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!
Bednarek to West Ham, Dawson to Wolves, Luiz to either Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool or Atletico according to Sky. Will Nakamba and Sanson be sold today? Have our owners switched from bringing in a player to getting in a manager instead?
Anyone watching Villa at the moment can’t see any signs that Gerrard has any hope of turning things round.
I’m so depressed with the way things are going at our club. I’ve been impressed with our owners up to the start of this season but they have been too quiet recently for my liking and I hope we aren’t seeing a Lerner style approach of reigning in the finances.
NWSE need to act and get it right pretty damn quick or we WILL be playing championship football next season.
If Luiz and Marvellous go, there will be riots. It’s like Gerrard can’t get his own way so has adopted a scorched earth policy for our club.
On motd last night night, did anyone notice how Lineker didn’t go to Danny Murphy for an opinion on Gerrard and Villa? Obviously he didn’t want to upset his old mate. Loyalty trumps honesty yet again. Everyone, even next doors dog and your dead Granny says we have no structure or gameplan.
Anti Gerrard protests the weekend?????
Dendonker then !! Medical this afternoon.
But is he an upgrade on what we have or is it to allow Luiz to leave.
I preferred the £35m offer (allegedly) to Chelsea for Gallagher – he’s just the type of player we need in midfield and at 22 likely to get better.
How about a cheeky loan bid for Grealish rather than him polishing the bench every week 🙂
Maybe not an upgrade on paper, but could be an upgrade in his ability to fit into SG system and improve results… Throw in a bid for Gallagher and I’d be satisfied at least for the midfield options. I’d keep Sanson and Nakamba though.
Dendocker is completely pointless, if he was any good Wolves wouldn’t be selling and especially at £13m, stinks of Championship to me.
Nakamba is far better, Tielemens or Gallagher are the kind of midfielder we need.
How have things got so bad so quickly, this is madness.
Lange needs to go to, ever seen so much money spaffed up the wall on utter dross in all my life.
Guest – I was of a similar mind.
I fear the squad is going to be even weaker come 11pm!
We’ve gone very defensive this window.
So Luiz didn’t want to sign the agreed contract because SG has barely played him this season and now there are a host of top drawer clubs after him.
Another SG f-up, while we hunt for Wolves cast offs…
in my opinion Dendonker is an upgrade on Luis. Apart from the few games coming out of lockdown and a couple of fluky corners he has been lightweight (pretty much like the rest of our midfield).
I think Nakamba is the only player at the club who can actually break the oppositions play up. Why did we sign Sansom !!!!
Gerrard said his message is not getting through to the players isn’t his job to get his message across to the players. That’s one hell of an admission – i bet the owners are very impressed with that.
Gerrard as always blaming the players – it’s never down to him. Perhaps he should start considering whether the players don’t think the message is worth listening to?
As I said – breathtaking arrogance
Aston Villa have a deal in place to sign defender Jan Bednarek from Southampton, The Athletic understands. I wonder if we have.. 0
Being reported we’ve ‘won’ the battle with West Ham to sign Bednarek from Southampton. Absolutely essential that we signed an experienced CB before the window closes.
Jan Bednarek turns down West Ham United to sign for Aston Villa on loan, Dawson could stay
Jan Bednarek has chosen to sign for Aston Villa on loan despite having been close to an agreement with West Ham, according to David Ornstein.
The Hammers had been set to seal a season-long loan deal for the Poland international as they prepare to let Craig Dawson join Wolves after receiving a £5.25m bid on 1 September.
0:00 / 0:00
But the Southampton ace has instead opted to move to Aston Villa after they made a late push to get a deal done, and he will now undergo a medical in the Midlands before sealing the deal.
Sky now reporting Bednarek having medical at BMH
And still Gerrard remains. That’s our biggest issue. it doesn’t matter who we sign because Gerrard will get the worst out of them. Dendoncker will be worth nothing more than a bag of scratchings in a few months time. Clearly Chambers decent performances have rubbed up Gerrard the wrong way so he is dropped to the bench until his standard is as poor as Konsa. Can’t help but feel uninspired till the clowns in the dug out have all gone.
Dendonker is a defensive midfielder and Belgian International – I looked that up -:)
So we bought Kamara as the answer to our defensive mid problem and now Dendonker – are both going to play together with McGinn pushed further up to play a role more in keeping with the one he plays for Scotland?
Why didn’t Gerrard play Nakamba with Kamara – oh he’s probably in the ‘bomb squad, the sequal’
Does Gerrard see McGinn as the answer to our missing number 8?
Answers on a postcard #whothef***knows 🙂
Ooo – I’m really getting into this Twitter sh1t 🙂
#gerrardisshite
😁
I’ve no problem with Dendoncker and while I don’t specifically know much about him, I’ve heard him being discussed during Wolves games when on WM and I get to listen.
His signing tells me everything about where we currently are as a club.
I struggle to see how signing Wolves’ third choice midfielder is anywhere near where we want to be.
It’s interesting to note that after 4 years service at Wolves, they’re selling him on for a small profit.
How unlike the Villa is that?
Bednarek turns down West ham to come to us?
Translation = we’ve overpaid in wages again.
Things need to change at the club because yet again, it’s all going wrong.
Iroegbunam to QPR (Michael Beale) on loan.
Pleased with that because I think Beale will improve him.
Is Gerrard all at sea without his number 2?
Think Gerrard wants to go 5-4-1 in hope of keeping a clean sheet! Martinez, Cash, Konsa, Bednarek, Mings, Digne, Dendonker, Mcginn, Kamara, Luiz, Watkins. 5 defenders, 4 defensive mids and 1 striker to chase the long balls!!
See Villa are standing firm on Luiz – good.
Reported that we won’t sell for less than £40m!
Now SG – please start him if you value him that highly!
We’ll buckle and take just under £30m I reckon
I wonder if any player was approached and didn’t think it would be worth moving to Villa because the Manager wouldn’t be around for very long. Just thinking aloud…
Bednarek to Villa, done deal.
Defensive window, just need an ST now.
I don’t mind it.
To put it mildly its been an underwhelming summer transfer window. (From Sky Sports) Players bought – circa £60m players sold circa £40m. Plus, whatever we might have got in loan fees for Traore. So roughly, our net spend this summer is £20m. Does that say a lot about where our owners heads are at? Maybe there were other reasons why the cheque book was half shut. i.e. Stadium expansion funding, possibly? Who knows but when you have the teams already firmly established in the top 4 spending £100m plus (not taking in to account net spend just players in) Its clear as day that we wont be breaking in to that group of teams anytime soon. The gulf in class between ourselves and Arsenal who were 5th last season was there for all to see on Wednesday. United are going to improve that’s for sure. So, we wont be getting in to the top 6 anytime soon either. All that talk at the start of the season about Europe was plain daft and premature and now makes us look like mugs. We need to spend seriously big and wisely if we are ever going to compete. I just dont see it happening if i’m honest.
I see Bednerak has talked about Villa being a bigger club than Southampton. How utterly disrespectful and doesn’t say much about him as a man, imo.
Southampton fans seem to be quite happy to have him out of the club too. Not sure what that says either! He was in the team that oversaw two 9-0 defeats in a season. But you never know, maybe he will be the CB to sort us out.