Unai Emery

[Guest av1]

31 minutes ago, TRO said:

Never in my wildest dreams, did I think he could turn these players in to this.

 

Just to add to that mate, with Moreno and Duran both out yesterday, what we saw yesterday was the exact same squad of players that he inherited. 

[TRO]

15 minutes ago, Adam2003 said:

Fair play TRO for holding up your hands and saying “I was wrong” - the world would be a better place if more people could do that!

Thanks......but I didn't really have a hiding place, did I.....lol.

This Gentleman, Has shown me, what and Elite Manager looks like......I have been enlightened.

I always attempt to make a convincing argument, to the best of my ability......but If events ( or other folk)prove me wrong, I like to think, I will just as easy admit to it.

really proud of the bloke.

Edited May 29, 2023 by TRO

[TRO]

5 minutes ago, av1 said:

Just to add to that mate, with Moreno and Duran both out yesterday, what we saw yesterday was the exact same squad of players that he inherited. 

Stop it!!!.....................It makes me look even more stupid.

Amazing man.

I'm running out of superlatives.

[Guest av1]

12 hours ago, TRO said:

Stop it!!!.....................It makes me look even more stupid.

Amazing man.

I'm running out of superlatives.

It absolutely doesn’t make you look stupid at all mate.

I know you was fortunate enough to watch the Saunders era, but for fans of my generation (I’m 44) we’ve simply never experienced a truly elite manager, so there is nothing to compare it too. 

I wasn’t a fan of Gerrard so I absolutely expected things to improve under Emery, but I would be completely lying if I said that I expected this much improvement, with the same squad, so quickly.

You know what’s funny? Emery didn’t immediately come out with players yesterday for the lap of appreciation, and I said the guy that sits next to me ‘I hope to bloody god he comes out, he deserves to know exactly what we think of him’ And he joked back and said ‘he’s probably sat in his office watching the match back trying to work out what we could have done better’ 

It was a joke of course, but the bloke just lives and breathes football, and it shows. 

I said yesterday on here that I wouldn’t swap him for any manager in world football, not only did I mean it, I said the same to my son a few weeks ago, so it wasn’t just the euphoria of European qualification. 

Blokes a genius.

[villarule123]

Can we keep him forever? 

[Tom13]

22 hours ago, It's Your Round said:

Emery will give himself a well deserved break now… two to three hours and then the preparations for next season begin. 
 

 

It's funny because it's true.

[danceoftheshamen]

For me this is the proof that all that has been wrong with AVFC all these years is the fact we have simply not employed a top coach! Ron Saunders was of course a legend, Big Ron was good and Martin O'neill was ok as were Brian Little, Gregory & Graham Taylor MK 1. None of them were on the level of Emery though and for me this is why we were always under performing. 

As for some of the others!? 

So we finally have the answer as to what has bben wrong with AVFC for so many years! Decades in fact!

We never put the main man in place!!!

 

[Zatman]

He won more points since joining than the bottom half teams gained all season including a team that should wipe the floor with us

Absolute elite level

[Talldarkandransome]

2 hours ago, TRO said:

I know......but I didn't think even an elite coach could transform them, to the degree he has.

I too , am humbled.

They say, you never stop learning, well this Brilliant manager, has taught me something, I didn't think was possible.

sometimes, its great to be wrong.

I over valued the leadership credentials of SG, and UE has just shown me what an Elite Manager looks like.....I would suspect many clubs look at him, and say , thats what we need.

For sometime now, we have watched Klopp and Guardiola, lead the praise, for such standout managers.....but Unai Emery, Roberto de Zerbi, Mikel Arteta and Eddie Howe.....are growing in stature too.

This league, is getting harder by the year, to navigate.

Come to my house, I'm always wrong

[Brumstopdogs]

Unai Emery just reconfirms what a lot of us have said before that getting the right manager is just so key as everything else filters down from there.

The importance of getting that decision right can't be overplayed as we have seen with some of the teams that have just been relegated whilst we marched on to Europe!

[macandally]

10 hours ago, Sulberto21 said:

I’ve heard many supporters of us and pundits talk about how Liverscum, Chelsea and TheSpuds will be better next season.

