Bill Fcukin Howell.

[kippaxvilla2]

Now don't ask me why but I was looking for that article where he asked us to send them the bill when I came across this gem.

The fact that we have royally fcuked them over so many times as demonstrated by his own article gives me so much pleasure....read and enjoy.  As Mr Woodhall once asked 'are they still everyone's favourite 2nd team?'  Or something like that...

19 Reasons why West Brom don't take to Villa
22 Jan 2016
So why exactly do Albion fans, and I count myself as one, dislike everything claret and blue?
I had nine very happy years covering Villa: home, away, Europe, North America and Dubai.
I met some cracking players, real good characters like Gareth Barry, Thomas Hitzlsperger, David James, Gareth Southgate, Ugo Ehiogu, Olof Mellberg, Martin Laursen  and Mark Delaney.
I met some terrific supporters on those foreign trips on Steve Gough's tours,  and I even found Doug Ellis pleasant.
Sure there was also David O'Leary -  but that's a chapter for another day.
Passions will run high at The Hawthorns tomorrow.
It’s a rivalry that may have started in the Cup Finals of the 1880s but to many an Albion fan of a certain age their dislike of Villa sprouted in the 1970s as the two clubs sought for not only regional but national dominance.
Here is a take, albeit slightly tongue in cheek, at the gripes many Albion supporters have with the foe down the road.
 
 
1: Villa think they invented the League. William McGregor wrote a letter and got a statue. But was he really as influential as Villa claim? Surely it was always going to be the natural progression once professionalism had come in just three years earlier and the railway network had been built. In any case McGregor pinched the idea off unofficial tables in newspapers for the Cricket County Championship that had been deciding their title for years.
 
2: All that Premier League money from 1992 and what have you got to show for it? Throughout the mid-1980s Villa built up their riches as all three of their rivals hit on hard times. All three ended up in the third division, Wolves the fourth.
 
3: High pitched chanting from ten year old boys: altogether now: ‘Viiiiiillllllaaaaaa..Villllllllllaaaaaaaa...”
 
4: Cottoning on to celebrities: Prince William, Tom Hanks and David Cameron - wouldn’t know a football from an orange.
 
5: The injustice of 1957: You battered Ronnie Allen out of the 1957 FA CUP semi-final replay like you did Ray Wood in the Final. Allen was knocked out of his senses in the 19th minute. Allen had put Derek Kevan through and as he hit the bar former Albion 1954 Cup winner Jimmy Dugdale caught Allen with a late tackle. He was out of the contest for 30 minutes and when he came back on he went to the wring side of the pitch not realising that the teams had swapped ends at half-time.
 
6: The injustice of 1990: Forget Tony Daley wht about Kent Nielsen’s leg breaking tackle on Gary Robson? A broken leg in only the fourth minute.
 
7: The injustice of 1981:  Albion won the league for you.  Ron Atkinson’s side dismantled Ipswich 3-1 at The Hawthorns, then battered Villa at Vila Park only to fall due to Brendon Batson’s backpass.
 
8: Ugo Ehiogu: Talented centre-back already in the team at 17 and pinched for next to nothing. Ron Atkinson offered him £300 a week and a £7,000 signing-on fee. It would take years for Albion to get some money back with Ehiogu moving to Middlesbrough for £8million and cash-strapped albion getting a slice of the sell-on fee.
 
9: October 2011 and Alan Hutton’s tackle on Shane Long - high, two feet off the ground, lunging and dangerous. “I suppose he has got to consider himself lucky he hasn’t got two broken bones in his leg,” said Roy Hodgson at the time. I was disappointed with that challenge by Hutton and not only saddened by it, but angered by it.” Long’s leg wasn’t broken but he was out out of the game with a knee ligament injury. Years later Hutton would also leave his mark on Saido Berahino.
 
10: Curtis Davies  - Villa tapped up Albion's 22-year-old captain who went on strike to force through a move. Within a season he turned a good prospect into a ‘pub player’ - his words not mine.
 
11: Tony Morley  - Albion’s fans had been spoilt with Willie Johnston and Laurie Cunningham on the left wing. If Morley was good then maybe Albion fans would have given him a chance. But he wasn’t. He moved to The Hawthorns in December 1983 for a fee of £75,000, scoring on his debut in a 2-1 defeat against Queens Park Rangers. Within months Ron Wylie was sacked and the following season he fell out of favour with Johnny Giles. To be fair to Morley he returned to Albion for far better acclaim a few years later as Albion battled relegation to the third tier under Ron Atkinson.
 
12: Luke Moore - if he was even half-decent maybe Albion fans would have given him a chance. He wasn’t. And for the most part looked disinterested. £3million down the drain.
 
13: Steve Hunt - a lovely ball-playing midfelder and England international who refused to play out wide for Johnny Giles and so would return to Villa for the cost of a few bags of scratchings... and Darren Brdaley to be fair. A huge loss.
 
14: John Deehan - lovely, lovely man, salt of the earth who arrived for £500,000 in September 1979 to seemingly put Cyrille Regis and Ally Brown under pressure. Five goals in 47 League games over two years tells its own story. Then whilst at Norwich he got into the scoring habit again - particularly against Albion.
 
