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Author Topic: Bruce Sacked at last (now official)  (Read 2113711 times)

Online Rodders

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20070 on: September 25, 2018, 11:22:10 AM »
My 13 year old composed this last night.

Oh Stevie B
(Oh Stevie B)
It's time to leave
(It's time to leave)
Why can't you see
(Why can't you see)
We don't believe
(We don't believe)
That shit you spout
(That shit you spout)
After each game
(After each game)
We want you out
(We want you out)
Cos you're to blame
( Cos you're to blame)

Vi-lla!

Offline aj2k77

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20071 on: September 25, 2018, 11:22:19 AM »
Has shit for brains located another center back yet or is he going all in on that center back who's a ginger twat, past it and injured and hoping he isn't A past it and B always injured.

Offline GarTomas

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20072 on: September 25, 2018, 11:39:00 AM »
Agnew seems less involved now for me in terms of consulting on the touch line.

Given he was credited by some with an upturn in our attacking play when he joined last year would he make a suitable caretaker?

Offline Yeltzer

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20073 on: September 25, 2018, 11:40:51 AM »
Villa look clueless and directionless - Steve Bruce is on borrowed time. From Matt Law in today’s Telegraph:

he guy to my right started within the first minute of kick-off. “It’s a joke”, he frequently complained. “We can’t pass. The defending’s s****.” And so it went on.

This was my first visit to Villa Park of the season and I could immediately see what Steve Bruce has been referring to when he has discussed the fact the locals can be a hard bunch to please.

Together with the noisy Sheffield Wednesday supporters, there were 35,572 of those locals packed into Villa Park on Saturday to witness Bruce’s 100th game as manager.

But any sympathy for Bruce during the opening exchanges soon wore off and I could quickly empathise with my neighbour, who had probably witnessed the draw with Reading, the lucky win over Wigan and the Carabao Cup defeat to Burton Albion earlier in the season.

A midweek victory over the mighty Rotherham United had seen Bruce once again take aim at his detractors and even accuse the local press of being too negative. Reporters from the newspaper he had referred to all tipped Villa to beat Wednesday, but their positivity was not rewarded.

Jack Grealish points the way
Jack Grealish was stuck on the left wing against Sheffield Wednesday CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES
Villa played like a team of individuals, which maybe should not be surprising given how late they did much of their transfer business following the summer takeover.

But there was no discernible plan or strategy. Bruce started with on-loan Tammy Abraham and Jonathan Kodjia in a front two with Jack Grealish stuck out on the left wing.

Even the kids sporting their Jack haircuts waiting in the long queues for a half-time pie will have been wondering why Villa’s star man had not started in a position from which he can run a game.

All season it has felt like Bruce has been throwing balls, or new players, into the air and hoping something lands. If it clicks, great. But if it doesn’t, as it didn’t against Wednesday, then Villa often look clueless.

And, unfortunately, there has often been no better way to describe the defending than “s****”. John Terry is virtually irreplaceable, but it makes no sense that Villa did not sign another central defender or redouble their efforts to bring in a left back after missing out on Joe Bryan. All the Yannick Bolasies in the world will not solve Villa’s problems at the back.

John McGinn’s wonder goal got Villa back in the game after Wednesday had taken a deserved lead, but this only served to illustrate another problem of Bruce’s tenure. His team are often too reliant on a moment of individual brilliance, rather than winning games or scoring goals through dominating their opposition.

Bruce should have taken McGinn’s volley as a cue to make a change and use the momentum it temporarily gave Villa to take charge of the game.

John McGinn celebrates after scoring a wonder goal for Villa
Villa have been reliant on a moment of brilliance this season
Instead he waited, hoping a second goal would come, but, predictably to the guy on my right, Villa quickly lost the initiative and fell behind again. Only then did Bruce make a substitution. Once again, he was reactive, rather than proactive.

Did the supposed moaning Villa fans turn on their team at going behind or even turn on Bruce? No, not until the game was gone in stoppage time and, even then, the chants for him to go from the Holte End were barely audible.

