So my previous post, asking if we needed another striker, got diverted somewhat.
That’s how things work and I don’t have a problem with it.
But it doesn’t help me draw any conclusions as to how us Villa fans think.
C’est la vie.
So I’m going to assume that it doesn’t really matter if we get another striker in or not.
Which leads me onto if we think the midfield are up to it.
This is a minefield for me, as I believe it’s our biggest single problem.
Our record for years, shows that the midfield’s contribution to goal-scoring has been abysmal.
Let’s start on the left. What do you call Jordan Amavi? A defender, who attacks or a wide left midfield player? Yes, he has a decent cross, but doesn’t do enough for my liking and is a defensive liability, so he can happily go, with my blessing.
That’s somewhat unfair, as I’ve never believed defenders are a good attacking choice without a very strong central midfield, but’s that how it is.
Grealish?
My opinion says we can’t afford him as anything other than a luxury player.
Yes, he should get games, but he’s another that doesn’t work hard enough in the Championship and is much better suited to the Premier league. Another sell, even if he proves to be another Cahill (and yes, I believe MON was right in letting Cahill go, even though it bit us on the arse).
Gil’s a goner, as are Tshibola and Vertout.
Which leaves us with Henri Lansbury (utter crap up to now, but let’s see).
Bacuna, who works hard and has won some fans over. He’s a total utilitarian type player though, which sums up the problems at the Villa. A grafter and that’s it.
Hourihane.
The big enigma, who given the way we play, is a totally wrong signing and the main reason why I worry about the way we’ve recruited players.
Andre Green?
I love this kid. He’s bloody good.
But we don’t play the game that suits him.
Bjarnasson? I don’t understand this signing at all, but there you go.
So let’s move to the centre. Jedinak is great.
Lansbury, not so.
But it’s the right where I’m quite simply stunned.
We have Bree, who was injured (I don’t know his current status), De laet and Alan Hutton, who isn’t a midfielder, but currently our best crosser (jeez).
We have Adomah, who I quite like, but what if he’s not available?
It’s Bacuna or one of the kids. Which is crap.
We have Gary Gardner too, but my opinion says he won’t make the grade, as much as we might want him too.
This is frankly a dogshit squad, that is totally unbalanced.
Ok, the top 11 might work, but we have so many weaknesses, it’s unreal, imo.
Bloody hell Badger – I’m now totally disillusioned and worrying about relegation, so maybe I’ll just identify with Bill who loves his whisky as I do.
Hard to answer that, because we didn’t play through the midfield, we played over the midfield.
Green and Grealish are must keeps. I know you don’t like Grealish because he’s a technical player that doesn’t work hard, but he’s also the only player we really have bar Green who can open up defenses. He’s an absolute must keep.
I said when we signed them Lansbury and Hourihane were a waste. Now I can’t claim I was right, because they never got the chance to show what they could do, because we didn’t play through them. Hourihane was also dropped for Bacuna, a lot.
Bacuna’s our current best center mid. I think he can pass, his free kicks are up to par, makes it even better than he can play multiple positions, but he should be an automatic starter in a 3 man midfield next to a more attack minded player, like Grealish.
Jedinak is decent, not great, has his good games, was trash when he first started. We need a replacement for him, not to sell him, but to be back up for, either in midfield or defense. Problem is, is finding a decent defensive midfielder you either over spent on mediocre English players or go abroad, like we did with Sanchez, Makoun, etc. England just doesn’t produce good enough defensive midfielders. Another reason to go foreign, is they can actually pass a ball. And I’m not talking backwards, sideways, etc, but the two midfielders our fans hated the most in Sanchez and Makoun actually tried picking a forward pass, which is the only reason they ever failed in passing it.
Gardner? Not near good enough, anything more than a role player and like 6th choice (having 3 center mid’s at once you need that depth). About the best you can ask of him.
Adomah I know some are impressed with, but he’s nothing more than average. Yeah he has his good games like when he played with Kodjia, but he’s really not great. Bar Green and Grealish if it was up to me, I’d sell them all and replace them, maybe keep Bacuna around. One position I have not figured out why some kids haven’t gotten the chance. Abdo has looked good for a few seasons now and can’t get a look, We basically just let go of any supposed highly rated winger we have. I know some of our fans don’tt hink the kids are good enough but they deserve as much of a chance as the crap senior side. Midfield is the one area we still need major upgrades in, hopefully Bruce does so, and doesn’t look for the average, cheap option this time. But I see us looking at the likes of Ledley or anyone Norwich got rid of instead of quality.
the squad is dogshit ??? its the best squad outside the premiership. it had issues last season in no leadership some disciplinary and look to have many other little issues. which will get ironed out this preseason. half of me wish that your all right and we stay in championship, it will save us from real battles in the futures, playing the likes of mancity and chelseas. why bother when we can play the mighty readings and wednesdays.
players like lansbury hourihane will be far better this season. lets just say before they came into villa team,that we were not in best shape. we were in a losing streak.so its hard to gel into a team like that. how many of you posters have played football to not understand that. its a team game so if 8 of you are playing a certain way. its hard for say 2 of you to change that way of the tide.
