Steve Bruce

[TheStagMan]

1 hour ago, Nigel said:

Jesus there is some ridiculous things written in this thread!

I get that some don't like Bruce but to use comments like 'wolves don't have individually better players than us' (seriously?) and 'sheffield wednesday was only a few weeks ago' (one off freak game) doesnt half make your points lose credance.

I'm positive there will be some legitimate ammunition against him in the next month or so but at the moment everythimg seems fine. Is it impossible to enjoy it?

Sheffield Wednesday was a one off freak game? Seriously? You are ridiculing my comments and you make statements like that. 

Perhaps you should read the comments again ... I am enjoying the wins. What I am not enjoying is the nail-biting ends to games where we try and defend a lead, where we cannot find our own players with a pass and where we end up backs to the wall. Ipswich was not too bad in this respect, but on the whole we cannot finish teams off and we just do not seem to have the appetite to do so. We also cannot keep hold of the ball. That cannot last as a long term strategy. 

What I cannot accept is that everything is fine just because we are winning (which is great) - I also want to see overall improvement and see us looking worthy winners. Last season we went on a winning streak and lots of comments like "we have turned a corner", "its all clicked into place" and "Bruce has turned us around" were bandied around the place when there was no improvement in playing style and performance, then look what happened....... 

Whilst I accept this does feel different to last season and it does seem to be more sustainable, we still have a lot of work to do before we can consider promotion to be in the bag.

 

[Dr_Pangloss]

9 minutes ago, TheStagMan said:

Are you seriously saying our players are not good enough to be coached into a cohesive unit that can pass to each other? Wow! Our local kids teams can be coached to pass to each other. 

I absolutely disagree that Wolves are man for man better than us. They are not, they have some good players absolutely, but not individually better than ours. Was it you that said "Wolves are at their limit, whereas there is more to come from us"? 

As for predatory attacks, maybe we should be expecting us to raid Wolves if their players are so much better. I bet we won't.

 

Just for starters, Ruben Neves is on another planet to any of our central midfield players.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

9 minutes ago, Dr_Pangloss said:

Just for starters, Ruben Neves is on another planet to any of our central midfield players.

The look on my face when you think Neves is better than me.

[omariqy]

8 hours ago, VillaChris said:

Everyone is now saying Adomah was out of favour at the start of the season. Wasn't it reported at the time he was injured? As soon as he was ready he was back on the bench in September, was great coming on v Boro and the rest is history.

Surprised you say SB was thinking of moving him as he was a regular last season. Maybe he was one of those we were thinking of selling to help battle FFP.

Spot on. He wanted to use the money elsewhere. Bristol City were close apparently. 

[omariqy]

8 hours ago, NurembergVillan said:

Unless the plan was to use him as a left winger this season?  Maybe he'd seen something in training?

Remember we all questioned why he'd signed another right sided player in Elmo, but seemingly left us short of cover on the left wing.

We'll never know, but playing devil's advocate here perhaps he's not had enough credit for Albert's move to the left.  We've all (myself included in my last post) said it was forced upon him, but looking at the signings in the summer it would suggest it was part of the plan.

Bristol City nearly got him I hear until Grealish got injured.

[Villarocker]

I think that the style of football - the way we are winning - is what bothers people. I don't think anyone denies that Bruce is getting us the results we crave and, let's face it, we are only two points off the two points per game target that he set out for us early in the season. Bruce is doing very well in that respect. Still, people want more - I want more!

I think people would like to see us win with a bit of style and more comfortably, rather than by grinding out victories, if only once every now and then. I think the attendances show that too. If we were playing the kind of football Wolves play and was in our current position, there would be calls for the upper Trinity to be opened for each home game. We would surely be getting 36k plus each home game if we were not grinding out wins and playing an open, more attractive, style of football. 

Having said that, it's a results business and right now Bruce is getting the job done. 

