Soobax

But we are in progress, some lovely passages of play, not just in the first thirty minutes, some clever ideas and some organised defending for the most part, especially as it was a new look back four gelling.

That's how I feel too. It's a work in progress, so not too bothered about the loss first game of the season as we need time to get into Lamberts system. It's more the games after the transfer window that I would be worried about.

Not very optimistic either. The best bet we have is with Lichaj at left-back and would possibly even bring Herd in to add a bit of bite to the midfield as Gibson/Neville/Feilani dominated the Man Utd midfield yesterday. Delph/KEA/Ireland is a little too weak.

If the players perform like that every week McLeish can stay.

He only ended up with this side due to injuries. He has had these players all season and not managed to sort it out.

I agree with that. It would have been interesting to see if he brought Collins back in the side over Cuellar for the Stoke game, had Hutton not got himself sent off. He will inevitably bring Collins back for that one then, and switch Cuellar to the right side, which may actually work anyway considering we would need a bit of height to deal with Stoke's set-pieces (probably won't make the blindest bit of difference knowing our record with them this season though).

McLeish needs to realise Albrighton and N'Zogbia as our two first choice wingers as well, now they've both proven themselves in the first team.

It was desperatley unlucky to leave that game without one point, let alone three, as our performance deserved much better than that. Yet it all falls down to a set piece again, which is shocking to concede at the best of times, but especially against a midget like Benayoun and a team like Arsenal who aren't exactly renowned for their corner taking.

I was so thankful hearing that Collins was out of this game before hand, and Heskey as well, as it allowed the three players I've wanted to see in the Villa starting team all season (Cuellar, Clark & Ireland) get a chance in the team. If tonight proved one thing it is that Collins should finally leave us as Dunne was a beast without him and Cuellar played a neat game as well, while Ireland if fit can play the position behind the striker perfectly. Clark did well and was a tad unlucky with the penalty I thought if a bit naive, but on the whole we were great.

I'm still having error messages whenever I attempt to connect to free roam online, which bugs me alot since the multiplayer mode was one of the main selling points of the game. Single player is good, though, although again it's frustrated me at times as I lost a hell of a lot of data from it for some reason and has to re-do seven or eight missions.

Galaxy chocolate has a nicer taste, but you can't beat Nestle's Yorkie bar or Cadbury's Bournville either! Classics.

Avatar is by far the best film of 2009.

The only other two worthy of being on a list are Public Enemies and Area 51.

I don't really know what to say about that game. Looked like being a 0-0 throughout the entirity, then they get two pieces of absolute luck for the goal 1] when Warnock slips over and 2] when the clearence bounces of 3 Villa players and into the path of Torres. What a poor way to end the year.

As far as ratings are concerned I would go with

Friedel - 7

Warnock - 7

Dunne - 8

Cuelar - 6

Young - 7

Downing - 5

Petrov - 6

NRC - 6

Milner - 7

Carew - 7

Gabby - 8

To be fair, Arsenal didn't need to do an awful lot to beat us. I'd hardly say we were outclassed, they weren't at their best either and we could have even snatched it had Milner not gave the ball away for the second which was always going to be the important goal.

Young pissed me off, he seemed to have cut out his, lets call it 'going down easily' over the past couple of months, however that dive today was embarrasing and cringeworthy coming from a Villa player and a stupid, albeit deserved booking picked up which now keeps him out the Liverpool game, fking cut it out Ash

Ash was crap all game. The frustration kind of got to him, but that dive just summed up our day really.

I agree with the NRC call. The midfield should line up as Dowing - Petrov - NRC - Milner, although I have a horrible feeling we'll see Heskey on the left wing. :|

Gabby, just one of those days, nothing seemed to fall for him. Not gonna have a go at him, it was just not a good day at the office

I actually thought Gabby was one of the only players to come away with any credit. The amount of effort this guy puts in is amazing, but without him today we would have had even less of a threat than what we gave - anything good from us today involved him. He's so important to our side, but he was let down by the players around him today.

As for the goals, well they were poor from our point of view. First goal was took well by Fabregas, although you could argue that it wasn't a free-kick and Friedel was out of position. Second goal was down to a shite pass from Milner (although MoN is partially to blame for that as he took our only hard working defender on the day in Luke Young, to put a rookie Fabian Delph in midfield). Third was shocking too as we had 5 or 6 players around Diaby with not one closing him down or sticking a challenge in.

Overall, pathetic performence.

Jimi Hendrix - Fire

Who else do you want then if not O'Neill? Who else is better? MoN is the best manager we could hope for, and I for one am happy to see him stick with us for many years to come.

With Barry, yes. With Sidwell, no. With NRC, no. In a 4-5-1, yes. Simples.

We have a decent enough record against them, but I still can't look past anything but a Chelsea win. Ancellotti has done them good so far, and I think they'll be a little too much for us. 2-1.

Just started my manager mode. I never like starting one with Villa though as I prefer the challenge of building a team with a lower league club, so I have chosen Charlton Athletic. Pretty average squad, but my virtual pro in the centre of midfield kind of balances it out.