markavfc40

No chance that Stevens will make his debut yet. He simply isn't ready which is not surprising given what a huge step up it is. I doubt very much we will see Stevens until sometime next season. If Warnock is to be dropped, which would be deserved, Clark, Lichaj or Baker would be ahead of Stevens at this point. I have a feeling that Warnock will play though. He has been poor recently no doubt about it and made a right **** up on Wednesday. However in the second half he did very well and I think McLeish will stick with him for now especially as we are away from home and he won't have a few muppets booing his every touch which is clearly not going to help.

Having an unbelievable honeymoon period thats going on and on.... Did I just hear it right that they have taken 22 points in 10 games since he took over? That is a remarkable run.

He signed a 3 and half year deal in December 2006 when he was just 19 which ran till June 2010. In 2008 when he was 20 he extended that contract by a year and it ran out in 2011. Osbourne would have been on no more than 3 to 5k a week and, like a lot of young players,spent a fair amount of time out on loan where his wages would have been paid. At one time like many of our youngsters over the years he looked a decent prospect. As things panned out it seems he wasn't up to Prem level.

Not to mention a 100% winning record against small health We had a fantastic record against all the local sides when he was here. Sadly that all went to shit under Houllier losing to Sha, WBA and Wolves in the same season for the first time in over 50 years. Hopefully the recent win against Wolves will be the first step on righting that wrong. Erm, we defeated Wolves away last season as well. And it's not exactly improving under McLeish seeing as we lost against WBA at home. When was the last time that happened? Like I said hopefully the win against Wolves was the FIRST STEP on putting another unbeaten run together in derby games and another run of 50 odd years of not losing to all three local sides in the same season. Given that we haven't and can't lose to Wolves or Sha this season then we are one season in to that run.

Not to mention a 100% winning record against small health We had a fantastic record against all the local sides when he was here. Sadly that all went to shit under Houllier losing to Sha, WBA and Wolves in the same season for the first time in over 50 years. Hopefully the recent win against Wolves will be the first step on righting that wrong.

Bang on. Just to add during our three 6th place finishes we had the 8th, 6th and 6th highest wage bill. We finished pretty much exactly where you'd expect us to. O'Neill didn't do a great job far from it. He did a good job though especially when you consider what his predecessors have done. The whole club was different when he was here. We rode a mini wave for a while. The first time in almost 60 years that we'd averaged over 40k and two other seasons where attendances were the highest they had been since the early 50's and one of those was a season when we had two cup runs that fans also had to fork out for. I dare say there is not a Villa fan that wouldn't now at the price of the sixth highest wage bill have us finishing 6th, a couple of trips to Wembley and average attendances around 40k . Lerner must have had his reasons for sacking him but its a shame it couldn't have all been resolved. In all fairness no one would now give a shit though had it not been for the two very poor appointments that have followed his departure.

I agree. Total waste of money and a major **** up. Shit like this, and worse, has happened at almost every Premiership Club at some stage and will happen again though.

Two excellent recent posts in the thread by AVFC1874. You clearly know your football mate and are bang on the money.

Couldn't agree more. He has been comfortably our most consistent player this season and I can see him pissing the player of the season award. He'll definitely get the players player award.

And another top post. I wish people could read this and think about it. It really is true. Take a bow, man. Yes I will have some of that. Very good post. Same goes for the recent post by darrenm. I was ashamed to be sitting alongside some of the so called supporters last night. If that's what you call support then **** off. The booing by some at the end of the game was a disgrace after the performance by the lads in the 2nd half when we played superb and deserved to win the game by 4 or 5 goals . I had my 13 year old daughter with me last night. She has had a season ticket since she was 6 and she has recently given the impression she doesn't want to go due to the attitude of some supporters. You know what though deep down I know she will continue to go as I have brought her up to know that when the going gets tough on match days you get yourself down to VP, show your support even more and do your bit to help produce positive results.

I can't really knock the way McLeish has been sending us out to play over the last couple of months. From the Arsenal home game onwards our attitude has been very positive. Last night there is no doubt we deserved to win and win comfortably by 4 or 5 goals. Its individual **** ups that are costing us. Dunne, Hutton and Bent against Arsenal, Warnock against Swansea and last night and Albrighton against Everton immediately spring to mind in recent games but you dig a little deeper and they have been happening all season. I'm not sure how as a manager you legislate for that though. You can drop the players I guess but you don't want to be replacing them with inferior quality and as things stand I'd say you'd always pick 4 from 5 of Hutton, Warnock, Collins, Dunne and Cuellar to play at the back. Enda Stevens isn't a viable option for me as he has never played above a level the equivalent of our third or fourth tier and will need time, Lichaj has been injured and is arguably no better than those playing. McLeish did actually drop Warnock and his replacement Clark was found to be wanting. Defence certainly needs an over all come the end of the season and I think it will be with Cuellar and Warnock off and possibly Collins. On a positive for McLeish he has done what his predecessor couldn't do and is getting the best out of Ireland, Keane has already proved to be a good move, Petrov has been excellent, Gabby has put some great shifts in and Darren Bent has over the last few games been finding the back of the net, looks hungry and is getting chances. Hopefully NZogbia will take heart from his performance last night and kick on. Things are far from rosy and the stats are poor with only 6 wins in 23 and half a dozen games since we won at home. It is however currently still an improvement on this time last season and in terms of how we are playing, certainly in our attacking play, we are heading in the right direction. I started from a low expectation level with McLeish and still don't expect too much from him but in terms of how we have been playing over the last couple of months its better than I expected. He is here for at least the short - medium term so lets all hope that the recent improvement in our play continues.

