The following has been submitted by Bradley Ricketts.
Cheers Bradley!
Well, there it is. Another loss for Aston Villa, and the worst part is that it was again a very poor performance.
I seriously can’t understand how Gerrard can watch this team fall apart and still persist with the same tactics every week, it genuinely fails me. It would honestly not surprise me if Gerrard gets the sack in the next few weeks.
To be honest, no team was any good and no team deserved to win, but if any team deserved the three points it would most certainly be West Ham. Of course, you can’t really directly blame anyone for their goal, but what makes the fans angry is the performance.
I have seen a lot of people slandering John McGinn saying that he should be sold and should be nowhere near the starting eleven, but I actually thought that he was one of the better players on the field, which of course isn’t much of an achievement with our current performances but maybe I would go as far as to say that he played pretty well.
Realistically, though, I couldn’t name a single player who played particularly great today.
On the manager situation, I think the issue is that Gerrard has an ego due to his footballing career and will only listen to himself. In fact, I think he is the reason for the club not doing much business in the window despite the fact that new signings are desperately needed. Personally, I think that he has been constantly repeating to the board that he thinks that the squad his good enough and he does not need anymore new players. Unfortunately, now that he has realised that new players are needed and that the squad is currently not good enough it is too late. The owners are definitely not to blame for this shambles though.
I mean, look at the business being done by other clubs, Newcastle have signed Alexander Isak from Real Sociedad for around £70M, to be honest it is very much overpaying for a striker who has the same amount of goals as Jacob Ramsey in his respective league last season, but at least it shows ambition.
But like I said, I am not blaming the owners at all, they offer the money but it is just not being spent.
My point about Gerrard has been backed up even more as today he has finally come out and said that he wants a few more faces in the door, which is something he insisted was not needed just weeks ago. He has finally realised he’s wrong, but doesn’t want to admit it to the fans and most definitely not to the players. But we can’t really talk about signings at the moment with nothing confirmed, and you can’t even say anything about players we are “set to sign” after we witnessed the club sign and unsign Ismalia Sarr in the space of 24 hours.
Focusing more on the game though, I think if I see another performance like that then I think I will be seriously trying to convince myself to not be Gerrard out. I am a pretty fickle fan myself and can see myself saying Gerrard out if things do not change in the next few weeks.
I think Cameron Archer should definitely be playing more and it’s disgraceful how little time he gets on the pitch, but rumours go round now that he is injured as well. We just can’t have anything nice, can we?
Bailey was good when he came on and should be starting week in week out, that’s if we don’t sell him to Ajax before the window closes. Once again, can’t have anything nice. With every positive there always comes a negative at Villa and it is something that our fanbase has just learnt to live with now, and with the vision of the owners I didn’t think at this stage in the project that I would still be saying that. But again the owners are NOT to blame.
However, apparently we were only just getting promoted in the owners eyes and they thought that it would take three years so who knows what comes next.
Things don’t look any better looking ahead, however, as we face Arsenal and Manchester City in the space of the next five days. Arsenal are on flying form as they have won all of their games and sit top of the Premier League as I am writing this (the first of the midweek fixtures are currently on as I write). We will probably go on to lose that but we do like a win against Arsenal in the past few years so for some reason I am going to throw it out there and say we will win 2-1, but as long as we make it tough I wouldn’t even mind a loss. A 2-1 loss is something I would probably take at this point in time.
I am definitely more worried about Arsenal than I am worried for Man City, but that’s not me saying that we will beat Man City as that is something that never happens. But I’d take 2/6 points from these next 2 fixtures and we would definitely be lucky if that was the outcome to be honest and I would be very pleased with it.
In the current form of the club, I wouldn’t even be mad if we picked up 1 point out of 6 as the teams we are playing against are just another level above to where we are currently at. We will see what happens though, I am very excited for these matches to see how we go as these are the toughest tests so far.
I may sound like such a negative fan, but I love the club and only want the best for Villa like we all do, so I will continue to go to every home game and support the boys like a true, loyal fan. I may turn on players or managers, but I will never turn on the club.
Let’s see how things pan out then, I’ll leave it there. Up The Villa!
How on earth we aren’t losing 5 or 6, it’s purely riding our luck first half. We could be bottom by Friday with only Man City and Haaland to worry about next.
