Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine
Heroes & Villains => Heroes Discussion => Topic started by: TimTheVillain on July 31, 2010, 07:28:41 PM
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Generally speaking, we're looked on as a boring club with over expecting fans and one with a boring team that plays uninteresting football and while we have ambitions, they are seen by many as ambitions way above reality.
How are we to change this perception ?
Indeed, how would we argue that it is just a perception and not reality ?
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Bring in some class players that will improve our style of play and league position.
It's my opinion that our biggest flaw is a lack of technical ability. We bring in two decent central midfield players and change formation and things could well improve.
Improve on the pitch and realities and perceptions will change.
I think a good many of our own fans share that perception judged by some of the recurring arguments on this board.
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Until we change the manager we are likely to continue along the same lines. This seems to be good enough for the majority of fans.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
How do you know he doesn't already?
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I don't think we are perceived that way and I don't think we do playing boring football. We're the 6th best team in the Premier League, is this good enough? No. But it's not as bad as posters like Risso, Paulie, Mark Kelly etc would have you believe.
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I don't think we are perceived that way and I don't think we do playing boring football. We're the 6th best team in the Premier League, is this good enough? No. But it's not as bad as posters like Risso, Paulie, Mark Kelly etc would have you believe.
Errr, that's a gigantic simplification.
I am not one of the ones moaning that sixth is terrible, it isn't. It isn't terrible, but neither is it a gigantic achievement.
I'm also not one of the ones who think we should have broken fourth by now. I just don't think MON is ever going to do it, because he's stuck in the past.
My gripes are pretty much entirely about the dire, sleep inducing football we play.
I'd take 8th next year if we could play a bit of football. Have a bit of fun, that kind of thing.
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I think we're perceived as a likeable team with good players who are trying to do things the right way. Certainly not boring, but not disliked.
Like a better version of Fulham.
I would say that most non-Villa fans would say we played much better football than we would. Most non-Villa fans seem to picture us as as flying wingers and lightning-fast counter attacks.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
How do you know he doesn't already?
Because of his/her consistent attendance on match threads, maybe ?
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From people I speak with on Merseyside we are seen as the biggest club in the Midlands, with a great vociferous away following, tidy ground but with little or no chance of breaking into the top four.MON is generally liked and our counter attacking play away from home appreciated. Generally I hear the comment - " I really like the Villa", primarily as we are not seen as a threat - our recent history tends to support this.
Will it change? I very much doubt it even despite our new owners suggesting a bright future - incidentally - "Proud history, bright future" is the same/similar phrase used by Philips of Eindhoven, so even that is not original !!
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I really couldn't care less how anyone but myself percieves the club.
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I think we're perceived as a likeable team with good players who are trying to do things the right way. Certainly not boring, but not disliked.
Like a better version of Fulham.
I would say that most non-Villa fans would say we played much better football than we would. Most non-Villa fans seem to picture us as as flying wingers and lightning-fast counter attacks.
Yes, that's the impression I've got of late being a Villa fan. In previous years we've been seen as boring, but not in the last 3 seasons.
With other fans I speak to, they seem to think we're a very attacking side, in ways akin to Newcastle under Keegan in his first run (with less success mind).
As you say Dave, lightening counters and pace to burn. I've also found that amongst those I know of non-Villa allegience, the majority if given the choice of cherry picking one of our boys, would pick Gabby Agbonlahor, a player who very much divides opinion on here.
In fairness I'm not suddenly saying we haven't played a lot of drab football under Martin, but I do think the doom and gloom and woe can get a tad too much here.
Certainly, writing off our season already as some have, is a tad on the pessimistic side.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
How do you know he doesn't already?
Because of his/her consistent attendance on match threads, maybe ?
Your post seems to assume he's not coming to matches because he chooses not to.
He lives on the Isle Of Man, which might have something to do with it.
If he's got other things to do which rule out coming to matches very often, then that's his business, as it is for every other overseas poster.
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One of my friends said he sees us as a club that is happy to float around the top ten and that so long as we are a bit better than mid-table we are doing well. He thinks we see ourselves as bigger and more fashionable than we are.
Then I punched him.
No I didn't, but it was interesting to see what another fan would think of us.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
How do you know he doesn't already?
Because of his/her consistent attendance on match threads, maybe ?
you're going down a dangerous road with your line of argument.
