Aston Villa v Tottenham Match Thread - Sun 21 March @ 19:30 - Sky | Page 36 | Vital Football

Aston Villa v Tottenham Match Thread - Sun 21 March @ 19:30 - Sky

Football isn’t about camps it’s about critiquing what you’re looking at and expressing your honest views. After watching our last now many performances and Dean’s inability to change things, standing with his fellow coaches looking clueless, I can’t believe he put that formation out this evening. Or last week or the week before. I just want him to try something different.
Too busy making a fuss of mourinho. Spurs had half their team out and still won in a canter.
 
I think Ollie is struggling on his own up against two premier league centre halves, without a winger or central midfielder within ten yards of him for most of the game. The times when he drops in or wide to link the play up, he’s 30 yards from the goal and the ball is whipped to fucking Trez and Bert.

The whole shape of the “4-3-3” we play where we’re supposed to be the attacking team leaves a lot to be desired. It’s a very disjointed 4-1-4-1 at best.

If we’re struggling with the same selection of players next game, it might be worth moving McGinn to a right forward position, he’s losing the ball too much in the middle for me. Perhaps he can cut in from the right and offer more than Bert, he seems to play more attacking and in that area for Scotland.
Might as well leave McGinn out altogether. And Luiz. And send Barkley back pronto.
 
Personally I never wanted the poison chalice Of the Europa league but our performance levels are a real concern

Even if we lose every game until the season ends, there will still be people who will tell you there is nothing to worry about as long as we stay up and finish even a place higher than last season. We need to continue this poor run into the next season for those mentioned above to wake up and smell the coffee, until then they'd be happy burying their heads in the sand !
 
Another dreadful performance. Dean has to use the break to figure out a way to change it up, and to lift the players.

If he doesn’t then we are just there for the taking at the moment.

You can’t point at the players anymore, otherwise just how the fuck if they’re all sub standard did we go on that run pre Christmas then. Nope this is good old coaching, team and man management, and they really have to earn their money now to stop this nose dive run of form.
 
An improvement on last season? Our form was worse than it is currently WITH Jack playing out of his skin.

Our recruitment has been really good for the most part but we're only 18 months on from having to buy half a top flight squad at £8m a player. Frankly, I think we should be reminding ourselves of where we were only recently more often than we do.

Strange one isn’t it.
I‘d be very surprised that if after the final whistle at Spam last season the vast majority of fans would not have taken where we are points and table wise going into the final 10 games of this season.

However, they raised the bar pre new year and the drop off is head scratchingly bad. Is it to do with SJ or is it a massive over achievement pre-new year and the bounce from survival has gone and this is type with the same players underperforming as they did last season and the recruitment is poor.

No idea tbh. But as said, for me the only way to truly assess is the final whistle of this season. No one can with 30 points still to play for .
 
And it would mean we'd achieve our aim of improving on last season. With a bench like ours and a couple of first team starters, why are people expecting more?
Gave spurs a better game last season.
This is true and very worrying. We couldn’t have played them at a better time last night and hardly created a chance.
 
Neville rightly points out that last night Spurs had the advantage of extra quality he could put on the pitch. Fair enough. But how does that explain our performances against the likes of Burnley, Brighton and the rest? One thing is certain that we have one of the worst completed pass records in the league and you could see that last night. We look like one of those teams that gets promoted, blazes away at the start of the season, gets found out, and starts to drop like a stone. If the fall stops when Jack returns it will just prove we are a one man creative force and that can’t be acceptable after all the money we’ve spent.
 
And it would mean we'd achieve our aim of improving on last season. With a bench like ours and a couple of first team starters, why are people expecting more?

Why are people expecting more, and why shouldn’t they take their foot off the pedal?

Really! we’ve endured Absolute dog shit football and management for over 3 months now, but because we’ve achieved our aim of staying up (early) that’s ok, sorry not for me.
I spend a lot of money on Aston Villa Football Club, season tickets, traveling 300 mile round trips for home games, sky sports for away games, clothing etc etc, but if we achieve safety before Christmas I don’t think oh well fuck it I don’t need to turn up.
 
Why are people expecting more, and why shouldn’t they take their foot off the pedal?

Really! we’ve endured Absolute dog shit football and management for over 3 months now, but because we’ve achieved our aim of staying up (early) that’s ok, sorry not for me.
I spend a lot of money on Aston Villa Football Club, season tickets, traveling 300 mile round trips for home games, sky sports for away games, clothing etc etc, but if we achieve safety before Christmas I don’t think oh well fuck it I don’t need to turn up.

So , where do you think we should be in the table then ? I am genuinely baffled about where the fans who think we are rubbish , think we should be. We have Silhill who is not happy and presumably thinks we should be higher in the table then saying he doesn't want us to be in Europe. !!! So it does confuse me a bit.

Are we a side that is going to finish in a European spot ? I don't think we are . Are we a relegation type side ? I don't think we are. I think we are a side whose position in the table reflects where we are , and I repeat the season is 38 games not 5 or 6 or whatever snapshot of games people want to take to make a case for whatever side of the fence they are on.

What I do know is that the majority on here would have taken mid table mediocrity all day long at the start of the season , I can't be bothered to look back but I guess plenty were tipping us for another relegation battle , but now people are moaning that we aren't higher than 10th.
 
So , where do you think we should be in the table then ? I am genuinely baffled about where the fans who think we are rubbish , think we should be. We have Silhill who is not happy and presumably thinks we should be higher in the table then saying he doesn't want us to be in Europe. !!! So it does confuse me a bit.

Are we a side that is going to finish in a European spot ? I don't think we are . Are we a relegation type side ? I don't think we are. I think we are a side whose position in the table reflects where we are , and I repeat the season is 38 games not 5 or 6 or whatever snapshot of games people want to take to make a case for whatever side of the fence they are on.

