The RJW63 Official Jack Grealish Appreciation Thread

[Stevo985]

He's utterly wonderful.

Maybe a lack of cutting edge still. But the way he plays makes me so happy. He just never loses the ball, and makes defenders look like mugs. There was a moment today on our left wing in the second half. he had the ball on the touchline, stood still waited for the challenge and took it round two players.

It was brilliant.

[PaulC]

46 minutes ago, Juju said:

and for all of those bozo's old enough to remember when players were not protected by refs in the same way, George Best used to get lumps kicked out of him every game.

What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. Difference is Best used his balance to stay on his feet. Beautiful balance he had. That's why Grealish may become Great, but possible not "one of" the Greats.

 

Yes Best was probably the greatest player to ever come out of Britain though

[Woodytom]

26 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

He's utterly wonderful.

Maybe a lack of cutting edge still. But the way he plays makes me so happy. He just never loses the ball, and makes defenders look like mugs. There was a moment today on our left wing in the second half. he had the ball on the touchline, stood still waited for the challenge and took it round two players.

It was brilliant.

Haha, he was good. utterly wonderful is a bit much imo.

He's starting to perform in what really is a shocking league. Hope he keeps it up.

[vreitti]

I still keep waiting for even more end product. Goals mainly. But perhaps it's a tad unfair at this point in time, and we should just be happy he's playing well and not getting the wrong kind of headlines.

He's just so unbelievably talented, I simply can't shake off the feeling we really have a world class player in the making. 

[villa4europe]

Done an interview with Henry winter in tomorrow's paper about growing up, might be a Bruce thing but a very smart move by the club, hopefully someone's finally trying to protect him

[PaulC]

18 minutes ago, vreitti said:

I still keep waiting for even more end product. Goals mainly. But perhaps it's a tad unfair at this point in time, and we should just be happy he's playing well and not getting the wrong kind of headlines.

He's just so unbelievably talented, I simply can't shake off the feeling we really have a world class player in the making. 

I find it quite amusing how the tone of the posts have changed on the Grealish thread.

[Stratvillan]

10 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

Done an interview with Henry winter in tomorrow's paper about growing up, might be a Bruce thing but a very smart move by the club, hopefully someone's finally trying to protect him

Which paper, may invest a pound.

[villa4europe]

Times, can't link it, you have to pay for the content, sure some on here can get it though

[Stratvillan]

Just now, villa4europe said:

Times, can't link it, you have to pay for the content, sure some on here can get it though

Worth the money, takes me a week to read it.

[dont_do_it_doug.]

On 21/11/2016 at 12:04, Grasshopper said:

@dont_do_it_doug.

at your age you have to stop those wicked "drops of the shoulder - quick turns - long runs". Its not good for you

Tell me about it. Turns out it's only my MCL though, so I'll have my boots back on in 2-4 weeks. 

[dont_do_it_doug.]

Grealish - Rubbish. Has had one good game for the club. Needs to sort himself out. We should send him out on loan. 

[hansardtony]

The Grealish article was in today's (Saturdays) Times. Good reading.

[Woodytom]

55 minutes ago, vreitti said:

He's just so unbelievably talented,

 yet more unbelievable talent talk on this forum? unbelievable..... really?

With all this unbelievable talent, it's no wonder were 11th in the championship.

Let's not get too carried away eh?

[StefanAVFC]

Let the lad receive praise after a great performance.

What's the point of being a fan if you can't get carried away without being debbie downer'd at every single opportunity.

[Woodytom]

Sorry but this is a forum where I am offering my opinion. I disagree with those saying he's utterly wonderful and an unbelievable talent. He clearly isn't. its not just getting carried away...... its far away and beyond that. fwiw, I don't agree with you that it was a great performance. He played well though. 

[Kiwivillan]

On 20/11/2016 at 16:42, Kiwivillan said:

He's the most fouled player in the league by a big margin 3.5 per game. 2nd is 2.6 per game. He will get us a lot of penalties and free kicks in dangerous positions

Called it 

[MikeMcKenna]

Here is the Grealish interview with Henry Winter in The Sunday Times. I assume as i am a Times On Line member I can post if credited and linked. MODs please delete if I am wrong

 

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/i-did-bad-stuff-but-i-was-young-i-want-to-be-a-role-model-now-m3rtbvrjr subscription only

 

JACK GREALISH INTERVIEW

‘I did bad stuff but I was young. I want to be a role model now’

Aston Villa’s Jack Grealish tells Henry Winter he wants to erase his wild-child image and help his club win promotion and earn a full England call-up

25.11.2016 Aston Villa's Jack Grealish. Bradley Ormesher/The Times see story Henry Winter.TIMES NEWSPAPERS LTD

It was only when Jack Grealish returned to Bodymoor Heath for pre-season training that the human cost of Aston Villa dropping out of the Premier League fully sunk in. Familiar figures were missing, victims of post-relegation budgeting, life in the Sky Bet Championship dawning painfully.