Here’s a thought - if our defence has improved and become so drilled after 25 games imagine how much better they’ll be once Don Unai has a full preseason and is able to get the entire squad as fit as he wants them to be? 

We’ll be better too. 

Shush, whisper this, let’s sail under the radar as long as possible.  It’s all going to be about Newcastle and Brighton, but we will shoot past them with a bit of clever investment and Unai at the helm

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

I'm just hoping people keep perspective and faith during inevitable " rough  patches and/or results

 

[VILLAMARV]

1 minute ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

I'm just hoping people keep perspective and faith during inevitable " rough  patches and/or results

[Brumstopdogs]

2 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

I'm just hoping people keep perspective and faith during inevitable " rough  patches and/or results

 

Welcome to Villa Talk!

i know what you mean though - at some point we could well have a wobble but we just need to remember how lucky we are to have him and remember how bad the alternatives could be.

[Mantis]

2 hours ago, danceoftheshamen said:

For me this is the proof that all that has been wrong with AVFC all these years is the fact we have simply not employed a top coach! Ron Saunders was of course a legend, Big Ron was good and Martin O'neill was ok as were Brian Little, Gregory & Graham Taylor MK 1. None of them were on the level of Emery though and for me this is why we were always under performing. 

As for some of the others!? 

So we finally have the answer as to what has bben wrong with AVFC for so many years! Decades in fact!

We never put the main man in place!!!

 

I think it goes a lot deeper than that. A rot set in during the late O'Neill years which progressively got worse until around 2017ish. We rebuilt down in the Championship and got used to winning a bit more, got new owners + Smith who transformed the culture of the club etc Losing Grealish and the Gerrard debacle was a bit of a blip of course but even then the recruitment seems to have been decent on the personality side.

Basically, having a world class manager helps a great deal, but there's a strong foundation there which has been built by Smith (for all his limitations as a manager), NSWE, Purslow, Lange etc.

7 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

I'm just hoping people keep perspective and faith during inevitable " rough  patches and/or results

 

Something I was thinking: who was the last Villa manager who made it this far into their tenure without actually having a proper rough patch? The closest he got was three losses on the bounce, but even then two of those losses were against Arsenal and Man City and the defeats were sandwiched in between two wins either side.

[viivvaa66]

4 hours ago, TRO said:

Never in my wildest dreams, did I think he could turn these players in to this.

I was convinced, it was the players, how wrong was I?......Thats not saying, we don't need strengthening, because we do....but some of the boys, have more than surprised me.

However, I am delighted to be wrong.......I never thought it was possible, to see such a vast change in their form.

Bravo Unai.

I knew the players were better than what they was able to show under Gerrard, and rightly blamed the manager, But not even I could have predicted the level of improvement under Emery. I feel like calling it an improvement is the wrong word, it more like a complete transformation, playing wise each player is unrecognisable from what they were a few months ago.

There is a lot of talk about managers needs a pre-season, to get players to properly perform in the manager’s system. If that is true, how amazing will our players be next season. 

[stewiek2]

Emery took over with us out of the bottom three on goals scored. Now with us in Europa conference next season it's 16 years consecutive seasons of European football for him. Elite.

[Pinebro]

So glad he stuck to his beliefs and not cathering to the 'kick it long' crowd.

[TheStagMan]

The more I think about it the more i realise how amazing the job he has done here is. 

Not just the results but the transformation in the players, the confidence and the clear gameplan each time.

I am really looking forward to seeing what he can do after a bit of a break and time to mould the team into his own with a full pre-season and a summer transfer window.

[allani]

6 minutes ago, Pinebro said:

So glad he stuck to his beliefs and not cathering to the 'kick it long' crowd.

Even if we had finished 12th I would have hoped that we stuck to the style of football Emery wants us to play.  It was important to find out which players could adjust to that style.  Personally, given how awful we were at passing the ball 5-10 metres under the previous regime I was worried that it would be too big a jump for many of our players.  Most have actually adjusted pretty well (most of the time).  At least we (and Emery) have a much better idea of who will / will not fit the system - rather than adopting any old style to survive the season and then reset over the summer.