Bjarnasson?this guy came from a different league and he looked just out of sorts alittle , amazed by the speed but once he plays a few games and HAS a pre season this guy will be a decent all round player,
Now I’m really worried, we dont just need 4 players, we need a new team. We have the best training ground bar none yet we are poor in performance, that begs the question , is our coaching staff any good.I’m lead to understand that 10 players have gone from the club, now most are young up and coming footballers that we never got to see only Green. Im confused i really am.
The season hasn’t even began not even the official transfer window & we’re a team full of shite. Maybe I’ll come back on when the season begins.
I could get technical, but hey it is mid-close-season, Ascot starts tomorrow. So let me keep it simple. What you need as a minimum from your midfield, whether that is 3/4/5 players, is the ability to play keep-ball amongst themselves. They can usefully do that while other players regain positions, or get their breath back.
That simple skill has not been reached yet by whoever plays in midfield. But, on the evidence of last season. I am not sure what the midfield is asked to do, so it is difficult to criticise individuals for not doing it. Hopefully this season we see signs of planning who does what. The current squad possess the individual skills, but the allocation of responsibilities seems absent.
Originallondonlion, then that what I’ve been saying , down to coaching ,are they good enough? I don’t think they are because loads of mistakes are showing mostly full backs, why are we waiting on players coming in, are we penny pinching again, youve got Xia playing silly sods by encryption of messages , tell us what’s going on. This is becoming a farce.
Yes bill Dr Tonys Chinese tweets are starting to piss me off as well.
Bit harsh, Lansbury hasn’t been utter crap, he’s being utilised incorrectly by the manager. If you watched him for Forest, he played behind the strikers in a more advanced role. Same for Hourihane, he’s gone from being the box to box engine he was at Barnsley to a crab sitting on the half way line under instruction because the manager too scared to attack in case we concede.
You have to utilise and play to your players strengths, and the ‘must not lose at all costs’ mentality we have adopted under Bruce is simply wrong for the players we have and for Aston Villa Football Club in the Championship.
I sincerely hope there is a change of attitude and tactical mentality at Bodymoor Heath this summer but I fear that won’t happen until the coaching staff and management is duly removed (which I believe will happen mid season regrettably when its too late)
In fairness, I wrote this post when I was a bit “tired” (ahem) and it’s probably more extreme than it was supposed to be.
I don’t really think the squad is utter dogshit overall for the Championship, but the fact remains that it is when you consider the money we’ve spent.
It simply hasn’t produced, has it? And it’s somewhat embarrassing.
And this is why it’s my firm belief that Bruce is on borrowed time if he doesn’t instantly produce.
I really hope the likes of Nath are right, in saying that a full pre-season will sort things.
But sadly, i just have a sneaky feeling that it isn’t going to happen.
Especially if Bruce keeps up his “shit scared” approach.
We should be taking the vast majority of Championship clubs by the throat and devouring them, not eeking out wins.
And that’s what I want to see.
We’re capable of walking this league, if we get it right.
Will we?
Been my argument this entire time. Bruce’s shit scared approach is the typical crap of English managers, especially older, experienced ones. He’s as bad as your Allardyce’s and your Hodgson’s. That’s why our midfield didn’t produce, because we played over them, not through them. I know it’s getting boring and repetitive but we need someone younger, smarter, and not tactically afraid to play the game how it needs to be played for us. We’ve always been shit playing a defensive style, we’re actually not half bad trying to play football (ala under Houllier and Lambert’s first season). But look how bad we were under McLeish, Sherwood, Lamber’s 2nd and third season and last season, we can’t play the scared, defensive way, it’s not suited to the players. Obviously stability is a good thing to have, but is it worth being scared and playing not to lose? No.
allardyce is always branded many things all incorrectly. he is a decent man manager that gets the job done with minimal fuss. he gets the best out of the less quality players and the players with bags of quality but fails to produce. long balls nice passes balls is all bulshit theres winning football and losing football. the rest is made up bulshit . allardyce wins games without the glamorous stars playing fancy stuff. usually on the cheap.