Bruce and his dwindling band of defenders will trot out his record for taking teams up, but this is no longer of any interest to Villa fans. He did not manage it last season with a squad that was every bit good enough to get out of the division and his team currently sit 13th in the Championship table with three wins from nine games.

Just as Manchester United fans are not particularly bothered how many Premier League titles Jose Mourinho won with Chelsea, Villa supporters, often accused with being obsessed about the past, are only worried about the present.

Like Mourinho, much of Bruce’s problem solving revolves around constantly signing new players so it is not surprising there are now murmurings of discontent within his squad.


The likes of Scott Hogan, Henri Lansbury, Neil Taylor and Birkir Bjarnason have all been signed by Bruce and left out in the cold. Last season’s top scorer Albert Adomah was told he could go, only to see a move blocked at the last minute and Conor Hourihane often finds he is the first midfielder to be dropped despite providing a constant goal threat from midfield.

There are at least encouraging signs for Villa off the pitch, with Grealish signing a new contract and chief executive Christian Purslow taking advice from some of the industry leaders in his bid to find the right sporting director.

But it is becoming a matter of when and not if Purslow has to take a tough decision on Bruce if the murmurings are not to get louder and Villa’s season is not to become a write off.

Offline Allan C

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20074 on: September 25, 2018, 12:11:02 PM »
Another great piece and Matt Law a villa fan too.

Offline Drummond

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20075 on: September 25, 2018, 12:13:59 PM »
Well bloody hell. Finally.

Offline chrisw1

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20076 on: September 25, 2018, 12:35:30 PM »
It's good to read that some proper press are actually taking a real interest in our position.

Offline mallo

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20077 on: September 25, 2018, 12:49:44 PM »
At last - now it will gain momentum.

Offline Chap

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20078 on: September 25, 2018, 12:57:21 PM »
Wonder what Spuddo’s reaction will be to that??

Offline Clark W Griswold

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20079 on: September 25, 2018, 12:57:40 PM »
Indeed. He signs a Kodjia clone to play alongside Kodjia, thus pushing Grealish out of position to accomodate him too. He signs 2 wingers when we have Adomah, Elhamody and Green already, surely one would have done whilst not loaning Green out, and signs one young centre back on loan whist loaning one out, when we only have one other at the club.
He did at least attempt to replace Johnstone and McGinn was a good signing that I think we needed despite all the CM's we already have but otherwise he must have been trying to get fired.

Offline ChicagoLion

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20080 on: September 25, 2018, 12:58:24 PM »
It has started, about time too.

Offline Risso

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20081 on: September 25, 2018, 01:07:42 PM »
Who's the bloke who asks Bruce the questions for the interview for the OS after the match?  That must be the most soul destroying job in football, with some of the most drearily inane questins ever.

"Another disappointing defeat, but you must have been pleased by the number of throw ins we had."

"We can't now mathematically be promoted, but the state of the Villa Park pitch must give you hope for next season?"


Offline PaulWinch again

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20082 on: September 25, 2018, 01:13:43 PM »
Good piece, finally, Bruce’s nonsense agenda being called out.

Offline Des Little

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20083 on: September 25, 2018, 01:15:48 PM »
Who's the bloke who asks Bruce the questions for the interview for the OS after the match?  That must be the most soul destroying job in football, with some of the most drearily inane questins ever.

"Another disappointing defeat, but you must have been pleased by the number of throw ins we had."

"We can't now mathematically be promoted, but the state of the Villa Park pitch must give you hope for next season?"



It's dreadful, I've stopped watching them.  They may as well just record them all in one go with a different backdrop.

Online paul_e

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Re: Bruce out!!1@"*!1£$%
« Reply #20084 on: September 25, 2018, 01:52:04 PM »
Great article.  What it does make me wonder is how many journalists that are commenting on us actually watch games (they don't have to be in the ground, all the problems are there on TV as well) because they very rarely talk about the games we've played recently. You get lots of talk about his record, lots of comments about where we finished last season, etc but almost no one who is backing Bruce has anything good to say about how we're playing, so they just skirt around it.

 


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