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Older fans of other clubs I talk to (40/50+) seem to rate us.
Younger ones (20's/30's) less so.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
How do you know he doesn't already?
Because of his/her consistent attendance on match threads, maybe ?
This might be a bit out of leftfield but stay with me:
How about if he'd been a regular for years, season ticket holder and the works. Yet had to move for work?
I don't know whether he was a regular, truth be told. But at a guess I'd say he has probably seen a game or two.
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Sack the manager and appoint one who is on nodding terms with the 21st century.
Would you then actually come to Villa Park to watch a game or two ?
As others have pointed out, my non attendance at Villa Park is entirely to do with the fact that I don't live in the UK any more. Before I moved over, I got to a lot of away games and a few homes games a year. Before that, I was a season ticket holder. Take your better fan than you bollocks, and shove it.
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I think MON has a better public image than Villa does, so quite how sacking the manager improves that, I'm not sure.
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Older fans of other clubs I talk to (40/50+) seem to rate us.
Younger ones (20's/30's) less so.
I'd agree with that. Talking to an older Arsenal fan a few weeks ago and he said that he thought the league needed Villa to be challenging and that he was brought up to think of us as a massive club, kept saying "the Villa" which I liked.
We need to win something or get into the CL for younger fans to start to see us any differently.
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Improve on the pitch and realities and perceptions will change.
exactly
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Hopefully we can improve enough so that everybody hates us.
That's what we should be striving for.
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Hopefully we can improve enough so that everybody hates us.
That's what we should be striving for.
I agree, and fears us - especially at VP.
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Hopefully we can improve enough so that everybody hates us.
That's what we should be striving for.
I agree, and fears us - especially at VP.
When we get Alex Ferguson moaning about how we always get the decisions at Villa Park, then we'll know we've improved.
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One of my friends said he sees us as a club that is happy to float around the top ten and that so long as we are a bit better than mid-table we are doing well. He thinks we see ourselves as bigger and more fashionable than we are.
Your friend is right
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Hopefully we can improve enough so that everybody hates us.
That's what we should be striving for.
I agree, and fears us - especially at VP.
They do fear us at VP, that's why they mostly come and put 10 behind the ball.
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Hopefully we can improve enough so that everybody hates us.
That's what we should be striving for.
I agree, and fears us - especially at VP.
They do fear us at VP, that's why they mostly come and put 10 behind the ball.
"They" know that's it not hard to defend against Villa's lack of inventive football.
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The original statement of this thread is that we are perceived as a little boring.
Well I dont find us boring and never have done in over 40 years whether we have been crap or good.
Sometimes I think people are measuring what they feel they should be provided with against the hyped up image of the likes of Arsenal, Chelsea, Man City, even Spurs fed to us by the media and in particular the likes of Sky and TalkSport.
Personally, I dont really care how others perceive us.
Do we really care what pundits who never had any connection with us during their careers say about us when they turn up on some football show to spout their generally inane repetitive rubbish in exchange for a few hundred quid ?
Do we really care what other football followers who have probably never been to a live match at Villa Park, and are being fed their perceptions by the same unforementioned media think about us ?
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That's the thing - as Irish villain said - we do see ourselves bigger than what we are. We scoff at those pundits that say we think we have a divine right to win anything and everything. We attack those pundits who say that 6th is a great achievement for us. We pour scorn at Newcastle for pundits going on about them being a big club when all they do is fill a ground to capacity every week despite winning nothing for 50 odd years.
But in reality we are big in our own minds. We're there or thereabouts when we have a good season but have only won something like 10 trophies in a hundred years or so and no matter how many excuses we can come up with we can only sell out the ground when the opposition are big.
Maybe its not us that's right and everyone else that is wrong. Maybe we are doing well to be where we are. maybe we're not a big club despite thinking that we are - yes we have the potential to be but so do many.
We are, like most clubs, possibly just big in our own minds.
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Hopefully we can improve enough so that everybody hates us.
That's what we should be striving for.
I agree, and fears us - especially at VP.
They do fear us at VP, that's why they mostly come and put 10 behind the ball.
"They" know that's it not hard to defend against Villa's lack of inventive football.
So why do they put 10 men behind the ball? If it was so easy then they wouldn't change their style to try to stop us.
