MessiWillSignForVilla Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Obviously this year our home form has been terrible, no one can argue with that, but is it a bit deceiving how bad it is? Hear me out here for a second. Of our 13 home games this season, 7 have been against the top 9, with only Chelsea and Southampton left to play at VP, and 6 have been against the teams around us. Of the 7 "top 8" games, we've lost 6 and won 1, whereas in the 6 games against the around us, we've won 2, drawn 2 and lost 2, which isn't that bad. Looking at these 6 games we've played, we've lost to West Ham and Crystal Palace, 2 humiliating and terrible defeats, but 2 games in which we dominated possession and had some good chances, and in some respects were unlucky to lose (just to clarify, I don't think we deserved to win these games, we didn't do enough to win in both). Against Sunderland the game was much more even and ended up in a fair draw, and we probably deserved to lose to Swansea and were lucky with a point. However in our 2 wins against WBA and Cardiff, we were the better team in these games, we created more chances - and better one - and absolutely deserved to win in both of them. In our last 6 home games we have 4 of the teams around us, games in which we could easily get points from, it's not unrealistic to think that we could get 7+ points from our remaining home games, we could even get points against Southampton and Chelsea if we play like we know we can. Plus if we keep up our away form of roughly 1.3 points per game, that would give us 7/8 from our remaining away games too, leaving us on 42+ points. Not an overly impressive total and not a huge improvement from last season, but a total that should see us steer well clear of relegation. Obviously no one want to see us roll over in the way we have done against many of the better teams this year, but the fact is we aren't good enough to regularly take it to these teams and it is much easier to do that away from home when there is less pressure. When you take into account the fact we have played 7 of the best teams in the league at home so far, I think the home form looks less shit. An optimistic post I know, but that's just how I try look at things. I'm not trying to convince anyone that our home form is good, it's not, it's just that after having looked at who we've actually played at home, I think how points we've picked up at home can be a little deceiving, and when you look at how we've done against the teams around us, it's not quite as bad. I'm still confident we can finish the season strongly and pull some form out of our arse just like last season, and I think our home form come May will look a whole lot prettier. Short Version: We've been shit at home this season, we all know that, but analysing who we have actually played so far, maybe we haven't been a huge pile of dogturd after all, just a small one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rovers13 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Spot on. Villa will probably finish similar to last year, in that the home and road records will be almost identical come the end of the season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Spot on. Villa will probably finish similar to last year, in that the home and road records will be almost identical come the end of the season. Which would be absolutely awful. Last year we won 5 games at home. Something we've only done once before in 1890 and its only been worse under McLeish. Last year we lost 9 games at home which is joint worst in the clubs history with it only happening in 66/67 season. Our home form over the last few years has been the worst home form in the history of the club. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
briny_ear Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Obviously this year our home form has been terrible, no one can argue with that, but is it a bit deceiving how bad it is? No, it's not deceiving. The one clear thing about football is that there is a simple and irrefutable method for measuring how good you are. It is the number of points you get from games, with the number of goals scored/conceded as a sub-text. Our home form has been abysmal and there is no getting away from it. Hear me out here for a second. OK, just for a second... Of our 13 home games this season, 7 have been against the top 9, with only Chelsea and Southampton left to play at VP, and 6 have been against the teams around us. Of the 7 "top 8" games, we've lost 6 and won 1, whereas in the 6 games against the around us, we've won 2, drawn 2 and lost 2, which isn't that bad. No, it really IS that bad. It is relegation form and the only thing that is saving us is the fact that we have not been so awful away from home. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
briny_ear Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Just in case there is any question whether our performance against bottom half clubs has been "not that bad"... http://stats.football365.co.uk/dom/ENG/PR/vbothalf.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Of all the things to try and defend this season I can't believe someone picked our home form. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NormandyVillan Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 (edited) Spot on. Villa will probably finish similar to last year, in that the home and road records will be almost identical come the end of the season. Which would be absolutely awful. Last year we won 5 games at home. Something we've only done once before in 1890 and its only been worse under McLeish. Last year we lost 9 games at home which is joint worst in the clubs history with it only happening in 66/67 season. Our home form over the last few years has been the worst home form in the history of the club. It's been by far the worst in our history Prior to McLeish, our worst ever home record was in 1966-67 when we won 7, drew 5 and lost 9. Converted to 3 points to a game, that would have been 1.24 points per game. 2011-12 under McLeish was our worst ever season at home. 19 points in 19 games = 1.00 points per game. 2012-13 was our second worst. 