Steven Gerrard

[WHY]

4 minutes ago, Tomaszk said:

Not met a villa fan who rates him highly yet! Little club on here though.

I don’t rate him but I also don’t think the squad is anywhere near as good as a lot of our fans think it is either. It’s a 11/12/13th Squad imo. 

[daft]

1 minute ago, WHY said:

I don’t rate him but I also don’t think the squad is anywhere near as good as a lot of our fans think it is either. It’s a 11/12/13th Squad imo. 

Agreed about the squad. And now we lost two obvious improvements on that rather mediocre bunch.  Quite frankly I don't think anyone on here is happy with the man and the job he's done so far. 

[Vive_La_Villa]

32 minutes ago, WHY said:

I’m not content but what I do know is that our squad is nowhere near a top 8 squad, currently I would say it’s just below mid table. 

But that’s why we need a manager and coaching team that can get the best out of them whether it through coaching, tactics or just man management.  

[Tom13]

1 hour ago, WHY said:

The football has been poor but it was under Smith when Grealish was injured. We still have virtually the same team as then, I’m not really that surprised it’s not great, Grealish carried the dross and it still shows. 

Steven has a better balanced squad than Smith had. He has both Kamara and Douglas Luiz - the basis of a very good midfield. And he barely starts them together

[smokingzen]

1 hour ago, Tomaszk said:

Not met a villa fan who rates him highly yet! Little club on here though.

Maybe that shows the world is a little bigger and more varied in opinion than your limited anecdotal experiences.

[PussEKatt]

Just now, Tom13 said:

Yeah I'd change my mind as well not playing in my preferred position, then we finally get a proper DM and he's benched for McGinn.

I put that down to Gerrards NEW "Pragmatic"football and tactics.Watch us go now.I would not be surprised if we finished higher than last season.Say 13th.

[Keyblade]

3 hours ago, Tomaszk said:

Going to be funny when the next manager comes in and the same content voices now will be barking for top 8.

Depends if it's a big English name or not. But if it's some foreign guy or an up and coming English manager like Cooper, it's going to be top 8, now!

[PieFacE]

The fact that he is seemingly talking about going back to a more pragmatic approach and no longer doing the pretty things (which we didn't do anyway) highlights even more how poor of a manager he is. How many pre seasons is it going to take until he can get this team defending well with an actual identity going forward. 

I think he has a way he wants to play, but he has no idea how to coach this team to do it. And that's going to be a problem forever. It's not just suddenly going to click. It would have already. 

[StewieGriffin]

The "going back to a pragmatic approach" part of his interview really worried me.

Other coaches come in and have an immediate impact on changing a style, some need a pre-season so effectively write off half a season, some need to bring in players to suit their style.

Gerrard didn't quite manage the first, but did roll out the "pre-season will be massive for us" from about March and has certainly brought in a lot of expensive players. Losing Beale will have been disruptive, but he's been replaced with another good coach.

When we saw pre-season games we were concerned that nothing had moved forward over the summer and now we're 6 weeks into the real thing and we're arguably worse.

And now he's thought "bin the pretty stuff, lets be pragmatic" - he had an idea, an identity he wanted, and has ended up second guessing himself which has resulted in a confused mess. The players haven't a clue how to create, yet we've got Coutinho, Buendia and Bailey - 3 of the most talented players we've seen at Villa Park in a generation.

This is on the manager, it isnt working. 

[WHY]

49 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

But this was classed as unacceptable ans eventually cost him his job. 

Why is it different now that we've signed more players on huge wages and improved the squad?

I agree it’s not acceptable. I was more pointing out that the squad isn’t that great and recruitment has been poor for the most part. I want Gerrard and Lange gone, both a culpable imo. 

Edited September 18, 2022 by WHY

[MaVilla]

19 minutes ago, StewieGriffin said:

The "going back to a pragmatic approach" part of his interview really worried me.

Other coaches come in and have an immediate impact on changing a style, some need a pre-season so effectively write off half a season, some need to bring in players to suit their style.

Gerrard didn't quite manage the first, but did roll out the "pre-season will be massive for us" from about March and has certainly brought in a lot of expensive players. Losing Beale will have been disruptive, but he's been replaced with another good coach.