sherwood reached a cup final and his sides were too adventures, again you look to prove a point why didn’t you go back to dr venglos or graham turner the guy that last got us relegated..
anybody thinks we can entertain and be successful, should look into the premiership they will see many styles not all will produce the football they like. players produce styles not all 20 teams in premiership have the ability to play pretty shit and win. so we change to play fancy attractive shit and get promoted and try to play that way we would be taken apart. takes a club decades to produce arsenal style and be successful at it. when did we play something like that ??? my guess around the 1990’s how many decades ago
all these posts are winding me up. we get one step ahead (in getting a decent squad together. then we want to change manager even before a ball is kicked in anger) too take two steps back. i wish we all were playing andrews manager game on his ps4 sack bruce and rreplace with garde give him another chance to prove andrew right
Lol manager game on ps4. What an utter load of garbage that entire post was. As per usual you take everything to the complete extreme of what anyone has said. Bruce plays the same defensive style as Allardyce, defensive garbage. Allardyce however is better at it, because he actually saves teams, Bruce has gotten every team he promoted, relegated.
Who’s talking about the 1990’s? Or the last time we got relegated? Or Arsenal? Arsenal’s football revolves heavily on pace, it hasn’t been attractive in 10 years
Also news flash, we’re not a Premier League side. The very fact we have to play a defensive style to get 13th in the league is the problem and the fact you’re fine with that shows the low standards you have. I’ve made quite the argument against the defensive style, bringing up the last decade, you know, an actual relevant time period, not 20-30-40 years ago, when you can even attempt to make a relevant argument. .
Sherwood’s side was adventurous? Apparently you were watching old tapes, because his side with us was crap. And guess what, we can’t and haven’t won anything with a defensive style, which is the reason we’re in this mess. It’s really not difficult putting a little thought into this. O’Neill – failed after spending a crap load of money. Houllier – no pre-season and no summer transfer window – 9th place. Decent football, had the likes of Gervinho agreed to join us. Gets sick, goes away. McLeish comes in – defensive football – failure. Lambert – defensive football, failure. Sherwood – defensive football, failure. Bruce – defensive football – failure. Di Matteo – an utter clueless idiot. Before even mentioning he played attacking football, taking off your wingers for strikers isn’t attacking football, that’s just stupid. Actually try making an argument for defensive football for Villa, not for what Allardyce has done, but for Villa. You can’t. Because every manager who has done so, has failed miserably. We’ve never had the mind set that defensive football can get us results because it doesn’t. And yes, I’d give Garde a chance well before giving bruce another.
Good points Andrew
what is it we all desire ????
bruce is charged with first getting promoted. then entertaining.
last season do ppl really think he should come in mid season be able to change all the squad players attitudes like simply switching light switch on/off.
our club have been perennial losers for so long. i cant remember last time we were winning 10 games on the bounce or lmao wining 10 games and entertaining as well.
don’t we all want to get promoted and then establish yourself before we create a style like in 90’s bruce is short term not long term. its not his job to start that he as massive job just getting the club turned around in mentality of perennial losers to wining week in and out
i am not saying he cant entertain. but like other decent managers he will first get the team wining then entertaining. if he cant get the team wining they are not gonna be able to entertain and win because playing open like sherwood tried leaves you open to be countered.
i think trying to play open style football first may mean win some lose some not a recipe for wining promotion. we would end up like fulham or sheff wed. if thats our desire play decent stuff. it could take years to prefect. and finally them styles in premiership dont survive. because you don’t get that amount of ball in premiership. you would have to change or be relegated
But Bruce can’t entertain even if he did get us up his football is boring and negative
he cant even lace his boots as well and your point is what ??? who cares about being entertained we havent been entertained in years name last time you got excited about anything let alone villa
Football is supposed to be entertaining
I don’t see why playing a more progressive style of football, passing through midfield, getting players forward in numbers when in possession etc shouldn’t be successful. It doesn’t mean going gung ho. The football served up last season was turgid. If we do the same next season we will miss out on promotion again. Newcastle averaged 0.8 goals a game better than us. That’s 38 goals more!! They didn’t do it by sacrificing defence. Brighton scored 75 goals. Unless our plan is to sneak through in the play offs we will need to produce something similar.
I don’t believe Bruce will bring that. Yes he has achieved promotion from the Championship 4 times, but 2 of those were through the play offs, and the other 2 as second place finishes. I suspect it is even tougher to get up now and I just don’t see it happening under him unless it is through the play offs again.