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No, they don't fear us. More, they know how nullify us.
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My non supporting Villa mates call Villa fan's F1ckle, Say manager is a stubborn moron who you upset at your peril. Also say football is predictable and our players dive to gain advantage and sometimes its hard to argue. One supports Blues and one supports Albion so im not sure if its just natural for them to feel that way.
My birds grandad supports Forest and calls us nasty Villa.
I agree with some of the other posters in really we need to mix up the play a little and buy some better football.
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They know what Ash will do.
They know what Petrov will do and they know he's tired after 70 minutes.
They are scared of Gabby's pace, but know he has to create a lot for himself so he's a bit of an unkown.
They know that our right back is a poor right back.
They know that Heskey is Heskey.
They know Dunnie and Collins are uber hard work to get past.
They are scared of Carew as he is good in the box, but his head goes down very easily.
They aren't scared of Downing - is he suffering psycologically ?
They know the Holte End gets restless 60 minutes into a game if we're looking lacklustre.
We need some more unknowns - some more unpredictables.
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I think the fans of every non Top 4 club think they're big.
I think the fans of Top 4 clubs think THEY are big for following them.
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Off the field we're still pretty anonymous to most. Lerner's spent a lot but it hasn't registered with most fans because its not been spent on anyone exciting. i certainly think if you asked someone to name footballs rich owners, Lerner would be mentioned after the first batch of names had been reeled off. If someone finds out i'm a villa fan, they normally bring up MON next, which shows how he dominates people's perception of Villa.
On the the field we're seen as a workmanlike team, all effort and little skill.
I'd say both perceptions were down to the manager
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No, they don't fear us. More, they know how nullify us.
That's just semantics.
They fear that if they allow us to play they will lose. Therefore their game plan is based on fear of losing rather than trying to win.
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Off the field we're still pretty anonymous to most. Lerner's spent a lot but it hasn't registered with most fans because its not been spent on anyone exciting. i certainly think if you asked someone to name footballs rich owners, Lerner would be mentioned after the first batch of names had been reeled off. If someone finds out i'm a villa fan, they normally bring up MON next, which shows how he dominates people's perception of Villa.
On the the field we're seen as a workmanlike team, all effort and little skill.
I'd say both perceptions were down to the manager
More or less how I see it.
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I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.
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My non supporting Villa mates call Villa fan's F1ckle, Say manager is a stubborn moron who you upset at your peril. Also say football is predictable and our players dive to gain advantage and sometimes its hard to argue. One supports Blues and one supports Albion so im not sure if its just natural for them to feel that way.
My birds grandad supports Forest and calls us nasty Villa.
I agree with some of the other posters in really we need to mix up the play a little and buy some better football.
Can't believe you take seriously what a couple of jealous Small Heath and Albion fans say.
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I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.
Give us hope, pray give us hope............enlighten.
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They know what Ash will do.
They know what Petrov will do and they know he's tired after 70 minutes.
They are scared of Gabby's pace, but know he has to create a lot for himself so he's a bit of an unkown.
They know that our right back is a poor right back.
They know that Heskey is Heskey.
They know Dunnie and Collins are uber hard work to get past.
They are scared of Carew as he is good in the box, but his head goes down very easily.
They aren't scared of Downing - is he suffering psycologically ?
They know the Holte End gets restless 60 minutes into a game if we're looking lacklustre.
We need some more unknowns - some more unpredictables.
After reading that it's a miracle how we ever even make it to the half way line.
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I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.
Give us hope, pray give us hope............enlighten.
Honestly, I think some on here are beyond hope.
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So when you talk to fans of other clubs, they praise our champagne football and ambitious transfer market swoops? Who are these madmen, and who do they support?
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None of the Liverpool fans I work with wanted O'Neill as their new manager when Benitez quit. That wouldn't have been the case two years ago. O'Neill's reputation is definitely on the slide.
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So when you talk to fans of other clubs, they praise our champagne football and ambitious transfer market swoops? Who are these madmen, and who do they support?
Who mentioned champagne football? Nobody but you. We're certainly not a boring club who play boring football though.
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None of the Liverpool fans I work with wanted O'Neill as their new manager when Benitez quit. That wouldn't have been the case two years ago. O'Neill's reputation is definitely on the slide.
They ended up with Hodgson - a man who led Fulham to the bottom half of the Premier League.