When we saw pre-season games we were concerned that nothing had moved forward over the summer and now we're 6 weeks into the real thing and we're arguably worse.

And now he's thought "bin the pretty stuff, lets be pragmatic" - he had an idea, an identity he wanted, and has ended up second guessing himself which has resulted in a confused mess. The players haven't a clue how to create, yet we've got Coutinho, Buendia and Bailey - 3 of the most talented players we've seen at Villa Park in a generation.

This is on the manager, it isnt working. 

a good manager finds a good balance between defence and attack, offering overall, optimal scenarios in both areas (ie: a good set of overall tactics and formation etc to balance attack/defence to give the team the best overall chances of picking up points).

Gerrard just seems to think there is only two ways to play, gung-ho or ultra defensive.

its depressing.

[MaVilla]

2 hours ago, WHY said:

Who would you suggest mate, Smith couldn’t manage it either, I watched plenty of games under him that were like Friday night and that was when we had Grealish. We’ve had different coaches who are highly rated and they still can’t get a tune out of them. Maybe just maybe the players just aren’t good enough. We lack proper athleticism throughout the team, this is the biggest issue imo. Recruitment has been for the large part poor. 

Honestly, however much i do now want Gerrard gone, i do think thats its not 100% Gerrards fault (although he isnt helping with his sh** tactics etc).

I think its partly the fact that some of our players just arent that good (technical ability/football intelligence), even us fans i think overrate a fair few of our players, coupled with a fairly poor manager, add them both together and we get what we are seeing at Villa.

Edited September 18, 2022 by MaVilla

[DaveAV1]

8 minutes ago, MaVilla said:

a good manager finds a good balance between defence and attack, offering overall, optimal scenarios in both areas (ie: a good set of overall tactics and formation etc to balance attack/defence to give the team the best overall chances of picking up points).

Gerrard just seems to think there is only two ways to play, gung-ho or ultra defensive.

its depressing.

Reminds me of Lambert, during various periods of his reign, we were either a team that defended or a team that attacked but never in the same game. The available funds were quite different then though though. 

[rbcuk]

How anyone can still want him as our manager I’ll never know, the 2nd half Friday night could have easily fell asleep watching that dross, was lucky Southampton was worse than us, the game against city they squandered so many chances it could have been 3 or 4, it’s some of the worse football I’ve seen when your in the ground you see the whole pitch unlike on tv and still ain’t got a clue what his tactics are 

[AvonVillain]

11 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

It’s just everything feels a bit boring at the moment. 

Absolutely. I didn't even listen to the last few minutes of the last match. I can't remember ever having done that before. The mood, lack of progress and dreadful style of play, big ego manager on massive money with no discernible aptitude for the job... on and on. I'm not even someone who 'expects' progress as though we've some kind of right to be good because of our history, but this lack of connection to what's going on at the club AGAIN after so much was put right by the previous regime, has just made become a bit numb to it all.

[R.Bear]

Its infuriating that loss to West Ham. They are total shit and would be level with Leicester if we hadn't gifted them 3 points.

[AvonVillain]

The sacking / appointment felt reckless and misjudged, and in typical Villa style, it's been even worse than we feared.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

26 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

Fair points. I’m not with the ‘anyone can do better’  and hate everything he does crowd. It’s just everything feels a bit boring at the moment. 

Yeah that's where I'm at.

Meh but not hyperbolic yet 

Edited September 18, 2022 by JAMAICAN-VILLAN

[viivvaa66]

2 minutes ago, R.Bear said:

Its infuriating that loss to West Ham. They are total shit and would be level with Leicester if we hadn't gifted them 3 points.

Problem is that we also are in the total shit category. We have better players, but they have been put in a formation that don’t get the best out of them.

The matches against West Ham, Bournemouth and Crystal Palace were all winnable, but we lost because of bad team selection, wrong tactics and rubbish substitution.

[Tomaszk]

58 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Yeah that's where I'm at.

Meh but not hyperbolic yet 

When you play football like this, it doesn't take much to flip people over into the OUT mob.

It's gives you absolutely no leeway, and nor should it. 

If we lost 1-0 to Southampton via a dodgy looking, up for offside discussion, goal, the reaction would be extreme.

I hope Gerrard knows this, but I expect he doesn't because he doesn't seem to get very much.