villaglint

I think Guzan would be well worth keeping. However by all accounts he's on fair bit of cash (25k someone said?) which does seem a lot for someone to sit on bench. Heard Scottish people say good things about this guy so if he can be half decent and come in on threepence ha'penny - give us more wage money to spend on first team players then overall I'm in favour could be a good bit of "trading carefully". Of course he could be shite so who knows...

Has very good recovery pace and really looks a much more solid player than when he had a short run last season. He has the ability to offer us something going forward to which he is not really showing at the moment. He's just bedding into the team and first team squad and is (probably correctly) just keeping things solid. For the ressys though he has shown a few times the ability to take his man on and get good crosses or shots in.

Champions!! A ray of sunshine in a very grey season.

Didn't think he had the best game yesterday but he admitted as much himself. I was surprised he played to be honest because he really ran himself into the ground against Liverpool - he could barely walk when he left the pitch. For those saying he doesn't work hard watch that game. For me there is a terrific player in there but we aren't seeing it yet - earlier in season I thought he was great for a few games before the driving ban which has set him back. Right now he is trying too much and showing plenty of poor decision making. Needs the premier league experience before we see the best of him (which by the way goes for most of our young players - all of them are making errors which is why we are still not getting results despite showing far better desire). I think our best bet is to have him as a squad player, have him playing with some more experienced players who will hopefully come in during summer. In 2 years we might just see him become a proper first team player and hopefully a successful one.

Not saying i disagree but who on our team is thick as shit? Gabby mainly though the rest are thick in a footballing sense players like Bannan, Bent, Hutton etc.. They are "good" (excluding Hutton) at what they do but just don't have the brain to keep up with him. They are always in the wrong places and never on his wavelength.. Maybe they will improve the more they play with him, but some just don't get what he's trying to do. I actually think Weimann, Gardner and N'Zogbia are on his wavelength much of the time.. The link up play with Weimann yesterday proved it for me, but so many in our side just don't get him. I very much agree with the overall point that the game intelligence of our players is woefully lacking. I think your being harsh on Bannan though. Having seen him play a lot for reserves I can say he is a very clever player. He is trying too much right now and hasn't got the Premier league experience to show it yet. I hope he gets there but jury is out on that one for me. As for rest of them. Hutton - Poor football brain and often poor execution to boot. Warnock - Seems to know what he is supposed to be doing but is limited by his ability and tendency to do something massively stupid at least twice a game. Maybe 4/5 times a game when he is out of form. Herd - Isn't allowing his brain to get out of "make no mistakes" mode so who knows. Albrighton - His game intelligence is his worst trait and he has a lot of learning to do in this area. N'Zogbia - Actually has a pretty poor football brain in my opinion often tries to beat a man at wrong time (i.e. when if he does beat him he is just running into another one). Collins - Again his worst trait - often struggles to find a pass - gives it away more than he keeps us playing. Gabby - Very little thinking in what Gabby does - though it has improved over the years. Not to say these players don't have other attributes but the fact most of our first team is on this post is a large reason why we often struggle to string 5 passes together.

Gabby is not in best form for sure. However to say he is not interested is pure bollocks My view on him is that he is only a real threat when he is 100% fit and match sharp. At start of season after a good pre season we saw the best of him and I would say for the first 10-15 games he was by far and away our best player. I think he has struggled to get it back since his injury in mid season - wouldn't surprise me if he is still playing with some niggles now.

If no one else is going to say it I will. 1st half was the best I have seen him play for us. All our play went through him and though he weren't really able to create much that wasn't for his lack of trying. Faded a bit second half but as always the whole team went into defend only mode. I dream of the day when we will try to score a second after tacking the lead. Showed he has the physicality to play in a 442 as well - made a number of good tackles and interceptions. Quite exciting really cos if we can surround him with some other players with a football brain (ie Keane type players) then with SI in middle we might be able to string 10 passes together next season!

Yep another shocker for Alan - he's been better of late but if I was him I would be very worried about my place with the emergence of Lichaj

Great finish - put everything into the game - as with a few others was so knackered towards the end that he failed to make the most of his other big chance. But that will come with more first team football. Hoping, hoping he could be a great find for us.

Yep agree with all of that - Collins has been outstanding since Dunne has been injured. Not sure why but it seems to be the case

Fingers crossed he can really work on that step over to give him an option of going down the left. As other have said it doesn't matter if you cut back in - just cant do it every single time. Defender needs to be kept guessing at least a bit. I think its partly been symptomatic of his fragile confidence - just wanting to get any kind of cross in rather than work a decent position first.

Was pleased to see Marc do well when he came on. I've not been his biggest fan recently but happy to see him prove me wrong in this game. Ivanovic is exactly the type of defender he usually struggles against and he even brought out a new trick and a left foot cross of all things for his assist. Maybe there is a player in there. Just think its going to take time for us to get best out of him and we would be playing a very dangerous game if we are going to rely on him to supply goals for us in mean time.

This A few times he has looked better coming on as a different option rather than starting.