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None of the Liverpool fans I work with wanted O'Neill as their new manager when Benitez quit. That wouldn't have been the case two years ago. O'Neill's reputation is definitely on the slide.
They ended up with Hodgson - a man who led Fulham to the bottom half of the Premier League.
Considering where they were when he took over, he did brilliantly for them.
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It is of great importance in the sky era how we are percieved whether we like it or not,we as a club are selling a product.The product we sell for the most part is of good quality and we seem to get a more than fair share of tv air time.We do have problems at home breaking teams down but we are not the only ones by any stretch of the imagination,even the "sky four" have had to put up with well organised teams visitin old trafford,the emirates etc and hoping for a 0-0.
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That's the thing - as Irish villain said - we do see ourselves bigger than what we are. We scoff at those pundits that say we think we have a divine right to win anything and everything. We attack those pundits who say that 6th is a great achievement for us. We pour scorn at Newcastle for pundits going on about them being a big club when all they do is fill a ground to capacity every week despite winning nothing for 50 odd years.
But in reality we are big in our own minds. We're there or thereabouts when we have a good season but have only won something like 10 trophies in a hundred years or so and no matter how many excuses we can come up with we can only sell out the ground when the opposition are big.
Maybe its not us that's right and everyone else that is wrong. Maybe we are doing well to be where we are. maybe we're not a big club despite thinking that we are - yes we have the potential to be but so do many.
We are, like most clubs, possibly just big in our own minds.
The counter to that is:
- There has barely been a decade since formation when we haven't won a major trophy.
- We're still the fourth most successful side in English football history
-For most of the individual domestic honours won in the English game, we're up near the top of the list in each
- We've supplied more England internationals than any other club
-We're one of only four English sides to pot the EC
That sounds plenty big enough to me, and if Tottenham, Citeh or any other side outside of the very elite had that kind of record their spin dept would never let the media forget it. Whilst our own fans are so keen to do us down others will be more than happy to do the same.
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My Liverpool supporting mate was fairly underwhelmed by Hodgson but will reserve judgement and see how he gets on. He was deeply afraid of getting MON.
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I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.
Give us hope, pray give us hope............enlighten.
Honestly, I think some on here are beyond hope.
If hope = watching the team play to support them, I have hope.
If hope = taking time on here to share opinions and thoughts with fellow Villa fans, I have hope.
If hope = truly believing that AVFC will be playing sexy football nest season, winning 4 nils and attracting the plaudits from the neutrals, I do not have hope.
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Older fans of other clubs I talk to (40/50+) seem to rate us.
Younger ones (20's/30's) less so.
I'd agree with that. Talking to an older Arsenal fan a few weeks ago and he said that he thought the league needed Villa to be challenging and that he was brought up to think of us as a massive club, kept saying "the Villa" which I liked.
We need to win something or get into the CL for younger fans to start to see us any differently.
Had a similar encounter with a Citeh fan a few years back when we were after Distin. Think it was back in 2005 under Pigface. Citeh fan said he was bound to move to us if we were keen as we were a 'massive club.' How times change, eh?
You're right on the last part too. We need to be current, or relevant to borrow Dave Woodhall's description.
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History means an awful lot to me but I despair to think how little it means to most people. That's why we are not seen as big or fashionable because so much of our success was so long ago.
We desperately need an FA cup win or a great run in the Europa League to attract attention from further afield. It's clear now we don't have the money to compete with the cubs who want to buy success and status so we have to try to do it the hard way.
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I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.
Give us hope, pray give us hope............enlighten.
Honestly, I think some on here are beyond hope.
If hope = watching the team play to support them, I have hope.
If hope = taking time on here to share opinions and thoughts with fellow Villa fans, I have hope.
If hope = truly believing that AVFC will be playing sexy football nest season, winning 4 nils and attracting the plaudits from the neutrals, I do not have hope.
The phrase sexy football makes me want to buy a shotgun and run amok through Moseley. Mourinho is the best manager in the world and has never knowingly had a team play sexy football. It's all about results, if you can score a few gaols along the way then that's great but English football is so physical and so competitive that few games live up to your romantic aspirations.
You also seem to have trouble with language. How can hope be the same as "truly believing"? I hope that we win the league by 20 points, I expect to see us once again involved in the battle for Champions League qualification.