20 points in 19 games = 1.05 points per game. So far this season we have 11 points from 13 games. So we need 8 points from the last 6 games to avoid setting a new low (again), 9 points to avoid being the equal worst ever, and by my calculations we need a massive 13 points to avoid completing a trio of the 3 worst home seasons in the club's history. We have also won only 9 of our last 45 home games. So we have won 9 times and failed to win 36 times in that period. I don't know when our previous worst sequence of 45 games was, but I would bet that it probably still included about twice as many wins as the last 45. In other words, the fans at Villa Park have never had it (anything like) as bad as this. Edited February 15, 2014 by NormandyVillan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cbr600rr Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 the common problem is simple, since RL new idea of replacing quality players with lower league players the form has dropped-fact. im not even looking at the cup games at home vs lower league its a simple game.i dont expect any mini runs of points as PL has not strung 2 wins together yet,we are what we are,it it was it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vandaq Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 No, our home form is just bad and it has been for some time. Next season the excuses won`t hold up anymore but we need to add more quality to our squad and I fully expect our board to open their wallet. Nothing to indicate they will but even with the regular funds we get at least we can bring in more expensive players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 In other words, the fans at Villa Park have never had it (anything like) as bad as this. A point I've tried to make when people defend our current owner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
briny_ear Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 This is potentially a very serious long term problem. Lack of success at home is eating away at home support. Numbers will drop, atmosphere will worsen. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
foreveryoung Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 (edited) Its funny people blaming Lerner for this?? So 62% of the time we cannot win at home and this has hardly any bearing on Lambert or tactics at Villa Park, but mostly to do with the austerity measures?????? Edited February 15, 2014 by foreveryoung 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Its funny people blaming Lerner for this?? So 62% of the time we cannot win at home and this has hardly any bearing on Lambert or tactics at Villa Park, but mostly to do with the austerity measures?????? Lambert wasn't in charge when we broke the club record for least amount of home wins in a season. And as you really don't rate lambert why do you not put any blame on the man who hired him and continues to allow him to work? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fun Factory Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 (edited) Um no. We have lost to the mighty Crystal Palace and West Ham at home and scored no goals. Somehow we also beat Man City as we could play like the away side in that one. All you have to do at Villa Park is put 10 behind the ball and wait for Villa to make a mistake, And win the game. And repeat. A caveat could be that a lot of teams play better on the road nowadays. I would perhaps put this down to the homogenisation of the football experience. Most stadiums are the same, they are not as intimidating as they used to be (eg Millwall's 59 unbeaten home record in the 60s), pitches are very good at all 20 grounds and players should not be tired by getting to the grounds due to the luxury they live in. Plus modern football is more about speed rather than skill so any decent counter attacking side should be able to pick up points on the road. Perhaps it is a bit ironic that more people have season tickets in the past 20 years or so, yet home advantage seems to be less strong. Edited February 15, 2014 by The Fun Factory Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
foreveryoung Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 (edited) Its funny people blaming Lerner for this?? So 62% of the time we cannot win at home and this has hardly any bearing on Lambert or tactics at Villa Park, but mostly to do with the austerity measures?????? Lambert wasn't in charge when we broke the club record for least amount of home wins in a season. And as you really don't rate lambert why do you not put any blame on the man who hired him and continues to allow him to work? Mangers come in and promise the world. Look what I can do with Villa on a tight budget. Unfortunately for me Lambert has not forfilled these promises. Not being able to turn around our home form with nearly 2 full seasons under his belt is amateur at best! If you watch or go to the games you will see the tactics are all wrong. I dont expect to win them all, but he seems to be clueless of how to win any. If we can go to Anfield with these young players and give Liverplop a game, how come we cant even give West Ham a game at home. To fully answer your question BJ10, im sure like some people may think. Lambert is not gonna get that gold watch from Lerner this season. Austerity or not, im sure he expected a little more this season! Edited February 15, 2014 by foreveryoung Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 I think Lambert's done a poor job but our home form has been abysmal for 3 years now and Lambert's been here for 2 of them. I don't see why you find it funny that Lerner would receive criticism for such a poor period in the clubs history. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KjParton Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Of all the things to try and defend this season I can't believe someone picked our home form. I don't think he's quite defending it, as you so elegantly put it. Considering he started the thread like this: "Obviously this year our home form has been terrible, no one can argue with that," Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rovers13 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Just saying villa have had disproportionately hard home fixtures compared to away ones, so it's not as unbalanced as it looks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Of all the things to try and defend this season I can't believe someone picked our home form. I don't think he's quite defending it, as you so elegantly put it. Considering he started the thread like this:"Obviously this year our home form has been terrible, no one can argue with that," You should have carried on reading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_John_10 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Just saying villa have had disproportionately hard home fixtures compared to away ones, so it's not as unbalanced as it looks. Its awful and if it ends up like last year it will still be awful. It will take a complete change from now till the end of the season for it not to be awful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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