Steve Bruce

[TRO]

5 minutes ago, AntrimBlack said:

Are you trying to tell me that CH teams are not inferior to PL teams? Because that is what I am saying, and you seem to be disagreeing.

On the contrary.....I am not disagreeing at all.....The premiership is a far more technically superior league.

I am saying the Championship in general is a more physically challenging league and the referee's don't protect players who want to play football in the same way as they do in the Prem.

so when teams come down, they get a bit of a shock, talking generally of course , there are always exceptions to everything.

[TRO]

2 minutes ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

Not many relagated teams got to blow the money on players that we did - and we still failed to capitalise on it.

because over a succession of seasons and managers, we have made a pigs ear of recruitment.

A previous post " Villa 4life" I think it was who said.....no due dilligence, no checking the character of some of the "bum steers" we have signed.

It's been nothing short of a scandal what we have done.....and its landed us where we are......only hard work, good decision making and a bit of spondulicks will get us out.

[sheepyvillian]

12 minutes ago, TRO said:

That's if you're are right of course....I'm not so sure you are.

I don't think the problem is so much style or design or coaching......I think we have players in certain positions who are not contributing to the overall sufficiently enough and its taking the edge off  the good ones .

Its not a pop, its an observation......Adomah and Kodjia functioning to their potential, would change the face of this team at present they are passengers, you can't carry passengers with promotion ambitions.

We need a dominating Centre Half.....you just cannot brush these things under the carpet and it affects other parts of the team.

In my opinion.....If we had 11 players with square pegs in square holes etc......I feel confident the shape and the style and the method would return......We are like a lumpy engine with a duff spark plug, fix that and it runs smoothly.

by all accounts SB is trying to bring players in .....we are a team with the largest gates and among the smallest Squads.....but we need players who can Dominate their position,(not just numbers)like Jack and John Mc

When the team is fixed and its still the same.....I will join the Bruce out campaign.......but I feel sure that's what it is.

The problem is when someone says the players are not good enough, someone else thinks they mean all of them......We have some damn good players, but not in every position.

We have just added one and I will be really surprised if he does not turn out to be an absolute crowd favourite.....but we need a striker like that now.

And at whose doorstep does the responsibility lie for that ? You've been saying this that long, that surely the manager should of rectified the problem, if that is indeed the problem.

[TRO]

6 minutes ago, sheepyvillian said:

And at whose doorstep does the responsibility lie for that ? You've been saying this that long, that surely the manager should of rectified the problem, if that is indeed the problem.

under normal circumstances you are right....but the circumstances in his time have been hardly normal......He took over a ship wreck and apart from his one cock up on Hogan has had dribs and drabs of money

After we just missed promotion, the natural thing would be to build on that improvement and then....BAM...... we was in doubt if we actually had a club, never mind a team.

Sheepy, If you read my post carefully......I have said, get the team right in terms of personnel, then if it doesn't still work, he has to go.

I accept that this argument cannot be sustained forever, but I believe he can get it right.....with the right players.

You have seen for yourself with McGinn what happens when you sign a lad with a bit of fire in his belly.....we need more like that in other positions

Edited August 14, 2018 by TRO

[AvfcRigo82]

15 minutes ago, TRO said:

On the contrary.....I am not disagreeing at all.....The premiership is a far more technically superior league.

I am saying the Championship in general is a more physically challenging league and the referee's don't protect players who want to play football in the same way as they do in the Prem.

so when teams come down, they get a bit of a shock, talking generally of course , there are always exceptions to everything.

Cannot argue with this one bit. I get what you mean by this. It is a whole new arena down here altogether.

I do feel however that last season ourselves and Wolves should have been the 'Automatic promotion exception' given the resources to both.

One capitalised but we're still here.

 

[TRO]

9 minutes ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

Cannot argue with this one bit. I get what you mean by this. It is a whole new arena down here altogether.

I do feel however that last season ourselves and Wolves should have been the 'Automatic promotion exception' given the resources to both.

One capitalised but we're still here.

 

AR.....I don't expect folk to Agree with me but for years IMO....we have been lightweight, in a general sense,some players have been ok, buy not enough IMO

I love watching the technical side of the game....but there is a darker side and you have to compete, the great players do, they are resilient and it some times goes unnoticed.