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Even ten years ago, you had a situation where players were probably aware of our success in Europe and the League at the turn of the 80's; and our record FA Cup haul (up until 1991) from the time they were growing up, so -providing we were't well and truly in the shit- we were still a vaguely attractive option for many.
But for players breaking through now -nevermind fans of other clubs- we really haven't achieved a great deal for a while. That's when it becomes harder.
Take Dunne as an example. In all the time he's been with us I don't think I've ever heard him refer to us as a big club or similar, whereas he generally can't shut up about how huge Citeh are and how they should be sweeping all before them.
He hasn't been particularly derogatory about us either. And I tend to go the route of much preferring performances on the pitch outdoing waffle in print. But he does seem to see us as a 'homely' club, rather than a major player. Maybe that's the wider perception amongst his peers now, and that you're only a 'big' club if you're top 4 or have money to throw around like Citeh.
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I think you're right.
We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.
We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.
If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).
If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.
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I think you're right.
We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.
We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.
If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).
If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.
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I think you're right.
We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.
We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.
If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).
If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.
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I think you're right.
We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.
We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.
If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).
If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.
I think that's a load of crap, if you don't mind me saying, you're confusing us with Ipswich.
I think it's all in your own head. On another thread you were saying how you agreed with Savage who, amongst other things, said "Martin has proved he can deliver success and I wouldn’t bet against Villa having another good season" now you're saying that you think that really we're not bothered.
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I agreed with Savage that we need to sign Bellamy, Chris.
I am optimistic by nature, but do find it hard to get really positive about the coming season and the way the club is progessing.
We are 3 players and one playing in the wrong position short of being a very good team.
A team that would excite and challenge for a top 5 position all the way bar injury.
We are not pushing on like I thought we would.
If you're happy, that's great.
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I think you're right.
We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.
We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.
If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).
If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.
I think that's a load of crap, if you don't mind me saying, you're confusing us with Ipswich.
I think it's all in your own head. On another thread you were saying how you agreed with Savage who, amongst other things, said "Martin has proved he can deliver success and I wouldn’t bet against Villa having another good season" now you're saying that you think that really we're not bothered.
O'Neill has delivered success at Leicester, who are about the same size as Ipswich.
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I agreed with Savage that we need to sign Bellamy, Chris.
I am optimistic by nature, but do find it hard to get really positive about the coming season and the way the club is progessing.
We are 3 players and one playing in the wrong position short of being a very good team.
A team that would excite and challenge for a top 5 position all the way bar injury.
We are not pushing on like I thought we would.
If you're happy, that's great.
The season hasn't started, there's still a month left of the window so talk of "pushing on" is at best premature. I'm relaxed because i'ts like this every summer with a few people getting their knickers in a twist over every twist and turn of the tabloid rumour mill.
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I think you're right.
We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.
We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.
If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).
If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.
I think that's a load of crap, if you don't mind me saying, you're confusing us with Ipswich.
I think it's all in your own head. On another thread you were saying how you agreed with Savage who, amongst other things, said "Martin has proved he can deliver success and I wouldn’t bet against Villa having another good season" now you're saying that you think that really we're not bothered.
O'Neill has delivered success at Leicester, who are about the same size as Ipswich.
It was the "homely" line that caused the Ipswich comparison so that's irrelevant.
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Most of the none Villa fans I know who are real football fans (not the dickheads who 'support' chelsea/man u/arsenal because the newspapers tell them to) think we're very close to being a really good side.
It's strange that they think that as it clearly reflects my opinion. It's also strange that all the other people who've posted seem to have friends who share their opinions. I wonder if it could, just possibly, be because the majority of their opinion on Villa is based on what we're telling them.
The reality is we seem to have a much higher percentage of negative fans than other clubs which leads to a generally negative opinion of the club. If this translates to players at other clubs (which it clearly will do) it's fairly obvious that they'll not be as eager to sign for us as they would for say a tottenham where all the fans have a very positive opinion of the club, etc.
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What my concern is not how other fans perceive us, but how football players and agents perceive us. It seems to me that we are seen as a stepping stone to bigger and better things. Players are only too happy to mention their delight at signing for a big club when they come to us, but the moment a "Big 4" club, or Man City come calling (And probably Tottenham although i have no proof) then they waste no time in expressing their desire to leave. This leaves us never being able to really kick on. Its starting to get so very frustrating.
