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Author Topic: The last 6/7 years  (Read 6920 times)

Offline Godfrey Brian

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #30 on: October 02, 2016, 10:07:24 AM »
Quote from Eamonn on 2nd October
"This is when the film ends with the protagonist finally being put out of his misery and a raven perched on a bit of aluminium on the Trinity Road stand takes an idle look at the Villa badge before flying across to Aston Hall where his family is waiting for worms.
[/quote]
....and gets taken out of the skies by a miss hit Westwood 30 yarder. ..  ;)
« Last Edit: October 02, 2016, 10:18:01 AM by Godfrey Brian »

Offline brian green

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #31 on: October 02, 2016, 10:31:35 AM »
Agree with every word and every sentiment expressed on this thread.  Except ravens don't eat worms.  They feed on carrion which makes the roosting on Villa Park an excellent metaphor.

In my mind/imagination we walked onto the hangman's scaffold the day Randy Lerner decided that the scaling back of fan expectation was the central plank in a policy of reduced losses at Villa Park.  Lambert was sent for, doffed his cap and promised to deliver cut price mid table stability.  He actually boasted about reducing the fans' expectations.

The big difference between this horrible slump and previous horrible slumps is that in past ones we, the fans never stopped believing that we would rise again, stronger than ever.  This time there seems to be widespread acceptance that we will take our place alongside Leeds and Forest and live on our memories.
« Last Edit: October 02, 2016, 10:35:11 AM by brian green »

Offline Chris Smith

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #32 on: October 02, 2016, 10:51:35 AM »
I was ill for most of 2012 and had this romantic hope that my own recovery would coincide with a Villa renaissance and that in years to come I would bore my grandkids with the story. Thankfully the doctors and nurses held up their end of the bargain while Villa have just carried on making us all feel sick.

Offline paul richard

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #33 on: October 02, 2016, 04:08:05 PM »
The pivotal moment was that Monday in August 2010 when O'Neill flounced off five days before the start of the season and left Lerner in the lurch, not knowing what the hell to do.  In that moment Lerner was exposed as a rabbit in headlights and revealed to be out of his depth. 

The floundering started, austerity was introduced, the managers came and went as we drifted downwards and backwards, and the humiliations came thick and fast as the established sides easily beat us without getting out of second gear, the up and coming Swanseas and Southamptons and Stokes overtook us, and the lower league teams gleefully picked us off in cup competitions. 

I thought our nadir had been reached last May, and we would begin the journey back to better things this season, but judging by what I've seen recently my optimism may have been misplaced.  Even up to as recently as the Brentford game I thought that the team would click and results would come, but the realisation has dawned that what we're witnessing is another mediocre manager, another (with one or two exceptions) team of mediocre players comprising last season's leftovers and a yet another clutch of poor purchases. 

I'm very much afraid that we are now into season number 7 of the downward spiral.  The misery continues...

Offline Matt Collins

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #34 on: October 02, 2016, 04:19:10 PM »
The pivotal moment was that Monday in August 2010 when O'Neill flounced off five days before the start of the season and left Lerner in the lurch, not knowing what the hell to do.  In that moment Lerner was exposed as a rabbit in headlights and revealed to be out of his depth. 

The floundering started, austerity was introduced, the managers came and went as we drifted downwards and backwards, and the humiliations came thick and fast as the established sides easily beat us without getting out of second gear, the up and coming Swanseas and Southamptons and Stokes overtook us, and the lower league teams gleefully picked us off in cup competitions. 

I thought our nadir had been reached last May, and we would begin the journey back to better things this season, but judging by what I've seen recently my optimism may have been misplaced.  Even up to as recently as the Brentford game I thought that the team would click and results would come, but the realisation has dawned that what we're witnessing is another mediocre manager, another (with one or two exceptions) team of mediocre players comprising last season's leftovers and a yet another clutch of poor purchases. 

I'm very much afraid that we are now into season number 7 of the downward spiral.  The misery continues...

I thought austerity had already started and that's why O'Neill walked

In fairness, it was never proper austerity for a while. We spent over 20 on bent, 5 on makoun and 10 on nzogbia
That's probably more than the entire Swansea team for that era cost

Offline paul richard

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #35 on: October 02, 2016, 04:27:58 PM »
Matt, it's true re Bent, Makoun etc, but I was making a general point about the overall sweep of events rather than picking on specifics.

Offline SoccerHQ

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #36 on: October 02, 2016, 11:52:22 PM »
Agree with every word and every sentiment expressed on this thread.  Except ravens don't eat worms.  They feed on carrion which makes the roosting on Villa Park an excellent metaphor.

In my mind/imagination we walked onto the hangman's scaffold the day Randy Lerner decided that the scaling back of fan expectation was the central plank in a policy of reduced losses at Villa Park.  Lambert was sent for, doffed his cap and promised to deliver cut price mid table stability.  He actually boasted about reducing the fans' expectations.

The big difference between this horrible slump and previous horrible slumps is that in past ones we, the fans never stopped believing that we would rise again, stronger than ever.  This time there seems to be widespread acceptance that we will take our place alongside Leeds and Forest and live on our memories.

If you look back in the Ellis era our poor seasons were always followed by strong ones. He made plenty of errors but didn't allow things to slip.

When we went down in the 80s we came back the following season, nearly went down in 94/95 and followed that up with one of tbe best in modern times. 02/03 was not great at all but followed it up with a 6th place the next season.

The club nowadays just doesn't show any inclination to win, there is little magic on the pitch despite all the money spent, it's a dam shame for any kid growing up now and getting into following us that we can't even present a mid table average finish in the premier league anymore which I saw plenty of growing up.