Jack has now embraced it and is nearly twice the player.....as an example Albert and Kodjia, for what ever reasons are miles off it.....They are just not competing and a team looking for promotion, struggles with that.

Taylor has lost that bit too and looks a shadow of himself.....Its a hard league and we need players who can not only play but resist the bullying too.....else we will end up mid table.

Those guys should be going back in the afternoons and working on getting back to form.

Edited August 14, 2018 by TRO

[villabromsgrove]

34 minutes ago, holteend1982 said:

Towards the end of our time this would have been a good result, 6-1 with mane scoring the fastest ever Premier league hat trick against us! People must surely forget how bad things actually were to be complaining about the way we win and talking in a way that we have some sort of right to be a top flight team. 

 Personally I looked at Hull and I thought that we had better players than they did. I looked at Wigan and I again thought that we had better players than them.

I expected us to win both games because we were better, not because we're some mythical top team with a divine right to win.

In general we will probably have slightly better players than most other teams in this division (at least by the time we bring in a couple of good loan players), but the equaliser will be that a number of other teams will have better head coaches and systems than us.

 

[AvfcRigo82]

15 minutes ago, TRO said:

because over a succession of seasons and managers, we have made a pigs ear of recruitment.

A previous post " Villa 4life" I think it was who said.....no due dilligence, no checking the character of some of the "bum steers" we have signed.

It's been nothing short of a scandal what we have done.....and its landed us where we are......only hard work, good decision making and a bit of spondulicks will get us out.

Again totally agree with you on the whole with most of this. However, the scandal goes back as far as 2006 if you ask me and in 2016/17 we felt we had finally plugged the problem, turned the corner and started a fresh.

It appeared not and only to discover we are still no different and in even worse circumstances now.

Without drifting away from the origin of this piece, we are still repeating the above as far as last January under Steve Bruce.

(James Bree, Henri Lansbury, Scott Hogan, Birkir Bjarnason & Taylor.)

Another manager in the same ilk would have spent the money more wisely on players he planned giving games to.

[TRO]

1 minute ago, villabromsgrove said:

 Personally I looked at Hull and I thought that we had better players than they did. I looked at Wigan and I again thought that we had better players than them.

I expected us to win both games because we were better, not because we're some mythical top team with a divine right to win.

In general we will probably have slightly better players than most other teams in this division (at least by the time we bring in a couple of good loan players), but the equaliser will be that a number of other teams will have better head coaches and systems than us.

 

I watched our  team last season, never missed a home game .....and I didn't think every one of our players was better than the opposition.....I could see certain players playing for opposing teams that were better than ours, just my Opinion.

We have players like Jack that are way above what the opposition have, but some are not.....until we get players close to jacks standard, we are going to struggle and I don't mean his silky skills, I mean dominating their position.It looks at first glimpse like John McGinn could be one.....Chester Overall is one....but we haven't got enough.....Terry and Snoddy was up there, but the shenanigans in the summer scuppered any plans to remedy that.

I understand its folks opinions and I respect yours.....for me, we still have players who are not good enough on match day.....whether its is temporary form loss, confidence, whatever.....but some are just not doing it.

[sne]

1 minute ago, TRO said:

 

I understand its folks opinions and I respect yours.....for me, we still have players who are not good enough on match day.....whether its is temporary form loss, confidence, whatever.....but some are just not doing it.

Agree with this, but that goes for every team in the Championship.

But unlike most other teams we have a vast squad that is supposed to offset this if used correctly.

 

[Vive_La_Villa]

Surely stats like the best home record, team with most goals, one of the best defence, best win percentage of any manager etc etc are all irrelevant if we don’t get promoted. 

[villabromsgrove]

1 minute ago, TRO said:

I watched our  team last season, never missed a home game .....and I didn't think every one of our players was better than the opposition.....I could see certain players playing for opposing teams that were better than ours, just my Opinion.

We have players like Jack that are way above what the opposition have, but some are not.....until we get players close to jacks standard, we are going to struggle and I don't mean his silky skills, I mean dominating their position.It looks at first glimpse like John McGinn could be one.....Chester Overall is one....but we haven't got enough.....Terry and Snoddy was up there, but the shenanigans in the summer scuppered any plans to remedy that.

I understand its folks opinions and I respect yours.....for me, we still have players who are not good enough on match day.....whether its is temporary form loss, confidence, whatever.....but some are just not doing it.