 
15: Ken McNaught - his debut told you everything you needed to know. A 4-3 defeat at Villa. McNaught was lucky to have Martyn Bennett alongside him. It was a miserable season of near relegation. To think Ally Robertson was waiting in the wings and that John Wile had been turfed out in that summer.
 
16: Andy Townsend - Signed by Brian Little on a two year contract but he was a shadow of the player who shone during his Villa days. To be fair he actually came from Middlesbrough. 15 League starts and no goals passed before Albion, mercifully, did a deal on the last 12 months of his contract and he retired.
 
17: Brian Little – Again, a lovely bloke and he can’t be fully laid to blame for what happened in his six almost chaotic months in charge because Albion were in a right old mess. The Board sold Kevin Kilbane without his knowledge. But three wins, six draws and 11 League defeats from November through to March left Albion staring at the third division before Gary Megson shook things up. Lowest point? A 6-0 thrashing at Sheffield United just before he got the tin tack.
 
18: Ron Wylie - a former Villa player who arrived from Coventry and whose one saving grace was signing Garry Thompson. But he also signed Ken McNaught and Tony Morley.. and Peter Eastoe. In such a short time Albion had gone from Giles to Big Ron... to Ron W. An alarming slide in ambition.
 
 
19: And finally: Ron Saunders - the chief Villain of the piece without a shadow of a doubt. Took charge of an Albion team in freefall and made them far, far worse than anyone could imagine. Ripped the heart out of the club before finally being sacked in September 1987 after four defeats in six opening matches, Signed players like Paul Dyson, Martin Dickinson and Craig Madden in his first season before bombing out the likes of Ally Robertson, Gary Owen, Mickey Thomas, Jimmy Nicholl and Imre Varadi and then signing the vastly inferior Stuart Evans, Martin Singleton, Kevin Steggles and Tony Kelly. Not only that but he then dispensed with goal machine Steve Bull despite his two goals against Ipswich in September and goal in the League Cup against Derby in a handful of games. Robbie Dennison and Andy Thompson quickly followed Bull to Wolves and rising star Micky Forsyth went to Derby where he is still revered.

[PeterWithesShin]

The "Send us the bill" piece was pulled pretty sharpish, which shows how bad it was when even that shite rag realised how bad it was. All I know that remains of it is a few bits I quoted when it first appeared.

As for that above, I love how much they obsess about us. Knowing how much it kills them that even though they had their greatest team in decades, along we came and celebrated winning trophies while they still celebrate winning away to a side that finished 9th.

[The Man With A Stick]

So most of his gripes are because our cast-offs were no good when they went to the Whorethorns in the twilight of their careers?

[the-farmer]

The Cnut conveniently sidesteps Alex Cropley

[old man villa fan]

So 13 of the 19 reasons for hating Villa were before the 9 good Year covering Villa. So, did he hate Villa when he covered us in those 9 good Year.  Or did those things suddenly strike him after he lost his professionalism as a journalist as things to hate Villa for. Can't have it both ways but, there again, we all know it is him just trying to be modern and controversial.  Twat.

[tomd2103]

The bitterness is astonishing.  Injustice of 1990? It was a comfortable cup win against a far inferior team on their own patch.  Injustice of 1981 doesn't even make sense, as it infers that Albion were wronged by Villa winning the league and the "cottoning on to celebrities" bit is pathetic.

As for the opening point about William McGregor, well that speaks volumes about his obsession.

[Randolph villa]

That mongeral allister Robinson broke cropleys leg.we beat them 3-0 with 10 men that day
Obsessed with villa we know what they are

[Havencheese]

Thoroughly enjoyed skimming those butthurt tears of bitterness.

We're totally relevant to their's and SHA existence. We don't need them but without us they'd be totally lost and mired in a morbid existential crisis.

[cdbearsfan]

Another fucking Smethwick thread? We are getting to be as obsessed as them.

[pauliewalnuts]

What a tedious ******.

[shirley_villan]

What a ******.

[Tokyo Sexwhale]

How was that c*** allowed to cover the Villa when he has such obvious hatred for us?

The Evening Mail can fucking die for all I care, with the contempt it's "journalists" have for the biggest club on its patch.

EDIT:  He's "available today" for work.   

https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-howell-432b60b1

[Matt C]

Wow. Is that real? Did an actual newspaper really print such bilge?

I believe the term 'cock hobbit' applies.

[robbo1874]

I just see it as him being demeaned by his employer. A seasoned journalist and Albion fan who should really have a blank canvas to witter on about how ace they am; and he gets told to write about why Albion fans (him basically) hate Villa, to generate clicks on their poxy website.

It's akin to a senior long-serving employee being told to hose out the shithouse and then clean the Director's car. Speaks volumes that he was prepared to actually do it. How any self-respecting 'journalist' could serve up that nonsense is astounding. As people have already said, some of the reasons just don't make sense.

[Jimbo]

This is beautiful. It reads like a drunken email to an ex-girlfriend: 'we had nine happy years together, but then you left me and now I'm sat in my underpants at 4am surrounded by spent pizza boxes and I hate you I hate you I hate you.' More, please.