blandy

The best bit of VT, bar none. Scott's reserve reports. Lovely job.

That can't be it, Drat. I mean last season, the segregation was for the lower witton lane only - there were no away fans in the upper witton. This season there is more segregation. I reckon it must be something to do with either getting a few more people in the lower north, or maybe the boxes. It's a curiosity, though.

So the retail industry gets defrauded, but the measures which the Gov't want to take (not industry) are paid for by, er, me. Hmmm. And the insurance industry.... And telecoms.... And Banks (money laundering) And then there's the Gov't. The actual cost to the Gov't is nowhere near the equivalent of the cost to introduce the scheme. A tiny fraction. And then there's the costs to maintain the scheme and then there's the issue of whether it will actually work. whatever body put up that chart has hardly helped the case for ID cards. Especially when considering who's going to be paying.

Even accepting this to be the case, to reduce this, carrying your card would need to be compulsory. "papier bitte - arbeit macht frei"

On Rio COker, yes, the first booking was so soft, and so similar a mild tackle, missed, with no injury, intent to injure, or intent to foul even as many others in the game. It should never ever have been a booking. The second one was a clear yellow. So he was unlucky. BUT his record of bookings last season for West Ham, and this season, again, with us is appalling. Shamefully so. He is not learning. He commits stupid fouls, needless fouls. He says he is a mature leader type of player, one with a bit of intelligence about his game. Frankly it's rubbish. He's an idiot. Only an idiot would continue to utterly fail to improve his discipline. He MUST do something about it, as countless other players before him have. It's no use playing the hard man. Play the game instead you muppet. I thought Man U were at times superb, and for a while, the first 30 odd minutes we matched them - it was end to end, with both sides looking dangerous, but once they equalised, our lot looked they were waiting for half time, to be told what to do. Man U just kept at it. That 10 minutes where we lost the mental focus and concentration is what cost us. Not a poor ref, not cheating, just a lack of mental application and fortitude. United have better players in the majority of positions, but not all. Gabby and Ashley were outstanding, for example. Though we were tonked, there is both promise there and some serious areas to be addressed. It's clearly very much a team in progress, rather than anywhere near a finished article. I'm not downhearted by the result, or even the performance, which was part excellent, part rubbish. Ozzy looked to have improved a great deal since last season (as the reserve watchers have been saying), Barry looked a bit tired, unsurprisingly - he hasn't been rested from games, or missed games, like many of the Utd internationals have had the chance to do. Zat Knight and Craig Gardner both had some fairly catastrophic lapses, which cost us. In essence it was these lapses, together with Utd's excellence that meant we fell short. I'd wager that Curtis Davies will be in next game and Ozzy too.

serious brainskin - von südenfed

He's excelling in central midfield. When he made the England team under keggy, he was playing superbly in a back 3 for Villa. He was in a back 3, partly as a result of dropping back there in his second game, when Ugo got sent of against Arsenal. In that back 3 position, he again was relatively central, had the game in front of him and he was able to bring the ball forwards into midfield and use it well. The telly keep saying he is a "holding midfielder" - he isn't, and he isn't playing as such either for England or Villa. As you say, he's doing well because he makes the game look simple, does the simple things very well and his passing and reading of the game is outstanding. He's also confident.

tightwad! it took a while to download. you get a link sent to your e mail to click on to fetch it. took my slow internet maybe 15 mins to get it.

The quality is "OK" - it's a mp3, so not as good as a CD, VB. Started back again about 6 weeks ago Al, after 14 months off with my 'kin knackered ankle. Budgie is back in the UK, now, too.

£5.49 I figured that that was about right. They get more money than a band gets from a CD sale royalties, I pay less than for a CD, but then again, I get no actual CD, just a 160 kbps mp3. result!

The last "thing" I bought was a music download - Radiohead's new album. The last thing I paid for was football playing fees.

I thought Luke Moore was excellent yesterday. He held the ball up, linked with the midfield and apart from missing a chance from a cross early on, was pretty faultless. He just needs a goal, he played well.

scapegoating, by definition, can't be natural - surely using the evidence of your own eyes is natural. A scapegoat is Someone punished for the errors of others. Even what people percieve to be scapegoating - blaming just one person who they feel played particularly badly (which isn't "scapegoating"at all) is not by any means universally natural. For everyone who blames "just" their particular target, there are others who at worst say "OK he was poor, but it wasn't all down to him". The so called scapegoating that goes on here, is mostly, er, ill-judged ranting and frustration rather than any kind of rational analysis.

Dunno if that's directed at me (you replied in detail to my post, above), but I don't. He was entirely responsible for conceding the 3rd goal, and it was dumb, but he didn't mean to. It's a team game. The team let in 4, the team scored 4. Let's hope they learn from it. I have my own thoughts about Marlon, but would agree that the concentration on him, when there ws a whole lot to look at, looks like scapegoating.

I think, TRO, that what MON said in the paper, and what he actually thinks are, in this instance, not the same thing. Watching on the telly, during the game, I'm absolutely certain that MON felt like we did - we were not doing some of the simple things right. Now after the game, he can either say as much, knowing perhaps that his young side were already well depressed and to do so would make it worse, or alternatively, as he did, kind of brush off some aspects, stress some positives and put the "misfortune" down to "one of those things" - HE knows, we know, it wasn't really unavoidable. There was a lot we could and should have done better. The players know it too. To my amateur psychology at least, he did the right thing. I saw his interview, and uncharactersitically he commented on the ref as a main point. That's atypical. He knows full well what the cause was. He has to stop it, the players have to stop it. Part of that is the avoidance of "panic" - Spurs have that panic, and it's doing them no good, for example. So you're right, but on this occasion I think MO'N isn't in denial. Good point, though.