“I didn’t really realise last year how much it affects everyone else,” Grealish recalls yesterday, sitting in the canteen at the training ground. “Then you come back in the summer, look for somebody and it’s: ‘Where he’s gone?’ ‘He’s been sacked.’ ‘You’re joking?’ It’s horrible. It makes me even more determined this season.”

You can see England doing well under him. I hope he [Southgate] gets the job because he’ll be good for the country

Grealish, 21, is immediately likeable, frank about mistakes that have seen him splashed across newspaper front pages, and equally open about his England ambitions. He’s chatty, more thoughtful than depicted and Villa through and through. Cut Grealish open and he bleeds claret and blue. “I was four when I got my first season ticket. I had my first trial at Villa at five. I started doing well at Villa when I was six or seven,” he says. “My dad [Kevin] is a mad Villa fan, went to the European Cup final in 1982, and has come to every game of mine, whether it was Cardiff when I was seven or eight, or now. He travels everywhere. He loves it. His son playing for Villa!”

And playing well at times. The technique is undoubted, the consistency unrequited. In the 2015 FA Cup semi-final win for Tim Sherwood’s side over Liverpool at Wembley, Grealish paraded his skills, his socks rolled slightly down to keep those tiny shin-pads in place, dribbling irrepressibly at Liverpool’s defence.

Grealish can play in the hole or out wide. “He likes to play off the front,” said his manager, Steve Bruce, yesterday. “That [in the hole] is where Tim liked me to play,” Grealish adds. “But I was more of a winger growing up. I looked at Cristiano Ronaldo and Ryan Giggs, the best players in my position. But if I wanted to choose, it would be No 10. But at the moment I’ll play wherever I’m put, whether on the wings or in midfield.”

He just wants to be on the pitch. “Playing for Villa, especially in front of the Holte End, is unbelievable. I love walking out and just looking at the Holte End. It just helps me so much with the fans roaring us on,” he says. That is why relegation caused him such anguish. He’s a Villa fan. “I need to spend time on my own if Villa have lost,” he says. “It’s hard to deal with defeat. Last season, I was definitely feeling it even more. I could see the way the club was going from November. I had a gut feeling that we were going down, and for me that was horrible, being a Villa fan. We couldn’t win, I wasn’t playing well, wasn’t happy. It was obviously tough, especially for me as a Villa fan.”

Grealish is well known for being pictured passed out on holiday in the summer of 2015 Rémi Garde had already gone, Roberto Di Matteo came in for this season, and soon floundered. Bruce’s arrival has brought Villa stability. Some old-school Championship nous has brought hope. Bruce was downstairs in his office, preparing training, and also getting ready to meet Villa’s new owner, Tony Xia, who had dropped by and was waiting in the canteen. Xia is far from fluent in English but even my short conversation with him revealed the sharpest of minds of this Chinese businessman. He’s wealthy, recently negotiating a billion-pound deal, and when the EFL sought proof of funds to support Xia’s takeover, it was politely shown details of one of his accounts, apparently holding £200 million.

“The chairman has come in, invested well, and been a good part of the success recently,” Grealish says. “Under Di Matteo, we were just lacking confidence. The new manager has come in and restored so much confidence into the boys. If you watch us now, the confidence is there. Same players but it’s such a different mood. I’ve played under a lot of young managers, Shaun Derry at Notts County [on loan], Rémi Garde, Tim Sherwood, Di Matteo. Steve Bruce is the best manager I’ve played under. He’s so experienced.”

The upbeat Grealish has straightforward targets. “Promotion definitely. Automatic, definitely,” he says. Villa are 16th, 13 points off second-placed Brighton & Hove Albion, so the play-offs are more realistic. “We are five points off the play-offs [sixth-placed Norwich City]. But we have 29 games left. For all the boys in the changing room, when we talk about it, going up in the top two is definitely doable. This club is Premier League — look at the facilities. Everyone knows how big Villa is. We need to do whatever it it takes to be back there.”

Villa play Cardiff City at home today when the Grealish family will again be out in force. “I’m grateful for that support. I wouldn’t be here without them. Mum and Dad made so many sacrifices for me when I was growing up. It’s not just for me but for my little sister [Hollie] as well, growing up with cerebral palsy, so it’s been hard.

“She’s just turned 13. She’s definitely a character, always smiling,” he says. “She doesn’t really come to matches; she gets a bit bored. She always says to me when I get back home: ‘How did you get on today?’ I still live at home. I don’t want to move out yet. I still get my food! I’m such a family person. I have two brothers and two sisters.

