two hypothetical questions

[villa for life]

1. If AM had been managing our squad last year (i.e. with Young and Downing), where would we have finished?

2. Seeing as we haven't really invested the money from Young and Downing, should we have waited till the end of the transfer window before selling them. Could we have got the same transfer fees and would we have got more points from the Fulham / Wolves game with them in the side?

[john e]

Apart from we lost At home against Wolves last year with them in the side

[noodles_]

9th probably.

[TheSandman]

1. I think McLeish is a decent manager not brilliant but definitely not the duffer some portray him to be. Considering the problem last season was that a lot of the players were alienated by Houllier and that the camp seems much happier under McLeish and you can see that we would probably have been a little better of.

2. No idea. Even with them in the team we had failled to break down resolute teams like Fulham and Wolves. We might have got a few more goals against Blackburn mind.

[PaulWinch again]

Mcleish is decent enough, but he needs to be backed not have every fucking player removed from the squad.

[villa for life]

john e, that's kind of my point . i.e what could AM have achieved had he had Young and Downing at his disposal. - AM seems to be doing a very decent job. He's tightened up the defence but has had the supply to Bent taken away from him. I hope Villa fans realise it's not necessarily his tactics that are at fault.

[TimTheVillain]

Mcleish is decent enough, but he needs to be backed not have every fucking player removed from the squad.

Agree.

Plus some ADDITIONS of quality.

[Irish villain]

I don't think anybody would suggest we are less creative because of AM. We are less creative because for the third summer in a row we have lost top quality players.

We are settling into a rather unhappy place. We are in a 'nice' comfort zone of being a big club where players go in the hope of attracting bigger clubs like Man U and *gulp* Man City. That's our lot until something drastic changes but football sucks right now.

My biggest worry is the attendances.

[Witton Warrior]

I don't think anybody would suggest we are less creative because of AM. We are less creative because for the third summer in a row we have lost top quality players.

We are settling into a rather unhappy place. We are in a 'nice' comfort zone of being a big club where players go in the hope of attracting bigger clubs like Man U and *gulp* Man City. That's our lot until something drastic changes but football sucks right now.

My biggest worry is the attendances.

This

[Shrek]

I wish we still had Houllier if I'm honest, Today was shit, No creativity at all today. I hope I'm wrong but I'm having doubts about Mcleish after 3 games.

[nigel]

One things for sure, had AMcL been in charge last season our defence wouldn't have leaked like a sieve.

[The Moose]

Four games played, one goal conceded. That is improvement. It'll take time, but we're heading in the right direction.

It won't happen overnight. Be patient.

Houllier?? Where were you last season?

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

I wish we still had Houllier if I'm honest, Today was shit, No creativity at all today. I hope I'm wrong but I'm having doubts about Mcleish after 3 games.

I beg to differ. I think we did create. I think todays level of performance will over a season win you more games than you lose. Sorry you have doubts about Mcleish but I'm sure a few wins will allay those. More importantly, at this moment as I look at the players out there I get no sense that they doubt their manager.

[PeterWithesShin]

1: We'd have probably done better pre Xmas, but would we then have bought Bent?

2: Who knows.

[TheSandman]

For my money McLeish has done little wrong since he took the hotseat. There are some gripes about his tactics but when did we have a manager whose tactics we agreed with completely? For McLeish's use of Heskey as some kind of roving defender you can have O'Neill picking Cuellar as a right back and Houllier's use of Ashley Young as a second striker. All of these things many on here disagreed with but happened anyway. I was unhappy with how little Bannan was used under Houllier and that is the issue many have with McLeish.

McLeish has said the right things, signed two players who look almost surely to be pretty decent, the existing players all seem to like him and has sorted out our defence which Houllier destroyed. Those are things you could most certainly not say about Houllier. He also hasn't lost a competitive game. It's early days and I'm sure he can improve things beyond what we have seen so far once he gets to know our players and their strengths. This is in spite of the retrenchment in spending which has resulted in him having one hand tied behind his back. I'm sure he would like to have Ashley and Luke Young, Downing and Reo Coker to still be at the club and money to spend on players to augment them but he has not been able to do this. Lets not forget his squad has been massively weakened compared to what Houllier had.