[NurembergVillan]

14 minutes ago, villarocker said:

I think that the style of football - the way we are winning - is what bothers people. I don't think anyone denies that Bruce is getting us the results we crave and, let's face it, we are only two points off the two points per game target that he set out for us early in the season. Bruce is doing very well in that respect. Still, people want more - I want more!

I think people would like to see us win with a bit of style and more comfortably, rather than by grinding out victories, if only once every now and then. I think the attendances show that too. If we were playing the kind of football Wolves play and was in our current position, there would be calls for the upper Trinity to be opened for each home game. We would surely be getting 36k plus each home game if we were not grinding out wins and playing an open, more attractive, style of football. 

Having said that, it's a results business and right now Bruce is getting the job done. 

Similarly, I don't think anyone who is "defending" Bruce would say that the style of football is what they'd hope it to be.

The main sentiment seems to be that we're seeing improvements - from losing badly, to losing, to not losing, to winning occasionally, to winning regularly.  Winning with style would be the logical next step, and I think you'd be hard pressed to find anyone saying we're there already.

Most clubs as bad as we were, for as long as we were, take a lot of work to get back on track.

[sheepyvillian]

2 hours ago, Dr_Pangloss said:

Just for starters, Ruben Neves is on another planet to any of our central midfield players.

You could say the same regarding the managers, certainly on the evidence of our recent encounter with Wolves .

[Stevo985]

2 hours ago, TheStagMan said:

. What I am not enjoying is the nail-biting ends to games where we try and defend a lead, 

 

 

But they’re not nail biting. At least not all of them. QPR, Sunderland and Ipswich have all been incredibly comfortable victories in recent times. 

We are not scraping victories anymore. We’re professionally dispatching teams. We’d all like to score a few more goals but when you’re left with one fit, 19 year old, striker then I’ll take it.

 

Sheffield Wednesday was not a good game. But it was very much the exception over the past few months. Using it as an example of why we’re not doing that well doesn’t make sense. 

Edited November 26, 2017 by Stevo985

[Lerner's Driver]

Seeing as we are currently in the ever so sensitive 'I passionately defend my right to believe...X' mode, I passionately defend my right to see what happens, in preference to holding on for grim death to a binary, good or bad choice. 

[terrytini]

In my view we are a very different prospect than we were a couple of months ago and all last season.

I don’t think our current Form of 28 Points from 12 is any more unrepresentative of our performances now than it was when we got 7 from 7.

I think we are now a very good side and will prove it again and again over the rest of the season. I think some of the football we played second half yesterday was as good as anything we’ve played for years and as good as anything I’ve seen any other side in this League play.

I think Bruce has also forged a fantastic team spirit.

I think we have a better squad of 16/17 players than any other Club in the League, although of course Wolves have half a dozen top quality players.

The media are raving about Wolves but there’s not a lot between the results we’ve each achieved against the other 21 teams.... there IS a difference, but it’s not huge.

 I’m now even beginning to think we might haul back enough to get an Automatic Promotion spot.

Without question there is now no case at all to even consider changing the Manager this season in my view.

[Stevo985]

49 minutes ago, terrytini said:

 

Without question there is now no case at all to even consider changing the Manager this season in my view.

Absolutely not.

I think even 10 games ago when things weren't going so well but we'd still picked up a few results the time had come and gone for the manager to be sacked. The upheaval and potential for a slump just wouldn't be worth it.

Now that you add our recent excellent form into the mix, it's a no brainer that Bruce has to stay.

I was in the Bruce Out camp for a while. But the time has come and gone.

[Villan_of_oz]

1 minute ago, Stevo985 said:

Absolutely not.

I think even 10 games ago when things weren't going so well but we'd still picked up a few results the time had come and gone for the manager to be sacked. The upheaval and potential for a slump just wouldn't be worth it.

Now that you add our recent excellent form into the mix, it's a no brainer that Bruce has to stay.

I was in the Bruce Out camp for a while. But the time has come and gone.

I agree the time has passed. Whether there was ever a time is up to the individual I guess. I backed him, then I wanted him gone and now I'm backing him again, with the caveat being that what irks me about him with probably always irk me. 

