Juju

And along with the Steve Bruce revival, we now seem to have a striker who seem's capable of troubling the scorers in the "Top Strikers". Think he's sitting at no6 in the list now.

And Clarke is a mass debater.

Well, we all knew it was coming - will there be a second?

Footballers. Most of them make me go "meh!". But seriously. if only half of our squad had half the determination and courage of this guy, we'd have beaten Leicester to the title by a country mile. The fact he's managed to make it to training, at his age, after that illness, 4y after retirement, well, even if he never get's a game, he'll still be an inspiration to those that do. And that's a captain right there.

But that's often due to the financial structuring. Manciteh for instance, managed to circumvent any sort of financial "healchchecks" by obtaining favourable sponsorship deals not open or available else elsewhere.

Lescott picked again. I can only imagine Lescott has some naked pictures of Eric Blacks mum, and has threatened to tweet them if he's dropped. There's no other credible explanation why Lieutenant Worf gets picked every week..........

And as Leicester City with the league, let's remember, that Pearson's "backroom boys" are still there. And in fact have done better without his presence in the managers room, replaced by the til relatively recently, discredited Ranieri. If Pearson was arriving WITH his backroom squad, and could be "managed" I'd be enthusiastic but it seems we're going to get stuck solely with the "weak link" in the team. Please do not believe for a second, that Pearson is the great manager/leader we want. Indeed, it seems under them, Leicester were a poorer side than they are without him. That's not a manager I want for Villa. Someone who's epitaph is "I was at Leicester, and they improved markedly when was sacked, having previously been flirting with relegation". But it seems the refusal to appoint anyone til a takeover, which none of us believe will happen with any speed due to the owners complete and total incompetence and his sizable personal "issues", will simply ensure we go weeks if not months without a crucial appointment. This makes shedding of the squad of abject and total failures we have and it's urgent rebuilding, grossly delayed. This ensures next season is already a write off, and quite possibly League 1 our final destiny before the rot stops.

When you do the calculations on how much per point they spent, vs what that dicksplash learner spent, regardless of winning the league, it just shows how hopelessly flawed the Hendrik Almstadt Paddy Reilly Tom Fox Randy Lerner strategy really was.

We'd have had more success with Clive Sinclair. Although the metaphor between Scott Sinclair and a C5 is pretty apt.

"Don't let the door slam on your arse on the way out!"

I think the point is that he and Almstadt were so close to each other. They came more or less as a team, with a vision/plan- and as CEO, Fox was instrumental in supporting the footballing direction that Amstadt took,ie signing cheapish imports with no experience of the premiership. Almstadt and Fox as a team, buying playersof dubious quality, based on statistical analysis. That it clearly hasn't worked, and £60 odd million spunked on players who have not only failed, but done so very badly, without any fight or determination, all of whom have left the club with little resale value on the balance sheet. That Almstadt and therefore by implication, Fox, went against and over the wishes of two managers, and have upset them,willnot have gone unnoticed. Fox chose the plan of action, and his fellow Directors for his experiment, it failed,badly, and so he must go. Fox was clearly off as soon as Almstadt was. Although some of us predicted this at the start of the season, that a large influx of mainly young French Ligue 1 players would not form the required "dressing room bond", nor have the support systems to allow them to be a success, that they were not a good cultural fit, and got dogs abuse off this board for it. Indeed, most here thought that it was an excellent transfer window, and were full of optimism. Those that begged to differ were roundly told we were fools for laughing at the Kings new clothes.

