Dean Smith

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

This sums up my thoughts on the argument... Lol

* It's an old screen grab so no link.

Edited March 23, 2021 by JAMAICAN-VILLAN

[osmark86]

6 minutes ago, sparrow1988 said:

A little bit but it's way more than that I think. It's the instant nature of everything nowadays and the always on economy which has been exacerbated by lockdowns etc. You can't go for a few pints, you can't kick a lad at training or in a sunday league game to let out your frustrations. You can't go to a stadium at the weekend and shout abuse at players for 90 minutes. People just let loose on their keyboards.

Computer games have always been computer games and as @JAMAICAN-VILLAN said they are actually becoming more and more realistic. I blame social media more so. You have everyone trying to break the news first, which quite often turns out to be wrong but people run with it in any case because it was first. The truth comes then maybe an hour later and is then lost in the shitshow that has gone before. Anyway that's enough from me on this subject.

 

I mean, you're pretty much right. Any excuse for a good ol' moan is accepted with open arms by an army of grumpy people.

[osmark86]

1 minute ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

This sums up my thoughts on the argument... Lol

 

* It's an old screen grab so no link.

misguided anger strikes again XD

[Zatman]

6 minutes ago, sparrow1988 said:

A little bit but it's way more than that I think. It's the instant nature of everything nowadays and the always on economy which has been exacerbated by lockdowns etc. You can't go for a few pints, you can't kick a lad at training or in a sunday league game to let out your frustrations. You can't go to a stadium at the weekend and shout abuse at players for 90 minutes. People just let loose on their keyboards.

Computer games have always been computer games and as @JAMAICAN-VILLAN said they are actually becoming more and more realistic. I blame social media more so. You have everyone trying to break the news first, which quite often turns out to be wrong but people run with it in any case because it was first. The truth comes then maybe an hour later and is then lost in the shitshow that has gone before. Anyway that's enough from me on this subject.

 

computer games + Twitter = toxic combination

I think there is a crossover if honest and it gives an unrealistic expectation. You have people crying if Southampton or West Ham sign some awesome player from the game and its a lack of ambition from your club

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

4 minutes ago, osmark86 said:

misguided anger strikes again XD

I'm not actually angry at all mate.

However I do think it's food for thought.

It poses questions, and of course, we could be totally off the mark, and looking for things where they don't exist. ( It's what we do )

It's just thinking out loud though really.

Get prepared for random moaning about anything to intensify though as we have two weeks of no Club football .

Edited March 23, 2021 by JAMAICAN-VILLAN

[osmark86]

2 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

I'm not actually angry at all mate.

However I do think it's food for thought.

It poses questions, and of course, we could be totally off the mark, and looking for things where they don't exist. ( It's what we do? )

It's just thinking out loud though really.

Get prepared for random moaning about anything to intensify though as we have two weeks of no Club football .

it wasn't pointed at you mate. in fact, my general impression of you on this forum is one of a very level-headed person most of the time

edit: it was aimed at that lovely twittee Clare fyi

Edited March 23, 2021 by osmark86

[barry'sboots]

19 minutes ago, Zatman said:

I dont know, i got 7 million combined for Elmo, Lansbury and Taylor recently in FM

Lange Out

I've never played FM but I can't believe that there is a game anywhere that could pay 7m for those 3??

[sparrow1988]

3 minutes ago, Zatman said:

computer games + Twitter = toxic combination

I think there is a crossover if honest and it gives an unrealistic expectation. You have people crying if Southampton or West Ham sign some awesome player from the game and its a lack of ambition from your club

Yeah there is that but they are also getting more and more accurate with their algorithms so to an extent they can be right, but you also have the Richie Partridges of the games as well.

[nick76]

4 minutes ago, osmark86 said:

misguided anger strikes again XD

Maybe but maybe not.  Folks working double shifts daily at hospitals and underpaid is not nice, so shoving a bit of pasta at 9am and playing a sport we all love for silly money seems a bit out of touch.

[osmark86]

1 minute ago, nick76 said:

Maybe but maybe not.  Folks working double shifts daily at hospitals and underpaid is not nice, so shoving a bit of pasta at 9am and playing a sport we all love for silly money seems a bit out of touch.

what I mean is that getting angry at Wayne Rooney won't help their situations. getting political might.

[sheepyvillian]

I remember when everyone was calling for Ferguson to go, and look what he went on to achieve. Even Saunders had his doubters. We all want an Aston Villa that is consistently achieving, but, rest assured, it's going to take longer than a lot of you, it seems, have the patience for.

 

Edited March 23, 2021 by sheepyvillian

[barry'sboots]

12 hours ago, nick76 said:

What is with some fans wanting to throw kids into a struggling team? I don’t get it, you just don’t do that for so many reasons and many coaches would tell you that. Just plain bizarre!