I don’t know what the answer is, but if the answer is Bruce I’m not sure what the question is.
the answer is to relax and wait for the season to start before bitching about the style. last season was a joke and the season before that and before that. how far do we go back. we are a joke and sacking managers is the main reason we are a joke. you won’t amount to anything keep ripping things down.
bruce is manager and had ONE TRANSFER window. how the hell is he supposed to build a squad in that time. given the time to work on the squad and given the support of fans he can complete the mission of promotion. if you want style over promotion that is great.
even if you got your way and sacked bruce. nobody else would come in and play entertaining football firstly and hope to get results secondary. you are getting it wrong. the horse goes before the cart. results first and then you win in style. if they sacked him which they wont nobody is gonna rush to manage us with no money to reshape the squad. one thing is common new manager wants money to spend
lastly if we fook up this season i agree lets play entertaining football cause we will be in championship for many years or even league 1
Yeah you’re right any any differing opinion is bitching. Grow up.
=season hasn’t started and you lay down your excuses thick. how many times you want to sack a manager before looking for another person to blame. its not about opposing my views, but having the wrong ones that pisses me off.
how does sacking bruce now before the season starts help with promotion. also by claiming we played long ball, where does this opinion come from it is opinion not facts. i can say for certain i watch the last game. and i never saw any tactic of long ball used by villa or brighton . even when they went down to ten men. so you grow the fook up and suck my dick while your feeling cocky
read my post numpty instead of what you think i said
you said you want us top play more progressive stuff thought midfield you think this won’t open us up to be countered and blar balr blar. i read and understood what was said
but you havent understood my shit.bruce has tried to organize the whole situation. during a season where your playing 2 times a week. the defense and middfield were in a right state.
i understand las season didn’t tickle your fancy and you dont want the same shit to happen again. but guess what do you think bruce wants the same again. i doubt it
as for chances created, if they work hard and build up team spirit and fitness in pre season. win the first few games,. they will build up the style as the season progresses. last season they were behind playing catch up. was a write off. yet they should av finished top 6 had they not had a crap january
yeah only got promoted 4 times. i done this 5 times on my manager game lol with leyton orient as well. seriously how the hell did he get the job. only 4 promotions from championship we should have stuck with black garde sherwood fook sake lamberts free mciesh anybody look at the list of quality managers we had oh i forget rdm. maybe we cant attract the decent managers as we are shit or we sack managers for nothing. or maybe the words out our fans are all super critical it can not just be down to bad look can it
Nath we could win 10 on the bounce guaranteed someone would find something to bitch about. UTV fixtures out tomoz
your 100% spot on giddy. i am fed up with this sacking culture. i agree we were rubbish last season. but was it down to manager i don’t believe it was. it was a transitional season and hiring rdm was a big mistake.
this long ball statement is bulshit. i watched villa more than a few games i watched brighton last game and i didnt see a long ball tactic. brighton were trying to counter villa and villa built up through midfield, more times than kicking any long ball (bulshit ) so that excuse is full of none sense.
only thing that annoyed me last game was the villa players refusal to cross the ball. like they were scared to cross it they turn back and OVER PLAYED it. not the action you would say from a long ball team. lmao
i think i am gonna go on the other chats see how they are posting ,as we build up to the season. if i stay on here. i might hang myself after the first preseason game. lmao over exaggerating things is normal.
we have a decent squad. book markers have published their season odds have villa favorites to win league and promotion. they just dont guess the odds they have statisticians with glasses lol geeks that know their facts and stats without guess they have placed villa as favorites. but they are wrong we should sack the manager and rip up preseason and place the club back into turmoil
If we won 10 on the bounce it would be papering over the cracks just like when we had that good spell towards the end of season. It won’t last and we will still end up midtable
Just to make this simpler for you here is my post repeated….
“I don’t see why playing a more progressive style of football, passing through midfield, getting players forward in numbers when in possession etc shouldn’t be successful. It doesn’t mean going gung ho. The football served up last season was turgid. If we do the same next season we will miss out on promotion again. Newcastle averaged 0.8 goals a game better than us. That’s 38 goals more!! They didn’t do it by sacrificing defence. Brighton scored 75 goals. Unless our plan is to sneak through in the play offs we will need to produce something similar.
I don’t believe Bruce will bring that. Yes he has achieved promotion from the Championship 4 times, but 2 of those were through the play offs, and the other 2 as second place finishes. I suspect it is even tougher to get up now and I just don’t see it happening under him unless it is through the play offs again.
I don’t know what the answer is, but if the answer is Bruce I’m not sure what the question is.”
I haven’t said here that I want Bruce sacked. I have been on here before and said that I recognise he is here for next season and will get his chance. What I have said is that I don’t think he will win us promotion, unless it is via the play offs.