Just concerned. We seem to be linked to, and actually signing and therefore paying a lot of money, for very young and therefore inexperienced, albeit talented, French players. However, I cannot think, of any that have been much of a success at Villa. Certainly, French players in the premiership have been successful, but say Arsenal, when Arsené Wenger took over and signed the likes of Petit and Henry, they were already either world class players having enjoyed an excellent World Cup and others were firmly established in the junior international sides. With a French speaking manager who had links with the youth national setup, who brought in an arguably "French" culture to the signing club, it meant the players didn't have such great cultural problems to wrestle with as they might otherwise have done. However, with the likes of Didier Six, Mattheu Berson, David Ginola and those who came either from France or via an English club from France such as Djemba Djemba,Hassan Kachloul, Mustapha Hadji,and Moustapha Salifou, I can't think of any who have really had any "success" at the club. There always seems to be a record of training room breakdowns, home sickness, or just inability to adapt or even put basic effort in. I am concerned there is almost more of a cultural gap between France and England, than many places further afield. Even with non French players, such as Angel, there were great "transitional" issues which negatively effected the effectiveness of very expensive players. With this, I have enormous concern over the recent signings of Amavi and Gueye. We seem to be paying large sums for young players, who with respect are more rather than less likely, to have cultural and basic communication issues than older "jobbing" pros. Certainly greater than say, established England internationals such as Delph have gone for. Noting we have a manager with no track record of signing players, it seems we could be blowing the "windfall" of selling our "family silver" by giving a man with no experience, the money to spend, on signings which have a high % of likely failure. I'd rather sign a player like Delph, than the two French players (who cost more) 10 times out of 10. Should Lerner (and by dint of his position,Fox) be stepping in at this point to reign in the manager, or are we seeing a reenactment of Martin O Neill -trust the manager and let him f**k things right up with no personal consequences. I think he should. Anyone agree? (open the flaming!)

I think in any big business, if you have employees openly encouraging your leading performers to leave, that's gross misconduct. I also think it goes against Sherwoods desire for "winners" and a winning mentality. Encouraging your best players doesnt fit in with this either. Richards should be transfer listed immediately.

My first budget tt was a second hand Revolver in 1987, with a Linn Basik+ arm and an Audio Technica at95e, It's still going strong at a friends parents house today. I then moved briefly to a Linn Axis for £300 in 90, followed by a second hand Linn LP12 in 1991 with Ittok LVII and Linn K9, for £700 On a student grant. It still sounds good today. at about £35 a year, tha'ts not bad. It's probably stillworth a few hundred. Don't worry about budget - the best stuff remains timeless........... But if you want to remain cheap, Rob's suggestion of a Dual 505mkII isn't bad, but it's not very upgradable. A Rega 2 or Revolver, better, a Rega Planar 3, should be achievable for a couple of hundred, and a Linn Basik for about the same. Don't forget Dunlop Systemdek's or Mitchell Gyro's for alternatives, or even a Little Pink Triangle if you can find one. I think even Roksan did a cheaper entry level turntable for a bit.

To be honest, the players just look tired. They're not closing down, they're ghosts, 1 step behind any Arsenal player - Arsenal, its not just that the players are "better" technically, it's that they're just, at this stage of the season, fitter.

Having a personal disaster today. Might be staying as who's going to want him with this sort of performance? Forget Man United Ron, you ain't making Salford United on this performance.

Knock knock.... Who's there? The Pilot....

Isn't it nice to watch an entertaining game. The last few weeks have been far better viewing, regardless of results. Sometimes we forget football is an "entertainment" industry.

In fairness, they're all Lambert players on that pitch. Perhaps his strength would have been a Director of Football role somewhere, rather than a tactical manager? We still await the first Sherwood transfer.

Na, he's just Robin the supporters....

Can we run it into the corners for 75 mins now?

Well, with the prevelance of cctv, I guess your clances of getting a ticket just rose, as a number of card carrying season ticket holders running on the pitch tonight will find themselves mysteriously uneligible for a ticket......

Was my MOTM, frankly, before he scored. Looking like a very astute signing, and Cleverly is beginning to look like the player we thought he was too.

Cant watch!

I was out with friends at the weekend, and one of them works or a firm of Solicitors, who now accept bitcoin for payment. That begins to look a little like mainstream adoption.