So we have gone from Bielsa being the alternative hero by some fans to now Rodgers.  Manager of the moment replication.  Rodgers is doing exceptional well but he also has many more options than Smith, his starting base was a team that had won the league not long before hand unlike Smith, so he has many more options at his disposal because of investment beforehand.

Smith has been trying things just not the things you want.  He’s rotated all the midfielders and wingers to no avail.  The only difference you have is play two strikers which he might have tried but he only has one decent striker in Ollie.  Even against Newcastle he play Ollie up top with El Ghazi at the end as a front two basically because KD isn’t good enough.

The kids did okay against a strong Liverpool team.  However, I am not saying throw all of them in, I am saying I'd rather see JPB, who is 19 and highly coveted, get a start than Trez.  The coaching staff will obviously have a view on suitability.  I do think, if they are as good as we are led to believe then it is worth giving them a run out.  I can understand your point if there is a lot pressure but there is none - we are safe on 41 points.  There are plenty of young players playing in struggling teams all across the country.  Ask them if they would rather not be playing first team football.  I'm not saying it is right for all or that they all need pushing in straight away.

I have never mentioned Bielsa but I do think Rodgers is proving this year that he is a tactically astute coach and he is also showing that he is prepared to be a lot more flexible than Smith is.  They are massively punching above their weight.  Smith is predictable - we all know that - and that, I believe, has been to our detriment since the turn of the year.

Smith has tried things, but it is always like for like.  He has mixed up the midfield but it is largely direct replacements and the same system.  I guess we are never going to agree and if you are happy with Smith dogmatically sticking to a rigid 4-3-3/4-2-3-1 then that is your choice - and you clearly are.  All I, and some others, are saying is that we want him to try something a bit different and see if it provides a spark.  I get that you don't rate KD and that I am probably a bit more optimistic about his potential than you are.  I am just amazed that anybody can be happy to see us repeatedly starting in a 4-3-3 with Trez and AEG on the wings - we have been really poor for the last 6 or so games and not great before that, even with Jack in the side as teams have seen how we play, figured out a way to combat it and we have not responded.  

I think we will have to agree to disagree on most of this though.

[Indigo]

1 hour ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

Not so much denial, more so about ignoring points that are being put across to you.

I said "for most parts of this season we have been in a realistic position to finish 5th, 6th or 7th", which we have been.

Let me make one final thing clear on this, I didn't come into this season thinking or expecting us to finish in the top 6.

However, seeing us in such a position right up until January to be in with a realistic shout of finishing in one of those positions, this was realistically achievable based on our results and league position up until then.

Since then, we have looked mediocre and bang average and it's frustrating we have thrown all our hard work away with stupid results to teams that are 14th-20th.

I hope this makes sense and clears up the confusion.

 

I mean I don't necessarily disagree at all with what you've said here (apart from that I think accomplishing such a high finish in the table was actually pretty unrealistic given the comparative quality in squad we have to the teams we'd be competing with), but you literally said "we could have easily cemented a top 6 finish this season" which is a bit more on the extreme end of things from how you've framed it in this case.

[DCJonah]

1 hour ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

Not so much denial, more so about ignoring points that are being put across to you.

I said "for most parts of this season we have been in a realistic position to finish 5th, 6th or 7th", which we have been.

Let me make one final thing clear on this, I didn't come into this season thinking or expecting us to finish in the top 6.

However, seeing us in such a position right up until January to be in with a realistic shout of finishing in one of those positions, this was realistically achievable based on our results and league position up until then.

Since then, we have looked mediocre and bang average and it's frustrating we have thrown all our hard work away with stupid results to teams that are 14th-20th.

I hope this makes sense and clears up the confusion.

 

Well this is where we disagree. Was there a chance? A slim one, but I wouldn't call it realistic and I certainly wouldn't say it was something easily achievable. 

We'd made a superb start to the season but the consistency required to finish top 6 is something else. The thing that gives these teams at the top consistency is that squad depth. Look at spurs the other night, poor form and injuries but still players that would walk into our team. I doubt even with their missing player trez and El ghazi make their bench and Davis wouldn't be allowed on their bus. We don't have that. 

In the last decade there have been 2 seasons in which a team you wouldn't expect to, have finished in the top 6. I think its safe to say there has never been a team go from bottom half of the championship to top 6 within 3 seasons, since the prem began. And apart from Leicester, I can't think of another team that finished 17th and then made the top 6 the following season. 

So when you take that into consideration, how realistic was it really that we'd maintain that form over 38 games? It's such a rare occurrence, then you add in the covid out break, fixture pile up and losing your best player. 