That doesn’t change the fact that I think he will turn out to be the wrong choice, and I saw very little last season to make me think I am wrong. Next season we will find out.
DS we can all read – you don’t need to repeat yourself.
Like Nath, I was disappointed with our football last season but am prepared to give Bruce a chance with a full pre season. On balance I’m against sacking yet another manager and the evidence in the Championship is to achieve results rather than necessarily play an ‘attractive’ brand of football (whatever that is!). I believe Bruce can do that and whether we achieve promotion automatically or through the play offs is largely irrelevant.
Everyone holds up Huddersfield as the example of the ‘new age of no fear football under a young foreign manager’ and yet the stats tell us they only scored 8 more goals than we did. Make of that what you will.
Totally agree. The only reason for the repeat was to show that I hadn’t said Bruce should be sacked only that he isn’t, in my opinion, the manager we need. I hope he proves me wrong.
My point about his promotion record wasn’t to denigrate this, and maybe I could have elaborated but the post was long enough I thought.
To expand though. Last season, Newcastle and Brighton ran away with the league. That may happen this season (it’s very likely that one team will do that if not two), and I would feel it unlikely that Villa will do that, and Bruce hasn’t achieved that elsewhere as far as I am aware. If that’s the case it’s maybe the play offs. I think we can all agree that is a lottery we would rather not have to take part in.
Maybe that’s being negative. I’m not usually that way but I feel it’s realistically where we are. My son called out the fixtures for next season this morning. I felt that so many of them were tough fixtures. I guess it shows how far we have fallen.
Yet at the same time, I think we have a decent squad that could be very good if Bruce can utilise it properly. He’ll get his chance but if he gets support in this transfer window (which I am concerned he might not) then he needs a good start to next season. If not the fans will turn on him, and we’ve all seen how bad that gets.
I agree looking at our fixture last there’s not many winnable games for us. Our run in at end of season is as tough as it gets as well. Millwall away last game a place where we always bottle it. I stand by what I said last season mid table finish and may sneak into top 10 with a bit of luck. But no promotion this year there’s too many teams better than us and even though our home form isn’t bad away from home we get bullied all over the place.
Nath, i wouldn’t call it griping or even bitching, i realish the opportunity of a team taking control of the game, why do we have to see drawing board football that most teams play, let’s get back to the skills of the players, its too much of you play there and you don’t go there, yes know of the team you play and counteract the game, its the way I see it strength and willing is the key. I don’t think its wrong if a player has that ability to take the bull by the horns and do what he thinks best. Letting backs get forwards has cost us big time, wing play we never do, why ?, it pulls defenders away and creates problems to defenders.I’m not yet at the stage of not understanding the game ,I might be getting on in life but I don’t like lo lose either.
We should be playing sexy football 😁
Now you’re talking Giddy! 🙂
We should be playing winning football
don’t bother to reply to my posts i am not replying to any posts regarding the manager i am beating up my teddy and off to bed lol
if you all want a new manager then i hope you get him. i really don’t care and thats the truth. i care not i know bruce will be manager and the rest of the chats are just a waste of time. as for styles last season was exactly that so last year. the team was not performing anywhere near its capabilities or listening to the managers instructions. you can see that the way bruce was going blue barking orders out ALL game if they were doing their jobs he would be be relaxing in the dug out and nbot prowling the touchline like a madman
addios
Now look what you’ve done Giddy, he’s gone to bed with his teddy beaten up.all I said was let’s play football ,
Yet more good debate. Well done chaps 🙂
Let’s consider that the original post was designed to raise exactly that, as opposed to the “Villa should/might sign this player” rubbish you might read elsewhere.
Fwiw, I’ll re-state my position/view.
I’m pro Bruce, it’s as simple as that, as I totally agree that changing the manager now will be a bad move.
I’m totally pro pragmatic footy that gets results.
But I’d also like to see us being a bit more adventurous.
If we’re going to keep the more skilled players like Grealish and Hourihane, at least play to their game and get them on the ball in the right areas.
As I’ve said, there’s pragmatic and being scared of the lower teams.
With the money we’ve spent, we ought to be better than that.
Absolutely spot on Badger
why bother to repost it was bad enough reading the first time
the truth is nobody can predict the way the team will play next season. your having a major laugh if you think any manager sends his teams out to bore the locals and sends his team to win one nil.
the whole last season was a disaster, starting with RDM and any manager following this dickhead would have struggled. then you had black and garde. villa have been unbalanced and without leadershipon and off field, players fighting each other fighting fans in short we have been nothing short off a joke . and ppl expect bruce to come in and accom,plish harmony and success with months or days.