Rob182

lolololololololololololololololololololol 111

I don't think it's fair that Collins' thread only gets brought up when he has a shocker! I thought he played well Saturday. He was commanding and, as usual, he'll throw himself in front of a bus if it'll help the team. If he is, fine, but I'd be happy if Collins wasn't sold this summer. He isn't a bad defender, he's just slow to turn and not the best at passing. He puts his body on the line and plays his heart out for the team, there's no harm in keeping a player like that, imo.

He had a decent game in a pre season friendly where fiorentina didn't turn up. a good game against man utd and he had a good game against brighton in the fa cup. the other 20 times he has played he has been awful. he can't tackle can't pass and generally can't control the football. i would get rid of him ASAP. he is also injury prone against blackburn in the cup he was MOTM until O'Neill subbed him. He played well at LB, when I saw him play one of the best passes of the season too Albrighton, down the left wing. He can pass & can shoot. He just hasn't shown it very often in the last 2 years. Maybe with a few better players around him he would be more confident, or have less defensive work to do.

You dont see team spirit on the pitch,thats in the dressing room and on the training ground. How do you work that out? :?

I agree snowychap. We should be saying it as it is. I see it that the first half of the Fulham game was completely controlled by us. They came back for a small period of time in the second half, but we wree still largely in charge of the game. It was just the fact that the players couldn't get the ball in the back of the net. McLeish deserves credit for the team, formation and tactics used. Against Blackburn, again, the first half we were, mostly, in complete control. N'Zogbia got his goal, but we should have scored one, if not two, more. Again, I would say McLeish deserves credit for that good first half performance - he was just let down by finishing (or excellent goalkeeping by Robinson). One thing I would say that McLeish needs to work on, is motivating the team to play as well in the second half as we do in the first. Maybe a half time sub could inject some energy? I don't know, that's McLeish's job to work out. But I think the point I'm trying to make, is that recently we have appeared to turn things round. I know they were just 3 easy games against 2 relegation-threatened sides and a decent Fulham side. But you can only attack what's in front of you, with the resources & players' abilities available. In the last few weeks I have seen significant change in the way we play (before that, I saw attacking play, but only occasionally).

I don't know whether Holman is a 'hoofball type' player. To play attractive, attacking football, we don't have to have a team of 11 players who have excellent techincal ability. You need to throw in some players with graft, some players with strength and a few magicians to pull off a party piece once in a while. I think Holman is a decent signing. At worst, he'll just be competition for Albrighton & Zog, on lower wages than Heskey & for no fee. At best, he'll score a couple of goals and actually be a good signing. I don't see many, if any, negatives in this. We've gotten rid of Beye, we're more than likely going to get rid of Heskey (and hopefully a few more). I'd much rather us use part of those wages to sign someone like this for free, than give Heskey a new contract, or buy a player like Heskey for £3m.

Oh I completely agree, Dunne would still be playing if he wasn't injured. But my original point, was that the whole defence played well. If we ignore the Dunne-shaped hole, replaced with Cuellar; Collins played well, Hutton was the player I thought we were getting from Spurs and Warnock was good defensively and on the attack. I just don't think that one fat Irish man in the middle would cause all 3 of them to play poorly (possibly his partner in the middle, but the fullbacks? I don't think so).

I find that strange Trent. One of the main things I see on VT, about our defence, is that Warnock, Collins, Dunne & Hutton are all terrible. Do you think that Dunne has been making the others play terribly? Or have you just failed to ignore the fact that the others have been playing poorly, to back-up your point that Dunne is the real problem and therefore McLeish deserves no credit for him not being in the team? Hutton, Collins & Warnock were all solid against Fulham. McLeish get's blamed for not motivating the players to play well, so why shouldn't he get credit when they put in a great shift like they did on Saturday? (And please don't spout the 'You're putting words in my mouth' nonsense. I'm asking you a question).

I'm loving the look of this team! No Petrov, aiming for the fans in the Upper North Stand

McLeish doesn't get credit for Dunne not being in the team, but he gets credit for the defence performing much better recently. I actually thought the whole back four play really well against Fulham.