What I do know is that the majority on here would have taken mid table mediocrity all day long at the start of the season , I can't be bothered to look back but I guess plenty were tipping us for another relegation battle , but now people are moaning that we aren't higher than 10th.

It’s not about where I think we should be, its not about a number I have floating around in my head, it’s how I think we should be playing, or at the very least trying too, and no one that I know as ever mentioned a number either!!
There’s absolutely no excuse for the 3 months of shite we’ve been served up.

I’m also sick of individual players being ripped apart, whilst Smith and his 3 mates stand on the sidelines and do the same fucking thing over and over and get protected because “we’re safe’ it’s BS Sirdennis.
 
Overall, we’ve had a good season - if you pro-rata’d the points over 38 games, we’d be on 55-56 points which is where you’d have expected Everton and wolves to be at the start of the season.

The flip side is the form table, if this was a calendar year table in 2021, we’d be battling relegation again.

If we did get Europe next season, I think we’d be firmly bottom half of the table in 2021/22 as we won’t have the squad to compete so it seems almost counter intuitive to jump ahead in that regard.

I’m quite happy with that 8th-12th position as that’s significant progress, but we can’t lose momentum and go back to making up the numbers and just being grateful for being on the big stage which is what it felt like last season at times, which is what we did yesterday. I won’t be happy to see us strolling towards the finish line as that’s what Sheffield United did after lockdown, and look where they are now.

If we lose the momentum and that winning mentality we found at the start of this season, I think it could be a slippery slope downwards.

I’m not being negative - it’s been a great season - but it is a huge call out and I think it’s a huge watch out in terms of where we go next as to whether we push on, plateau or go backwards.
 
So , where do you think we should be in the table then ? I am genuinely baffled about where the fans who think we are rubbish , think we should be. We have Silhill who is not happy and presumably thinks we should be higher in the table then saying he doesn't want us to be in Europe. !!! So it does confuse me a bit.

Are we a side that is going to finish in a European spot ? I don't think we are . Are we a relegation type side ? I don't think we are. I think we are a side whose position in the table reflects where we are , and I repeat the season is 38 games not 5 or 6 or whatever snapshot of games people want to take to make a case for whatever side of the fence they are on.

What I do know is that the majority on here would have taken mid table mediocrity all day long at the start of the season , I can't be bothered to look back but I guess plenty were tipping us for another relegation battle , but now people are moaning that we aren't higher than 10th.
I personally think we should sack the coaching staff and management. We're now tenth in the table with only a single game left in hand. Let's act now before things get too serious.
 
So , where do you think we should be in the table then ? I am genuinely baffled about where the fans who think we are rubbish , think we should be. We have Silhill who is not happy and presumably thinks we should be higher in the table then saying he doesn't want us to be in Europe. !!! So it does confuse me a bit.

Are we a side that is going to finish in a European spot ? I don't think we are . Are we a relegation type side ? I don't think we are. I think we are a side whose position in the table reflects where we are , and I repeat the season is 38 games not 5 or 6 or whatever snapshot of games people want to take to make a case for whatever side of the fence they are on.

What I do know is that the majority on here would have taken mid table mediocrity all day long at the start of the season , I can't be bothered to look back but I guess plenty were tipping us for another relegation battle , but now people are moaning that we aren't higher than 10th.
I said I didn't want the poison chalice that is the Europa league not that I didn't want a 6 or 7th place finish. We've been largely diabolical throughout 2021 so even if we finish say 12th mid table the big concern would be the current form and the decline in creativity, tactical awareness, the management are like rabbits frozen in the headlights
 
I said I didn't want the poison chalice that is the Europa league not that I didn't want a 6 or 7th place finish. We've been largely diabolical throughout 2021 so even if we finish say 12th mid table the big concern would be the current form and the decline in creativity, tactical awareness, the management are like rabbits frozen in the headlights

Makes no sense about finishing 6th but not wanting Europe.

Anyway if we had had a dreadful start and were flying now we would still be on the same number of points and the perception would be a whole lot different.

I will maintain that the season will have peaks and troughs associated with a mid table side and as such should be taken as a whole and not a snapshot of a few games.
 
I think there are three reasons for the loss of form, number one obviously being the loss of JG's enthusiasm and drive on the pitch. The other two are kind of related, the covid lockdown the club went through plus the fitness of the squad in general.
From the start of the season we were as fit as every other team and were able to play them on an even playing field, we were near the top of the table on ability. The fitness we lack is stamina related, put simply, the whole squad have run out of puff. Year on year the squad will get fitter stamina wise, meaning the team will be able to play on that even playing field for deeper into the season. The way the head coach could help is by rotating the players, instead of playing the same team week after week This would not solve the problem on it's own but, it would help. The fact that we have a squad that doesn't get rotated in and out of the team, must mean that the coach doesn't trust them to be good enough, that being the case, replacing players with better quality players is what needs to be done.
 
Strange one isn’t it.
I‘d be very surprised that if after the final whistle at Spam last season the vast majority of fans would not have taken where we are points and table wise going into the final 10 games of this season.

However, they raised the bar pre new year and the drop off is head scratchingly bad. Is it to do with SJ or is it a massive over achievement pre-new year and the bounce from survival has gone and this is type with the same players underperforming as they did last season and the recruitment is poor.

No idea tbh. But as said, for me the only way to truly assess is the final whistle of this season. No one can with 30 points still to play for .

Why wait till the season ends when performances and results are clearly heading in the unintended direction. Waiting till the season ends would have been right if we were playing well but still not getting the right results but here we are poor both performances and results wise, so the longer we wait the harder we are making the situation to be resolved. I can understand why you'd want to wait but I think the faster we act the better.