It never seems we can hit rock bottom and start rising again, there always seems another depth we need to slump to.

Offline Smirker

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #37 on: October 03, 2016, 12:40:16 AM »
It's been horrible and has killed my enthusiasm for the sport. Not really much else to add that hasn't been said already.

I dream of the day our team is competitive again.

Offline SoccerHQ

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #38 on: October 03, 2016, 10:22:27 PM »
The pivotal moment was that Monday in August 2010 when O'Neill flounced off five days before the start of the season and left Lerner in the lurch, not knowing what the hell to do.  In that moment Lerner was exposed as a rabbit in headlights and revealed to be out of his depth. 

The floundering started, austerity was introduced, the managers came and went as we drifted downwards and backwards, and the humiliations came thick and fast as the established sides easily beat us without getting out of second gear, the up and coming Swanseas and Southamptons and Stokes overtook us, and the lower league teams gleefully picked us off in cup competitions. 

I thought our nadir had been reached last May, and we would begin the journey back to better things this season, but judging by what I've seen recently my optimism may have been misplaced.  Even up to as recently as the Brentford game I thought that the team would click and results would come, but the realisation has dawned that what we're witnessing is another mediocre manager, another (with one or two exceptions) team of mediocre players comprising last season's leftovers and a yet another clutch of poor purchases. 

I'm very much afraid that we are now into season number 7 of the downward spiral.  The misery continues...

On the other thread someone was criticising me for saying we couldn't attract Bournemouth's manager...let's remember 5 seasons ago when our disappointing season consisted of us finishing 9th...and only a year since we'd been top 6...and only 4 months since we signed at the time England's main striker for 18m....we couldn't attract the Wigan Athletic manager to come here.

That's when the warning bells to me about Lerner well and truly went off...a shambolic managerial search that ended up with McLeish and that followed the underwhelming appointment of Houllier.

At least Dr Tony's search and appointment of RDM was professional and at least looked good on paper. More difficult during the season but I trust him to get in another suitable candidate.

Offline sickbeggar

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #39 on: October 03, 2016, 10:29:23 PM »
The pivotal moment was that Monday in August 2010 when O'Neill flounced off five days before the start of the season and left Lerner in the lurch, not knowing what the hell to do.  In that moment Lerner was exposed as a rabbit in headlights and revealed to be out of his depth. 

The floundering started, austerity was introduced, the managers came and went as we drifted downwards and backwards, and the humiliations came thick and fast as the established sides easily beat us without getting out of second gear, the up and coming Swanseas and Southamptons and Stokes overtook us, and the lower league teams gleefully picked us off in cup competitions. 

I thought our nadir had been reached last May, and we would begin the journey back to better things this season, but judging by what I've seen recently my optimism may have been misplaced.  Even up to as recently as the Brentford game I thought that the team would click and results would come, but the realisation has dawned that what we're witnessing is another mediocre manager, another (with one or two exceptions) team of mediocre players comprising last season's leftovers and a yet another clutch of poor purchases. 

I'm very much afraid that we are now into season number 7 of the downward spiral.  The misery continues...

On the other thread someone was criticising me for saying we couldn't attract Bournemouth's manager...let's remember 5 seasons ago when our disappointing season consisted of us finishing 9th...and only a year since we'd been top 6...and only 4 months since we signed at the time England's main striker for 18m....we couldn't attract the Wigan Athletic manager to come here.

That's when the warning bells to me about Lerner well and truly went off...a shambolic managerial search that ended up with McLeish and that followed the underwhelming appointment of Houllier.

At least Dr Tony's search and appointment of RDM was professional and at least looked good on paper. More difficult during the season but I trust him to get in another suitable candidate.

Don't agree. I didn't want RDM sacked yet but a manager with 50m to spend and we got him? Really the best we could find this season  given the biggest spend outside the prem was some unemployed guy? To me they just saw chelsea/champions league  winner and went for it

Offline SoccerHQ

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #40 on: October 03, 2016, 10:55:47 PM »
Well it was him or Pearson....

I never really got why people were judging his time at Chelsea...to me that was completely irrelevant to the challenge here.

I was more looking at his time at WBA and seeing him getting them automatic promotion very comfortably with 90 points and thinking he was a decent appointment so I'd let the Dr off this one.

Offline eamonn

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #41 on: October 04, 2016, 12:19:00 AM »
Martinez was only offered an interview though wasn't he? Probably too scared to face going back to Dave Whelan if we didn't go for him in the end so he stayed put.

Offline PeterWithesShin

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #42 on: October 04, 2016, 12:40:50 AM »
Or he was perfectly happy at Wigan at the time and didn't want to leave. He loves Wigan

Online joe_c

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #43 on: October 04, 2016, 10:05:56 AM »
The rot set in when I started my current job in April 2010. The first game we played after that was the 3-0 Semi Final defeat to Chelsea and things have deteriorated ever since. So if anybody fancies saving the Villa, then please feel free to offer me a job (though I'll clearly spend the majority of my time on the internet instead of doing any work).

Offline UK Redsox

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Re: The last 6/7 years
« Reply #44 on: October 04, 2016, 10:14:43 AM »
The rot set in when I started my current job in April 2010. The first game we played after that was the 3-0 Semi Final defeat to Chelsea and things have deteriorated ever since. So if anybody fancies saving the Villa, then please feel free to offer me a job (though I'll clearly spend the majority of my time on the internet instead of doing any work).

Yeah, people really shouldn't do that  ;)

 


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