I diagree with a lot of the remarks made above, to be honest. Where I do agree is that our inability, collectively, to look after the ball was essentially the cause of our dropping some points. There was a lack of collective calmness or maturity in the team, that meant we were playing, at times, desperation football, rather than playing with the authority a big lead should have given us. Basically when a team is set up to play on the break, as we are, it is essential that when you get the ball, you don't just hoof it up the pitch as we did too often, but pass it to the players with pace and skill. I also agree with the comments about the substitutions having an adverse effect, but equally I can see why Luke went off. He'd worked hard, but was not much of a threat. I guess he needs a goal, having had a couple of good ones wrongly disallowed this season he's yet to get off the mark. The manager can't know that Harewood was going to be so utterly blunderingly stupid as he was. Taking Gardner off for Petrov, rather mystified me. Gardener was doing OK, and had a decent game - he did look after the ball - but he was already booked, so maybe that was why he came off? but then why move the also booked Reo-Coker out wide into Gardner's position? Although we let in 4 goals I don't blame either of the central defenders, or the goalkeeper who to me all played pretty well. The problem was that Spurs were allowed to get at them so many times, through our midfield and down their left. I think in the end you simply have to learn the lessons from the mistakes, accept that the result was fair, whatever order the goals came in, and move along. I don't think we should worry about it as a team. It was just a crazy game, in what's been a pretty unusual weekend for goalscoring.

I thought the ref was pretty pants in terms of not seeing a lot of foul play, and then blowing for innocuous stuff. Some things he did well, but he didn't seem quite at ease with the game, somehow. Not completely on top of the pace and power of it. There were a couple of verton tackles in particular that really should have been bookings. Villa were decent, Everton had possession but did now't with it and made a couple of mistakes. Decent day out again.

What do you prefer in Manc? Not having a go, just interested. Personally i prefer Liverpool to Manchester as a city and have never liked Manc at all Not answering for Risso, but as another (sort of) "both Cities" bod, I would say Manchester has a lot going for it. The centre of town is quite well contained, has been modernised very well. The pubs are, overall, better. The public transport is better, with the Trams. You can get a good curry in both places, IMO. Chinatown is better in Manchester, perhaps. Where Manchester falls short is that it is less "international" than Brum - it does seem more provincial (which doesn't have to be a bad thing). While they might try to claim (ridiculously) that they are the second City, they are more realistically the top Northern City (despite size). I like Liverpool a lot, another place with great pubs and culture, but it's kind of like an Island. It is "different". It's basically the underdog, and plays that part, whereas Manchester plays the Big "I am". The music scene is vibrant in both Manchester and Liverpool, more so perhaps than Brum. Basically all 3 places kind of reap what they sow. Brum for Donkeys years has been selling itself on it's central position and links with Europe, Manchester sells itself on boldness and Liverpool plays the plucky underdog with some serious virtues. Manchester's regeneration and distance from London are what it bases it's claim around - because of the distance, it has a media hub for the North, whereas Brum is too close to warrant a similar media thing. Manchester was also the birthplace of the co-operative movement, unions, standing up for the little man, and general reactionary forces for change. They're all great places, but only Brum has the Villa.

I feel it is very important that, as a matter of principle, there is no acceptance of the extortionate and abusive level of pricing that small heath intend. It is not a case of accepting the situation, and making some adjustment/subsidy for one game. It is WRONG and contemptible what small heath are trying to do, and must be opposed by the club, in my view. As said earlier, Albion stood up to the same thing last year. If they get away with it once, they will always do it.

She just called me and spent some time understanding the circs of my concern, explaining how things work, promising to get it sorted where necessary, to call me again once things are done and Generally being an all round Star. You'll not find a better customer focused manager anywhere.

I see no reason to change from MO'N.

Pasties, Chris

Quality reporting and it made me smile, too. You should be shortlisted for some sort of award - you seem to be at the height of your powers..

A comment about the ticket ofice - normally excellent, they seem to be having a few problems The cock up with the League cup tickets being charged against people who can't go (such as myself) was well dealt with. I got a letter explaining about the mistake before I even knew it had been made. So well done with that. For the away scheme, where you get tickets automatically billed and sent, I phoned up 2 weeks ago to cancel my Spurs ticket,( because I can't go to london from the North where I live and work, on a monday night,) and was told it was too late, as it had already been sent - just send the ticket back. It didn't turn up so last week I phoned again. Same story - it was "Sent" on 20th August. But ut wasn't. It came today, post marked 17th September on the envelope, with a slip saying last return date is the 21st. I've sent it straight back tonight, and hope to therefore meet the deadline for a refund, but it shouldn't be the case that I get no time to send it back, but the club takes 3 weeks plus to get it to the post box. Does that make sense? Basically, please could the time taken to sort out ticket dispatch be reduced, or the system better reflect real posting times. ie. There was almost a month where the club still had the ticket, but claimed it had been posted and so couldn't be stopped, which clearly wasn't true. thanks.

good to see he's now fully recovered from his kidnapping ordeal Pete! :winkold: That Michael Johnson's not a bad player for Citeh either. Yeah, yeah! I 'fess up, sorry. :oops: