Press off

[Drummond]

Couldn't agree more.

[ChicagoLion]

nly disagree in one respect Dave - I think the squad is awful. We've repeated Lambert's fishing expedition from a few years ago except this time we didn't luck out with a Benteke, and all we've landed is Tonevs and Lunas. And the odd Bowery.

I agree with that absolutely. I don't think we're the worst team in the division, but we certainly are amongst the three worst.

Keeper is ok as a shot stopper but distribution and 'leadership' are shockingly bad.
Fullbacks - Hutton can't attack and Amavi can't defend.
Centre halves - error and injury prone. At least one howler per game. At least one of the three sat on the treatment table each week.
Midfield - Doesn't blend whatever way you mix it. Either creates nothing, or too wide open. No matter what combination is tried.
Forwards - you can perm any combination of Gabby, Gestede, Kozak, and they still won't score enough to keep a side up.

Players we have look ok in patches individually, but as a unit, they fail utterly.

I am in the same camp, whilst Sherwood was a crap manager and should have got more points, I think this squad lacks basic competance at this level from Goalkeeper to attack.

[old man villa fan]

Press leaks were a two way street thou, have we forgot we got told he had 2 games to save himself and sure enough that's what happened, that was not Dim Tim telling his mates that one.

But I say fair play to the club for that, if you have a guy in your employ leaking to the press and he is not doing the business, leak to your own sources, that for the first time in years shows the Villa maybe catching up with modern day cut throat football.

The week before the '2 games to save his job' came out I said he had 3 games to get to his best team and 3 games to start to get them playing. It was pretty obvious and I don't think it needed a leak from the club.

It was clear that he either hadn't a clue what his best team was or he had no intention of trying. Either way, he had to go before more games were wasted.

I still believe we have a half decent squad. We have only lost one match by more than one goal, although we have played quite a few weaker teams. With some strengthening at Christmas and a decent coach with a modern game plan, we can stay up.

[Chinchilla Bathhouse]

nly disagree in one respect Dave - I think the squad is awful. We've repeated Lambert's fishing expedition from a few years ago except this time we didn't luck out with a Benteke, and all we've landed is Tonevs and Lunas. And the odd Bowery.

I agree with that absolutely. I don't think we're the worst team in the division, but we certainly are amongst the three worst.

I really don't know how you can come to that conclusion based on ten games in which the new recruits have been so dreadfully mismanaged. The weak link was Sherwood, and he's gone. I'm sick of reading lazy articles about how much weaker we are than last season; this new bunch are players with Premier League, Europa League and international experience, not lower league punts like in previous years. We even had to fight off rivals to sign some of them.  Of course we miss Benteke, but the others?  Isn't Richards a clear upgrade on Baker? Isn't Ayew more accomplished than Weimann?  Amavi better than Bennett?  As I said, it's too early to judge considering how they've been managed, but on paper I'd say we're stronger than we have been for a few years.  We'll see what happens, but I reckon under a manager with some tactical nous and an ounce of intelligence, rather than Scrappy Doo, we might see a half decent football team emerge.  I don't think we're a top half squad, but I'm pretty sure we're not a bottom three one.

[PeterWithesShin]

No one can convince me that Watford, Bournemouth, Sunderland and Norwich have better squads than us.

[brian green]

A very clear and fair summary of the situation as always.

Now that the fog of Sherwood's removal is clearing, I am left with two strong impressions. Firstly I agree with PWS that our squad has a great deal of ability in it that has simply been untapped by Sherwood. My second point leads on from that and touches on DW's pertinent question of how did it all go so wrong so quickly for Sherwood?

The answer I believe lies his his inability to resist the temptation to be perfidious, provocative, bloody minded.  He knows what he ought to do but uses the making of decisions not to address problems but to assert himself. The perpetuation of his own view of himself and the need to buttress that view causes him to blunder. It is not dissimilar to MON's preoccupation with protecting his "brand". Tim Sherwood ultimately was devoured very quickly by his own ego, aided and abetted by his love affair with the media.   A Harry Redknapp not yet having grown Redknapp's crocodile hide.

[Chris Smith]

The majority of the signings have shown glimpses of ability so there is clearly something there. What we do not know if we have the right mix to make a decent side despite, or perhaps because of, Sherwood trying several different combinations. His replacement will need to quickly identify what he has and turn them into a team. I just hope he can do it quickly.

[Villa in Denmark]

nly disagree in one respect Dave - I think the squad is awful. We've repeated Lambert's fishing expedition from a few years ago except this time we didn't luck out with a Benteke, and all we've landed is Tonevs and Lunas. And the odd Bowery.

I agree with that absolutely. I don't think we're the worst team in the division, but we certainly are amongst the three worst.

Keeper is ok as a shot stopper but distribution and 'leadership' are shockingly bad.
Fullbacks - Hutton can't attack and Amavi can't defend.
Centre halves - error and injury prone. At least one howler per game. At least one of the three sat on the treatment table each week.
Midfield - Doesn't blend whatever way you mix it. Either creates nothing, or too wide open. No matter what combination is tried.
Forwards - you can perm any combination of Gabby, Gestede, Kozak, and they still won't score enough to keep a side up.

Players we have look ok in patches individually, but as a unit, they fail utterly.

I am in the same camp, whilst Sherwood was a crap manager and should have got more points, I think this squad lacks basic competance at this level from Goalkeeper to attack.

And it is precisely there where good coaching makes the difference. A good coach makes a team better than the sum of it's parts.
By the end Sherwood had managed to get the whole squad to balance out as a nul equation.