I didn't mean that every one of our players were better than the opposition, just that in total we had the better players.

I remember how many times last season other team's managers said pre match, that Villa had some very good players and an enviable squad.

There are a couple of players that I would replace in an instant, but on balance I still think that a better coach could get more out of the players we've got.

As you say TRO, it's all about individual opinions.

[TRO]

2 minutes ago, sne said:

Agree with this, but that goes for every team in the Championship.

But unlike most other teams we have a vast squad that is supposed to offset this if used correctly.

 

just as a matter of interest we are in are in 18th place of 24 in squad size.....Derby have the biggest squad, Blues have more than us.

We have 25 players with squad numbers.

We have the equal least  amount of strikers 4. with the rest of the league.

This is not a bitch, its just observing the facts.

I know SB has promised Loan signings, I just hope he is able to secure some and plug the weak gaps.

[sne]

Just now, TRO said:

just as a matter of interest we are in are in 18th place of 24 in squad size.....Derby have the biggest squad, Blues have more than us.

We have 25 players with squad numbers.

We have the equal least  amount of strikers 4. with the rest of the league.

This is not a bitch, its just observing the facts.

I know SB has promised Loan signings, I just hope he is able to secure some and plug the weak gaps.

Thought we were talking about the previous 2 seasons?

Anyway I bet we are among the top when it comes to number of RB's so that's something...

[TRO]

3 minutes ago, villabromsgrove said:

I didn't mean that every one of our players were better than the opposition, just that in total we had the better players.

I remember how many times last season other team's managers said pre match, that Villa had some very good players and an enviable squad.

There are a couple of players that I would replace in an instant, but on balance I still think that a better coach could get more out of the players we've got.

As you say TRO, it's all about individual opinions.

and hey! who am i to say you are wrong.....its subjective.

I just happen to think when a couple of players are struggling offensively to make any kind of mark, its make it difficult for the rest.

The No9 position is crucially important for me.....over the years I have seen the right player come in and it has transformed the team, its more than just scoring goals if the job is done right.

Mitrovic transformed Fulham last season, when they were lying 10th in Jan......Its only one position but its the fulcrum and only one player, but its critical its played right.

I hope Steve Bruce see's it for what it is, because Kodj is no leader of the line.

 

[TRO]

7 minutes ago, sne said:

Thought we were talking about the previous 2 seasons?

Anyway I bet we are among the top when it comes to number of RB's so that's something...

sorry, just talking about this season....but yes, that's true.....less goalies and right backs.. more forwards.

[Vive_La_Villa]

8 minutes ago, TRO said:

just as a matter of interest we are in are in 18th place of 24 in squad size.....Derby have the biggest squad, Blues have more than us.

We have 25 players with squad numbers.

We have the equal least  amount of strikers 4. with the rest of the league.

This is not a bitch, its just observing the facts.

I know SB has promised Loan signings, I just hope he is able to secure some and plug the weak gaps.

Before the takeover I would have literally taken anything that meant keeping us in this league. But now we’ve managed to keep our best players and Jack if we don’t bring in quality additions and improve on last season it will feel like such a massive opportunity wasted. There is no way Jack would stay another year in this league.

Id say the pressure on Bruce is even greater than last season. He has to deliver.

[AntrimBlack]

26 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

Surely stats like the best home record, team with most goals, one of the best defence, best win percentage of any manager etc etc are all irrelevant if we don’t get promoted. 

Exactly. I want to be back in the Premier League. I don't give a shit about these stats if we are not promoted.

[Vive_La_Villa]

2 minutes ago, AntrimBlack said:

Exactly. I want to be back in the Premier League. I don't give a shit about these stats if we are not promoted.

Bruce has basically been given an extra life. It really does have to be promotion and nothing else. If at any point this season we start dropping away from the top 6 the new owners will pull the trigger. 

 

[Dave J]

2 hours ago, bannedfromHandV said:

It's all relative though surely? 

We are not a PL club, we do not have a PL team, so why would we devalue our results using that criteria?

By that logic, a defeat in the PL is not so bad then, yet I doubt anyone, whilst we were doing so poorly in the PL, consoled themselves on reflection by thinking 'well we've just been beaten 3-0 by Southampton but at least it was in the PL'.

Its flawed logic, in my opinion. 

Would you not agree that he's had resource as close to the prem that you can get in this league  ? So is it really that flawed ?