villa89

Why sign a player for £15m when you can get him for free in six months? Would it have gone to a tribunal otherwise? I thought that only applied to players under 24.

This is the problem they will have. It already looks like Alli is preparing his exit by teaming up with Wolves saviour Jorge Mendes. Once he leaves then what do Kane and Ponchettino do? Stay with a team who don't seem to be able to win anything and who's aim is to get Top 4 every year and get out of their CL group. Their are six top teams in England and only 4 CL spots so Spurs are always going to be on the bubble. If Kane leaves and joins a Manchester club or one of the big two in Spain then suddenly he's winning things and challenging for titles every year. Spurs also have a shiny new stadium to pay for so it's not like there's going to be lots of money to spend.

True, but I'd say it didn't help that he was utter shite and 90% of the time it was his fault. The Spanish Joe Hart.

A countdown timer that's using hundredths of a second as a measurement.

That's because of the Martinez/Henry management dream team that Belgium have.

Yeah but you can't blame the board for panicking after the Moyes/Van Gaal debacles. They needed someone who could guarantee them champions league football every year and Mourinho will do that. I think he'll last until next season unless he walks in the summer. But I expect he'll complain all next summer he's not getting the transfer targets he wants and use that as an excuse for his failure.

Play the kids and anyone needing a run out. The result is meaningless.

Me too, I don't see much to his game to be honest. I think he could develop into a decent championship player but I couldn't see him becoming good enough for the premier league. Just my opinion but I haven't seen a huge amount of him, just a few appearances this season.

Jordan Ayew.

If it's not on the official site ( which it isn't ) I would doubt it's available for sale anywhere.

He won't be leaving until the summer IMO.

Well he's already house shopping there according to Paulinho.

No surprise if this is the case. I'd say every club has players who don't get on. Put 30 lads together and there'll always be people who fight/hate each other, etc. There are plenty of cases of team mates who don't like each other Sheringham/Cole, Bowyer/Dyer, Sanchez/Ramsey. It's not surprising that Baker left one on Jack if they didn't see eye to eye as team mates. It's happened before and will happen again.

So we'd have whelan, Jedinak and your new signing all only capable of playing in one position? We should have signed a better player than Whelan in the summer but buying a new DM now would only compound that error.

He didn't really have a choice. Davis has shown he's not up to it (yet) and couldn't keep playing every week.

I think this only happens when the fans don't think the manager is up to the job in the first place. When a good manager goes through a "blip" then the fans will stick with him because they know he's a good manager, for example the fans won't turn on Benitez at Newcastle regardless of how many bad results come their way. Can't imagine too many Watford fans are turning on Marco Silva either.

I'm actually not too bothered about what he says but I am bothered about what he does, or in this case is not doing. He should have been working to improve the way we play, tactics etc. over the last few months given that he's long enough in the job to have his own style/tactics/formation/whatever firmly established. However from his continuous "it's not my fault, I'm overachieving with what I have, the clubs expectations are too high" comments then you have to assume that he thinks he's doing a great job and that his methods, his hiring of a new coach every two weeks are all working great when that's clearly not the case. The issue I have is that if he doesn't know what the problem is, or accept that there's a problem at all how can he fix it? If he is coming out in post match interviews and acknowledging that the performances are poor, despite a good result here and there, and that the style of play needs to improve then at least that would be a small sign that things might actually improve at some point. He never gives that impression. I believe he thinks he's doing at great job and when he finally leaves Villa he will continue to believe that and say as much. The media will also buy into that fallacy.

I don't have time to go through the posting history but I bet people were posting similar things this time last year. 12 months on, heaps of money spent and nothing's changed.

He will continue with this mantra right up to the end of the season and if we make the playoffs he will claim he's performed a miracle just to get us there. He's ego and refusal to accept any responsibility is amazing. I can see why someone like Mourinho or Benitez can act like that given what they have won, but Steve Bruce? These "Proper Football Men" like Fat Sam, Pulis, Sherwood, Fistface, pardew think they are Gods amongst men. Imagine employing one of them, what are people thinking...

I would be interested to find out who these players are and what the penalties or payments are. I can't imagine any manager picking a player in his team because it's going to cost the club a few pound or agreeing to loan a player knowing that he has to play him every week even if he's shit/on the piss/not interested/fighting with his team mates/etc.. In onomah's case I would be astonished if we agreed to loan him with any clauses like that in his contract.

It never is. Also the reason that we are underachieving is that there's no focus or action by the enormous coaching team to try to correct the quality of the performances. Here's a theory, if we play better football that involves passing and isn't an assault on the eyes we will get good results on a much more regular basis. It's a concept lost on people at Villa.

We have the highest wage bill in the league, have spent a fortune and have probably the second best, if not the best, squad in the league. Any semi competent manager would have us in the top two in this (terrible) league. Derby, Bristol City and Cardiff all doing better than us with vastly inferior squads. It's simply not true to say that promotion isn't/wasn't achievable. We are underachieving because we have a shit manager. It's as simple as that.

Has any player ever in the history of football actually had this clause in their loan contract? Or is it just something football fans speculate about when they disagree with the teamsheet? I suspect it's the former.

That's just wishful thinking imo. We are 9 points behind second place and teams at the top of the league win alot more often than they lose. Barring a miracle, we are in a battle for the playoffs. Automatic promotion is a pipe dream.

You enjoy misery? I have little doubt that Bruce will try to set us up to grind out a draw (which we'll fail to do) and he'll think a draw would be a fantastic result. My prediction for the team: GK Johnstone RB Elmo CB Chester CB Elphick LB Taylor RM Snodgrass CM Whelan CM Jedinak LM Adomah CAM Grealish ST Davis/Hogan