree it's getting worse. Birmingham is one of the most forward-looking places in the world, and the new infrastructure of the trams and all around the new library etc., the rise of Digbeth as a national (even international) place of interest is really exciting to see.

42 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Until he faces us again, no doubt.

The likes of him, Gayle and Ings might as well form their own team to play practice matches again us.

Put them together with players who haven't scored a goal in years, and ex players and it will be one hell of a sessh.

Break Your Ducks FC

You're forgetting Shane Long.

15 minutes ago, TRO said:

Injuries are part and parcel of Pro football, its what managers have to deal with and plans have to be arranged around, they factor in, these troublesome events....they can all cite instances.

Take out a crucial part of your spine, and EVERY club suffers. In our case, it's the difference between finishing 15th/16th, or being relegated.

7 minutes ago, Rob182 said:

Considering the rebuild we had to undertake, with the limited money available, and the injuries to key players, I think we’ve done okay. Had we kept just one of McGinn, Heaton or Wesley then I think right now we’d be safe. Any team that loses 1 key player suffers, let alone 3.

I think it boarders upon the ridiculous to not consider these 3 injuries. Season changing. Smith gets a free pass from me because of this. To watch as he swaps two non-scoring strikers game after game is tortuous. Only Norwich have got a more pathetic attack, and just look at their point haul.

2 minutes ago, Rob182 said:

If at the start of the season I said that we would lose 3 important players from the spine of our strongest eleven for 1/2 of the season, and we’d be within touching distance of safety with 2 games to go... would you take that?

Yes.

If Watford manage to stay up this season, at our expense, then the board will be praised for acting decisively. Personally, I'm glad we've stuck with DS, regardless of what happens.

7 minutes ago, PieFacE said:

I just find your original point a really weird argument. I think everyone hoped for more than 34 points, but what everyone really wanted was to at least not get relegated. It doesn't matter if 34 points is a poor return, as long as it's enough to stay up. As already pointed out, 36 points is the average for surviving relegation in a "normal" season, and this season has been anything but normal with the introduction of VAR, COVID break, playing in empty stadiums, 5 sub rule,  water/tactical breaks etc...

... not an argument, just a point of view. That being that a 34 point return from 38 games is really, truly miserable. If it's good enough, and if we can do it, then great! I suppose a different way of looking at it is, is it really worth being as consistently horrible as we have been over the course of a season, merely to survive on the final day? Would you take the same outcome next season, and the one after that? Personally, I'd prefer to be back in the Championship rather than disgracing the PL like this. I'm almost embarrassed that we can be this awful, and still have a chance of survival.

39 minutes ago, PieFacE said:

But if 34 points is enough to finish 17th then I would have absolutely taken it. 

League position > Points accumulated 

I don't care if we stay up on 60 points or 25 points. It's all the same end result.

But, that's a moot point, and dare I say, a Dion Dublin-esque observation.

If we were offered to stay up at the start of the season would we take it?? Well, obviously... There isn't anything hypothetical about that. The point of the hypothetical "if you were offered X" is that you are gambling on an unknown outcome. So I think it's perfectly reasonable to state that any offer of a final point haul of 34 points over a 38 game season is a dreadful outcome. You would never take that gamble, but back the team to perform much better. I certainly would have at the start of the season.

Anyway, 34 points might still relegate us.

1 minute ago, DCJonah said:

36 is the average. 34 is hardly pathetic. 

I think if someone offered us 34 points to finish on at the start of the season, nobody would take it. It's a terrible return.

Just now, villalad21 said:

Have the bottom teams ever been this bad?

Surviving on 34 pts would be pathetic.

It would be pathetic. But it would also be the only bit of luck we've had all season!!

Just now, villalad21 said:

Yeah sure.

We are well capable in beating Arsenal 4-0  

1 - 0 would do it if Watford lose 3 - 0 to Man City.

Christ, just realised we could climb out of the bottom 3 by Tuesday night!

Watford sack Pearson! They are completely finished now. SURELY we can climb above them??

This has probably been said already, but, again, all we need is for Bournemouth not to win. Can't ask for more. So many results have gone our way since the resumption...

3 minutes ago, Reivax_Villa said:

We can’t be developing managers hoping that they will do well in their 3rd year.

Honestly mate, what on earth are you talking about? The same manager who took us out of the Championship at the first time of asking! Jesus.

4 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

poor teams with better squads than us, who didn't lose their first choice keeper and only proper striker halfway through the season. 

+ John McGinn. Dreadful luck for a newly promoted team to lose 3 key players for a large part of the season. With these 3, I would argue we would be comfortably mid-table, and all this Dean Smith talk would be much more positive.

Even after last night, or probably because of it, think I'm a bit more resigned to us going down now.

Can we really beat Arsenal? Even if we get a draw we're then looking at stopping West Ham scoring, whilst scoring at least 2 or more ourselves to take all the points. After all that improbability, we're now looking at Bournemouth who are in really good form not piling the pressure on and gaining more points than us from the final two.

In retrospect, I'm not certain we as a club, and us as fans, really believed we would be this bad or the season this tortuous. It seemed to only click that we were in a perilous position and perhaps we should play as a team during the last 5 games. I think the mentality of us being a bigger club than some of our direct rivals has probably been our biggest problem over the last 10 years.

The fact that we're still in with a chance of staying up after being as consistently poor as we've been casts doubt on the idea that the Premier League is a huge step up in quality from the Championship. Just look at how well Sheff. United have done simply by organising themselves properly over the course of a season. I can't remember a season where so many teams have looked so mediocre, and this perhaps points to the reason Liverpool walked the title, and another bitter pill to swallow. We couldn't stay up in perhaps the poorest Premier League since its inception.

18. Watford
19. Villa
20. Norwich

If we do somehow manage to take it to the final match on that fateful (hopefully) Sunday in 10 days time, imagine what it'll be like on these boards!?

Watford to lose next three. Bournemouth to draw next two. Villa to do what they've barely managed all season.

There's still hope, just.