Its time for everyone (begrudgingly or not) to back SB until the end of the season, and see where this seasons journey takes us. 

 

[Dave J]

1 hour ago, terrytini said:

In my view we are a very different prospect than we were a couple of months ago and all last season.

I don’t think our current Form of 28 Points from 12 is any more unrepresentative of our performances now than it was when we got 7 from 7.

I think we are now a very good side and will prove it again and again over the rest of the season. I think some of the football we played second half yesterday was as good as anything we’ve played for years and as good as anything I’ve seen any other side in this League play.

I think Bruce has also forged a fantastic team spirit.

I think we have a better squad of 16/17 players than any other Club in the League, although of course Wolves have half a dozen top quality players.

The media are raving about Wolves but there’s not a lot between the results we’ve each achieved against the other 21 teams.... there IS a difference, but it’s not huge.

 I’m now even beginning to think we might haul back enough to get an Automatic Promotion spot.

Without question there is now no case at all to even consider changing the Manager this season in my view.

With the very greatest of respect there is a chasm between us and Wolves - they have a forward thinking manager and quality running through their  team- trust me as a villan who grew up surrounded by Dingles this is not easy to admit but we are a million miles behind them. 

[Demitri_C]

3 minutes ago, Dave J said:

With the very greatest of respect there is a chasm between us and Wolves - they have a forward thinking manager and quality running through their  team- trust me as a villan who grew up surrounded by Dingles this is not easy to admit but we are a million miles behind them. 

I think that abit disrespectful to Bruce, are you saying Bruce isn't forward thinking than I find that rather odd when you consider the form, results and the team unity here. That for me suggests he is forward thinking. 

A million miles away? Absolutely wrong in my opinion. Better perhaps but million miles. You are over rating them and massively under rating us.

[Dave J]

34 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Absolutely not.

I think even 10 games ago when things weren't going so well but we'd still picked up a few results the time had come and gone for the manager to be sacked. The upheaval and potential for a slump just wouldn't be worth it.

Now that you add our recent excellent form into the mix, it's a no brainer that Bruce has to stay.

I was in the Bruce Out camp for a while. But the time has come and gone.

The time has passed for the moment - there remains a number of us who clearly believe this guy is not the man to take Aston Villa to where we all believe we should be. Feel free to bask in the sunshine that this decent run brings with it- i’ll Pop on the shades with you - however I also see the storm clouds in the not too distant horizon - despite the shades 

[Stevo985]

1 minute ago, Dave J said:

The time has passed for the moment - there remains a number of us who clearly believe this guy is not the man to take Aston Villa to where we all believe we should be. Feel free to bask in the sunshine that this decent run brings with it- i’ll Pop on the shades with you - however I also see the storm clouds in the not too distant horizon - despite the shades 

I don't think anyone thinks Steve Bruce is the man to take Aston Villa to where we all believe we should be.

[Dave J]

2 minutes ago, Demitri_C said:

I think that abit disrespectful to Bruce, are you saying Bruce isn't forward thinking than I find that rather odd when you consider the form, results and the team unity here. That for me suggests he is forward thinking. 

A million miles away? Absolutely wrong in my opinion. Better perhaps but million miles. You are over rating them and massively under rating us.

Oh gosh yes I am totally saying Bruce is not forward thinking imo - he is one of those managers that I personally put into yesterday’s category. If you can’t see that the Dingles are miles ahead of us - we’ll thats entirely up to you - I believe they are 

[Jareth]

2 minutes ago, Dave J said:

 I also see the storm clouds in the not too distant horizon - despite the shades 

Shades would make even normal clouds look like storm clouds, so would more likely make you see storm clouds because of the shades, rather than despite.

[Dave J]

1 minute ago, Jareth said:

Shades would make even normal clouds look like storm clouds, so would more likely make you see storm clouds because of the shades, rather than despite.

Ok - ok my bad - but I think you know what I mean