Because he wasn't - as said before he got involved a lot but his quality let him down every time.

Was pleased to see he was able to bring his form from reserves to big league. He has been playing really well for some time now and just needed his chance. For my money - he came in and did well and so has retention of the shirt. Surely that's how a squad is supposed to work. Otherwise how demotivating is it for the squad players if whatever they do they know they cant keep their place. Not as if Hutton has been pulling up trees for us anyway. If you ask me Lichaj did more in that game than Hutton has done in any this season

Tragic news Puts our season into perspective I think One thing I'll say is that the man is a hell of a fighter which will stand him in good sted

I think they were relying on big things from Delph this year. How else can you justify the lack of depth in CM this year? However it has not gone well for Fabian and as lots have suggested the jury is very much out on whether it ever will. For my part I had high hopes for him when he signed now with injuries and poor form my hopes are rapidly diminishing. My view is that if he makes it now it will be a big bonus because I don't have the expectations I once did.

Paying for potential, innit. He did quite well on loan at Tom Tomsk, has recently made the step up from the Russia U-21's to the full national side and he's not really spearheading the attack anyway. Spartak either use him just off Welliton's shoulder or as an attacking midfielder behind a front three of Ari, Welliton and Emenike. A target man who plays as an attacking midfielder ? Sounds an odd blend

Ok happy to agree to disagree - not a big issue. Also happy to agree that Hutton and Given are also at fault. But in my eyes it ends up with Stan being the only man who can put in a challenge on Gibbs and he is left flat footed. His effort at trying to stop the shot is disappointing to me and was symptomatic of the rest of his performance. Stan probably has more heart than the rest of them combined which is why it concerns me to see him playing like that. Actually it concerns me to see any Villa player playing like that. And I'm not trying to make a scapegoat of him either - most of the team were all over the place - this is just one chance that led to a goal but their running off the ball had our entire midfield and defence in ribbons.

These are my thoughts as well. He should win player of the season, just for his general consistency (always around the 7/10 mark). Saturday was possibly the first time I have seen him put in a really bad shift (which if mentioned above he was injured then understandable). Was so surprised to see Herd come off from holding midfield and Gardner put into that role. In my eyes it would have been better leaving Herd on, Gardner as the advanced midfielder and Petrov to go off. It even looked as if Petrov thought it would be him going off. Started to move towards the dugout when the board was produced, only to then see Herd's number appear. Hutton was the man marking Gibbs, he then lost Gibbs and Gibbs ran into our box and scored. Given should have saved it, but Gibbs was being tracked by Hutton and then he let him go. So Petrov gets a pass on that particular gripe although I though he was poor in the game. Nope sorry - watch it again and look at the effort Stan puts in to stop Gibbs getting his shot in - non existent. He did that quite a few times. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdJNRxiYHKs As I said overall I am a Stan fan. However it makes me angry that he has been allowed to play this shit. If he was injured then I feel sorry for him. But does that mean that Eck would rather play a clearly injured player than have two kids in centre of park? Surely this is taking the austerity too far?

So he went with Emile after all - not sure it was Ecks proudest moment. Anyway thought Weimann looked good again when he came on - deserves a start and a run of games before Bent comes back.

Nobody seems to have mentioned Petrov's performance on Saturday. Let me start by saying that broadly this season he has been one of our better players (admittedly not sayin much). He is experience is essential to our midfield and we miss him when he's not there. However his performance was really really bad on Sat. On at least 5 occasions I say him walking back towards our goal as the Arsenal midfield streamed past him. He was also walking when Gibbs got in for the first goal. For a centre mid that is inexcusable - Now Father Abraham said he saw him limping heavily after the game which would explain the performance but the fact is if he was injured what the **** was he doing on the pitch.

The arsenal game was the very essence of where Marc is right now. As others have said at least he got himself involved whereas Gabby was largely anonymous. We works really hard and gets himself into good situation which is why some have said he was our only threat and in some ways they are right to do so. Problem is though his quality when he gets himself into good situations is really not there. He looks like a kid who is playing above his standard. I think he is useful cover but if he's our starter we are in a world of trouble. Part of the reason we cant string five passes together is that we have Marc and Gabby on wing who are both headless chickens neither has the game intelligence to know when to attack the defender and when to keep ball.

I have tried and tried to not immediately slag Eck off but it is really difficult to do. My biggest gripe amongst many is that he seems to think we are incapable of getting a result against about half the teams in the league. Then we are in such bad form with so much pressure on getting results in the other games sometimes/often it doesn't happen. Eck for me is a bit like the signing of Heskey - you know it aint going to turn out well but you just have to sit and watch the fat arse for the remainder of his contract. Maybe Utd will take him as Sir Alex's successor after all he is the obvious choice. Our squad club is in a broadly equivalent situation to Everton but do you think they ever go into a game against the big boys thinking they cant get a result. Obviously Moyes is a much better manager but you dont have to be Mourinho to at least get your team to have a go.

Money or not this is embarrassing