Martin keown keeps going on about how we’re being murdered on the flanks.
Why don’t the coaching staff see it?
Because they haven’t a clue Badger.
Haha Martinez headlocks an Arsenal player and then makes out that it was him who was fouled.
I’d detest him if he played for the opposition.
60th minute. Substitution imminent
Have you noticed that Cash cannot cross a ball . I said that before he’s useless for it .
Luiz straight from the corner again!
1-1
Can you believe it 1-1. We are so lucky …..oh it’s 2-1
Fucking Useless. As soon as the ball comes anywhere near our box we turn in to prime Sunday league players. What’s happened from 2 seasons ago!? When we looked so solid at the back.
Terry left.
And it’s Martinelli for 2-1.
Ah well, it was nice for a short time.
Martinez costs us way too many goals.
But saves us loads more, Guest.
Mings gets crucified for mistakes that lead to goals but I’d argue Martinez is just as bad.
But Mings is mostly shit lol.
Watch him stop running for their first goal.
Were there any positives from that performance? Totally outclassed and Martinez chose today to have a stinker. Comes to something when our best hope of scoring is Luiz direct from a corner.
Post match interview.
GS “because of our technical ability”. That’s right SG your job is to coach the team. To make them better. To improve their technical ability.You can’t coach – get out of our club.
Ps managed to throw Martinez under the bus today and implicated Cash as well. Most of the team have now been publicly ostracised.
Useless
Forgot to mention…..Gerrard out!
Just seen Gerrard’s interview.
He sounds like a man who knows his days are numbered, to me.
Will watch motd later…
I’ve had a great evening out with friends and shared a very nice Chateaubriand with the lady of the house.
I confidently predict we’ll be bottom once Leicester play their game in hand – even Bournemouth have more points than us.
We won’t sign anyone tomorrow (or if we do they won’t improve us), Gerrard will hopefully be gone by Monday and it’s highly likely we’ll be relegated. Wonder if I could get good odds on that as a triple bet 🙂
So, on that cheerful note friends, I wish you all good night.
We are shambolic, it’s upsetting seeing us like this, to be honest, lol.
Just watching motd. You have to wonder where Grealish will fit into this Citeh side. I can’t see him wating his time on the bench. Can we have him back once we’ve secured a new Manager please?
I really don’t know if I can put myself through the stress and pain of watching us against City on Saturday. I’ve got a terrible feeling about this season. We had terrible luck with Diego Carlos injury and evenerything seems to be going from bad to worse. Its a recipe for relegation unfortunately. Will our owners stick around if we do? Can we deal with another embarrassment and setback like that? I have my doubts. We have 24 hours to make something happen in the transfer window to see us in to January where we will need to buy big to stand any chance of staying up this season. Also, Gerrard has to go, he can’t manage this club.
Im fucking fed up to the back teeth of talk of relegation. This club should not ever be in a relegation fight. With the players we have we should be easily mid table at worst. Totally the fault of Gerrard who seems to be out of his depth and to be honest I would take Scott Parker over him in the dugout . He would make a better fist of things. Im finished with this shit until they get rid of him and gty an experienced manager, no more up and coming gambles for me. We may as well have stuck with Dean Smith. It has all went to shit since Grealish left. He obviously was carrying the team.
I feel the same Tekkers, but it’s looking like a serious reality.
It’s going to be bleak for a few weeks yet, but as long as we don’t leave things until it’s too late, we should be okay.
You think Poch will come to us?
Doubtful, Alfie, imo.
Guys, I’m I’m going to lighten the load for us all here. Take a look at the table. One win can propel us up to mid table. It’s early days and everyone is dropping points. We’re nowhere near being cut adrift as yet so all the talk of relegation is a bit premature.
IF, and I say IF Gerrard goes soon otherwise we will implode.
Break the bank to get Pochettino in.
UTV
I like the positivity Bum Bum but it’s all predicated on Gerrard going – will Purslow admit he’s made a massive mistake?
Gerrard will still be here tomorrow and we will be light of at least two more decent players – Luiz and Nakamba – and won’t have signed anyone of note. Sanson will be in his private bomb squad and we’ll be well and truly f**cked having had a truly poor transfer window.
Which manager, of any note, in their right minds would move to Villa?
If Gerrard goes Critchley will probably take over – or is Tim Sherwood available. 🙂