McLeish is awesome. We are unbeaten in 3, he's getting the best out of Stevie Ireland and he managed to play Wiemann, Gardner, Bannan, Herd & Albrighton in a game that we won and where we dominated for most of the game. Anyone who doesn't rate McLeish is bonkers.

Quelle surprise

Herd was quality on Saturday imo. His tenacity and workrate has always been good, but his passing and skill on the ball was much better than anything I've seen from him before. He was also very confident in the interview on AVTV. I wish we could play Gardner & Herd together in the middle, but it may lack experience, so we need to put old-man Petrov in there to take shots at the First Aid sign behind the goal every 20 minutes.

I assume this was posted as a 'bad kit' example. But I like it. (Not for Villa, obviously, but I like it)

The 'mythical' big picture to defend Houllier? So you were glad that we lost Houllier and brought in McLeish then Trent? I interpret the 'big picture' to mean 'more than the 'here and now''. Maybe not everything wrong is McLeish's fault. Maybe if we sack him, we'll bring in a worse manager and he'll be the one to handle players who occasionally can't get a shot on target. Unless.. You knew about the Houllier-big-picture and wanted McLeish in charge?

That is incredible. An excellent post/ article and sums up my thoughts exactly. I've said it for months. Occasionally we play negatively, occasionally we play attacking. Occasionally the players are at fault, occasionally McLeish's subs/ tactics are suspect. But this constant abuse to McLeish (oh no, he took off N'Zogbia and brought on Wiemann - someone who would probably benefit from Albrighton's crossing and NOT Zog's blind runs down dead ends) is not justified. There is more to the stats than 'Manager in' or 'Manager out', imo.

Excellent win and a good performance. I didn't see a problem with taking Zog off. Albrighton and Marc were both ineffective in the second half, however Albrighton hit the crossbar and probably has more of an eye for a Villa player. If we'd taken off Marc instead then our attacks might have just dwindled away with Charlie's blind runs. Gardner needs to replace Petrov much earlier. Petrov appears to now aim for the big 'first aid' sign behind the North Stand goal.

It is very tempting to not renew tbh. An extra bit of money from petrol/ food/ ST each year would come in handy - but I still get the buzz on Friday before a matchday, I still get excited to go up to VP and guess the teamsheet, in spite of the poor results and occasionally negative football. I'm not going to say that it's always negative or boring, because it's not. I'm not going to jump on the bandwagon and use the same recycled reasons, when I don't feel that they're always completely his fault. Occasionally I can see what he's trying, occasionally I am stumped by his decisions, and occasionally I can see us playing attacking football that is simply let down by the players or bad luck. I fully expect to see McLeish in charge next season, from my Holte End seat. Hopefully we'll start to climb back into the top half, with lower wages, and build from there.

Cheers Cule4life, I only saw your above post after I'd sent mine :winkold:

The post I was commenting on was about 'Randy selling our best players'. Carew & NRC weren't sold, their contracts ended. I too would have kept NRC, but I would have let Carew & Davies go personally. I still think our 'best' players that we sold were just Downing, Young, Milner & Barry.

So season ticket holders have no right to complain but someone who doesn't go and has a Barcelona avatar does have the right? Okay. Wake up Jimmy. What im saying is: Most people on here are complaining about MCleish and Lerner right ? You cant moan if your funding their pocket's if you want to hit them don't buy ST's. Pretty simple to be fair What a load of nonsense. So, because I buy this seasons top, a season ticket, and food & drink in the ground, I have NO RIGHT to complain about the football style/ a signing/ a managers weaknesses?

I'd rather be in the stadium with only 10k fans who are there because they love the Villa than with people like you. People who renew don't have a right to complain?! Jesus christ... THIS! I will be renewing and supporting ASTON VILLA, no matter who the manager is, no matter what league we're in and no matter what style of football we will be playing - as long as it doesn't stop me from paying my mortgage and buying food. I've just been chatting to my sha mate who works with me, his ST this year was £495.

That'll do!

I got it for my birthday 3 days ago, and I was about to play it for the first time tonight. Thanks Yillan :cry: :winkold:

To name a few? I think you mean 'to name them all'. Luke Young is the only other player that we sold, that I would have wanted to keep. But I wouldn't have called him one of our best players.