You look at league history, the quality of the players the teams above us have, their strength in depth, their experience in this league and I can't see any reason why I could argue that over 38 games we should be more consistent than any of them

That's where the unrealistic nature of it is for me.

[AvfcRigo82]

2 minutes ago, Indigo said:

You literally said "we could have easily cemented a top 6 finish this season" which is a bit more on the extreme end of things from how you've framed it in this case.

I don't deny it.

In the position we were in back in January we could have done, I don't think it was being too unrealistic given we had two games in hand for quite a while.

[DCJonah]

48 minutes ago, sheepyvillian said:

I remember when everyone was calling for Ferguson to go, and look what he went on to achieve. Even Saunders had his doubters. We all want an Aston Villa that is consistently achieving, but, rest assured, it's going to take longer than a lot of you, it seems, have the patience for.

 

Absolutely. 

As a fan, I just want something to get behind and something to believe in. We have that. The players talk about what we are building. The owners are mega rich and have shown their ambition. 

We're on a journey, I don't get why some are so impatient. 

[Vive_La_Villa]

I always take a complete day off from the site when we lose a game. Especially when we were shit.  Gives people a chance to calm down. 
 

Logged back on here yesterday and it’s quite relaxed.

[Mjvilla]

1 hour ago, Demitri_C said:

I see this football manager quite being bought about alot.i dont think there is football manager about it.

We all seen trez is not consistent and he really is not good enough for this level. He has 0 goals 0 assists this year. He was heavily linked in the summer with Turkey but we kept him on and smith felt we only needed one winger in traore. 

Now im hearing excuses from some posters that because trez and aeg cant get in any of the top sides that means we shouldnt be looking at challenging for europe.

No one said finishin top 8 was easy but it was achoevable this year due to how bad the likes liverpool spurs wolves arsenal etc have been.

We havent even had injuries like leicester have yet they seem to cope. Why is it we cant cope with one player injured?

Its poor and not good enough. Wewill never achowve anything if we cabt cope when grealish gets injured 

Name a Turkish club that could afford the £8.5m plus fee that would've come with trez? I think I remember reading they wanted to loan him, absolutely no good for us.

If we got £8.5m for him, are we really going to be able to get better for £8.5m? 

All the players mentioned (benrahma the latest by you) cost £20m plus. We simply didn't have that to spend. This is neither the owner nor deans fault. It's simply FFP. 

Simply saying we can sell trez and bring another winger in is football manager type speak. It's easy on there, I play it. I sold trez to China for £17m. PERFECT. But it's not going to happen in the real world.

I just don't think it's a coincidence that those that think all this is easy are those that are complaining about Smith.

It's funny though, also, that despite those teams you mentioned being so bad. 1 is sat behind us, 1 is 1 point ahead of us having played a game more.

The other 2, only 1 side in the entire English game has managed to sit above them that you wouldn't expect to be there... But it's Deans fault for us not being there? I just can't get my head round it. 

To compare us to Leicester is even more bizarre. They have had years and years of building a squad full of £20m plus players. Developing the players they buy. Being able to buy shit and replace it after a couple of years if they aren't good enough. They spent £31m on a 19 year old in the summer. We aren't there. We are a long way off that. If you're comparing us to Leicester now, then we may aswell give up now on Smith and any other manager we employ. Even with multiple injuries, they are better than us 

 

[Mjvilla]

6 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

I always take a complete day off from the site when we lose a game. Especially when we were shit.  Gives people a chance to calm down. 
 

Logged back on here yesterday and it’s quite relaxed.

Yep, this and staying away from the match thread and the immediate post match thread do the business for me.

[Indigo]

At the turn of the year we were sat in 5th while level on points with 4 other teams, 3 of which were City, Chelsea and Spurs. I think to expect to fend off those sides over the course of over 20 remaining games given the respective quality of all the squads involved is a bit unrealistic at best and bordering on just an outright unfair criticism.

Our league position isn't a concern for me at all at the moment, it's just the manner of our recent performances, specifically concerning our ability to create chances and generally retain the ball. Our unexpectedly great start to the season has only really given the coaching staff credit in the bank on that front for me rather than grounds for some of the derision I've seen. There's plenty of time left in the season for a turnaround to be made and I think it's just as possible that we manage that in some form as there us for us to completely fold and drop to 13th/14th or wherever.

None a given obviously but if we could beat Fulham, Palace and West Brom - which while completely feasible watch us get battered in each now that I've said that - and possibly nab a draw here or there across the more difficult fixtures remaining we'll have accrued a points total that in recent seasons has seen teams finish in the 7th-8th sort of range. Put in perspective like that it really won't take much for us to manage what would still represent a significantly successful season even with the context of this run we're on taken into account, and be in an even stronger position than anticipated to be able to continue to build.

 

...cue a 10 game losing streak.