Grealish is well known for involvement in any Villa community or charity projects helping children, as is his father sorting out shirts for local good causes. “My little sister has a few disabilities, so when I see what it means to her when she meets people who are her idols it makes me think,” he says. “It puts life into perspective that there are kids out there who idolise me, so why not give some of my time to go and make their day?”

This is the other Grealish, the one the public tends not to see so much. The perception is more formed by images of him inhaling nitrous oxide in 2015, and a couple of overindulging clubbing stories, most recently as September. “When I first broke into the first team, it was hard,” he says. “A few months before that, when I hadn’t played a game, I was just a normal lad, just Jack, and I could go and do whatever I wanted and no one would say a word.

“But as I started playing a few games, and did well in the Cup semi-final, I found it difficult. I thought I was still Jack. I thought I could still go to these places, go out and do whatever but I couldn’t because everywhere I went people were just trying to stitch me up. I kept being in the papers for the wrong reasons.

“I can’t live like when I was 17 or 18. That’s part of growing up. I’ve seen it happen with quite a few other players. But I want to be a role model for kids, and be successful. I’ve done bad stuff in the past. I was young. I’m still learning now. Next time I’ve got to be a bit wiser.”

Scrutiny intensified when the Solihull-born Grealish chose to play for England over Ireland, after formative years spent in the FAI system and also playing Gaelic football, even turning out briefly at Croke Park. “I wasn’t really into other sports growing up but I loved Gaelic,” he says. “You can play football in it; you don’t just have to have the ball in your hands, you can just run with the ball [kicking or soloing].

“But when I was 13, Villa told me I need to stop because it’s rough. I still played now and then until I was 15. It helped me develop. When I was young I was always playing above my age but I struggled physically. But getting kicked around at Gaelic, getting shoulder-barged, it helped.”

His footballing career was accelerating, alerting the FA and the FAI. “When I was 15, I went to England trials and I collapsed,” he says. “I was just nervous. I don’t usually get nervous but I collapsed. I told them I was fine. I was desperate to stay on but they said: ‘No, you’ve got to go home.’

 

Grealish goes out of his way to help good causes at Villa

 

“Then Ireland called me up. I played with Ireland, loved it, loved all the lads, the coaching staff, and you get treated well. England didn’t call me so I carried on playing for Ireland. But a year later England called me. Kenny Swain rang. I said: ‘I’m enjoying playing for Ireland.’ So I stayed there. But the older I got, I put things into perspective. My grandparents are Irish. But I’m English, I was born here, my parents were born here.”

Roy Hodgson called, and Grealish committed to England, becoming a part of Gareth Southgate’s under-21s and playing in the Toulon tournament last summer. It was a fillip after relegation. “Gareth said to me, in a nice way: ‘You haven’t really justified your call-up.’ I hadn’t had the best of seasons. ‘Yes, fair enough.’ ‘But I’m going to take you and give you a chance.’ I was so happy,” he says. “I did all right there, got two goals and an assist.”

A wonderful photograph exists in the FA archives of Grealish in the middle of Southgate’s jubilant squad, celebrating the trophy. “As soon I came back, I said to Dad: ‘Gareth’s such a good manager’. Because he’s not long stopped playing [a decade ago], he understands man-management very well,” he says. “Our team was so together, and that’s partly because of Gareth. He gives all the boys confidence. You can see the England first team doing well under him [during his four games as interim manager]. I hope he does get the England job because he’ll be good for the country. I’m trying to keep my place with the 21s, hopefully go to the European Championships next summer and then try to get into the first team. I feel in the future I can go and play for England. That’s definitely my target. That’s my dream.”

Grealish wants to join the new England under Southgate. “I look at all the young players, John Stones, Ross Barkley and Raheem Sterling,” he says. “I know Dele [Alli] very well. I knew him from when he was at MK Dons; Dele’s gone on to big things — I hope to do what he’s done.”

 

 

[Zatman]

a good honest interview and doesnt come across as an arrogant prima-donna or a show boat off the pitch as some people have described him since he broke through the youth team

only worry is that some prick will go through him this season and give him a bad injury because he doesnt really get much protection from referees even if he is most fouled player in the league

[CosmicVillan]

Did you see how Gollini ran over to Jack after the final whistle ? He seemed genuinely ecstatic with the win and seemed to be congratulating Jack. Then they both gave their shirts to fans in the Holte end, Jack to little girl down near the front. It was great to seem them enjoying the moment and some team bonding.

[Stevo985]

11 hours ago, Woodytom said:

Haha, he was good. utterly wonderful is a bit much imo.

He's starting to perform in what really is a shocking league. Hope he keeps it up.

Sorry for praising one of our players.

Don't know what I was thinking.