Not long back. Can't believe a few pr*cks booed. You'd have to be small minded to base your sole judgement of the game on the result tonight. We deserved to win comfortably. It wouldn't have flattered us had we won 6-2. Best I've seen us play in ages in the 2nd half. In fact for the last hour of the game we were excellent. More of the same please.

:shock: when was this? I'd struggle to think of any league game when we fielded more than 3 or 4.

WTF :shock: Is that your ex missus who made the comment about an hour ago mate

Very good post TRO.

2 relegations - par for the course for that mob. A trophy is an unbelievable achievement for them, a 9th place finish is one of their best ever in the top flight and best ever in the Premiership and he also got them a promotion. I'm no fan of McLeish but his record at Sha was good when you take in to account the size of the club and its history.

Luke Young was sold for around 2 mill mate.

I'm yet to meet an Aston Villa fan who is happy that McLeish is manager. What I think we have is a large section of fans who have resigned themselves to the fact he is manager and will be for the short - medium term at least. Due to that there are supporters who are focusing on the few positives, however few and far between they may be, to make life as a Villa fan bearable. The other option to that is to continually focus solely on the negatives and make being an Aston Villa fan extremely hard work. I've missed little more than a handful of games home and away over the last 18 months and its been bloody hard work and left me totally demoralised for the most part. What can you do though. I love this great club. You have to keep some chinks of light and try to focus on the positives to keep you going.

This is Sha you are talking about here. Look back at their history. Whilst relegations are par for the course for that tin pot mob a 9th place finish is an excellent achievement and to win a cup is a remarkable one. It should also be remembered that he got them promoted after one of the relegations. McLeish's record at Sha, given the size of that club, contains way more good than bad.

Good for you Denis. What was the last game you went to?

You really think he would have been sacked at most other clubs. I don't see it apart from maybe the top 6 or 7 clubs. We finished 9th last season with a far superior squad, we are currently 11th. With haven't been in the relegation zone all season, we haven't gone through a string of half a dozen or so defeats on the trot. He has been here for 22 league games. Last season a manager with a far worse record after 22 games in charge ( 5 less points, 10 more goals conceded, 2 less goals scored ) kept his job so at the very least you'd expect that one with a better record and far less resources both in terms of personnel and transfer funds would also keep his. I'm no fan of McLeish by the way but I'd struggle to think of any club outside the top 6 or 7 who would have sacked him 22 league games after appointing him.

You want myths, there's one for starters. Come on was it long ball or counter attacking, I'll give you the latter but the former is a complete myth, no one plays long ball football with two out and out wingers. Here's another myth. Firstly what the hell does that mean? and secondly assuming you mean he got us to play a more ball on the deck playing through the centre of the park type of game, did he ****. Houllier always has played a game over reliant on defence and at Liverpool he was the ultimate long ball merchant, their entire game was long ball. The Houllier plays pleasing on the eye, tippy tappy passing football has to be one of the biggest myths around, he's never done that in any English game. I seriously don't know why people make this stuff up. Bang on on both counts.

collins makes more, he should be the one being pushed out Well whether you agree with it or not one is playing week in week out the other is a bit part player and this has been the case under both McLeish and Houllier.

We may have had this discussion before but its down to how high your standards are for Aston Villa and I set my bar pretty high as I know this great club can do far better than it has been over the last couple of seasons. Last season it was totally unacceptable that between November and the end of April we were in or with in spitting distance of the relegation zone. That after 22 games we had 22 points and were 18th, that after 31 games we had 34 points and were 16th, that it took until the 36th game of the season for us to be safe from relegation. Lets not kids ourselves that the two very good results under Gary Mac at the end of last season masked over what was an exceptionally poor season. Well it was by the standards I set for this great club. What others choose to do is of course up to them. I do therefore think that we are setting our standards low by setting the bar at how well we did last season. I am though of course also mindful of the fact that since last season we have lost Ash and Downing and have a transfer deficit of -20 mill.

2-2 fantastic goal from Bale. Great second half.