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What worries me is how does that perception explain the wage bill. If we were signing top players from clubs above us, the need to pay them over the odds would make sense, but the majority of signings we've made have been from smaller clubs. Are we really that unattractive that we have to bribe them to join us from the likes of West Ham and WBA?
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Fans of other clubs that I know are usually complimentary about us, especially the whole "generally buying British" policy that MON has adopted. The only time they slag us off is when we beat their team. I know an Arsenal fan who (despite laughing at Heskey) was very impressed with our team in general, even suggesting that Gareth Barry's move to Man City had caused him to stagnate and that he should have stayed with us.
In additon, almost every single person that I know in the entire world wanted us to beat Man U in the League Cup last season.
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I don't think we're perceived as boring, but rather aged giants who in recent years never reach their potential or promise, given the passion of support. As a season ticket holder working in Merseyside and living in Cheshire, Villa seem to be viewed with admiration and respect, although not too much threat (even finishing 6th). The owner's apparent willingness to sell Milner and lack of transfer activity (again) might (sadly) support that view?
Villa till I die (which hopefully is a while yet)
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For some strange reason, telling people who I support tends to be a conversation killer. The foreigners normally follow it it with where in England are Aston Villa from, whilst the Brits will just stare blankly and mumble "Oh, right".
We're not really on the football radar.
Edit: I'm just watching the build up to the game on Benfica TV and when conversation turned to us, apart from saying we finished 6th, a slide show of the players,MON was our manager, they really didn't have anything to say about us except we have some of the most fanatical supporters in England.
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You need to find yourself some better foreigners then.
I was 5,000 miles from Birmingham the other week, on a tiny spec of an island in the sea of Thailand, about to go elephant trekking. The Thai that was running the show was telling me how he wanted to BBQ that squid as he kept losing him money with his bets. He asked me who I followed in England. I told him the Villa, he then told me how he thought Gabby and Young were brilliant.
I’ve never found us to be unheard of or conversation killers anywhere in the world.
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I cant bear to read any more of these posts cos Id feel like slitting my wrists (after) shredding my season ticket.
Of course Id like to have some great new young talent in our line up, the kind thats going to score big and often...
.........realistically its unlikely the above would be released by any club
... so I shall continue to cross my fingers, toes, knees etc and hope that our home-grown talent makes the grade - after all Im a Villa fan and always have been...
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No, they don't fear us. More, they know how nullify us.
That's just semantics.
They fear that if they allow us to play they will lose. Therefore their game plan is based on fear of losing rather than trying to win.
No, they know that if they set their team up a certain way they can look to cut out the space to us, don't defend high, suck us in and then hit us on the break. Also, pressure us in the middle and you'll get the ball off us.
Its called tactics not fear.
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No, they don't fear us. More, they know how nullify us.
That's just semantics.
They fear that if they allow us to play they will lose. Therefore their game plan is based on fear of losing rather than trying to win.
No, they know that if they set their team up a certain way they can look to cut out the space to us, don't defend high, suck us in and then hit us on the break. Also, pressure us in the middle and you'll get the ball off us.
Its called tactics not fear.
Its a plan developed to nullify our strengths, because they’re fearful that should we be allowed carte blanche to use our pace, then we’d muller them. Like we do to Bolton, every season.
Christ the internet can be depressing.
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That's the thing - as Irish villain said - we do see ourselves bigger than what we are. We scoff at those pundits that say we think we have a divine right to win anything and everything. We attack those pundits who say that 6th is a great achievement for us. We pour scorn at Newcastle for pundits going on about them being a big club when all they do is fill a ground to capacity every week despite winning nothing for 50 odd years.
But in reality we are big in our own minds. We're there or thereabouts when we have a good season but have only won something like 10 trophies in a hundred years or so and no matter how many excuses we can come up with we can only sell out the ground when the opposition are big.
Maybe its not us that's right and everyone else that is wrong. Maybe we are doing well to be where we are. maybe we're not a big club despite thinking that we are - yes we have the potential to be but so do many.
We are, like most clubs, possibly just big in our own minds.
The counter to that is:
- There has barely been a decade since formation when we haven't won a major trophy.
Accepted
- We're still the fourth most successful side in English football history
True, but thanks to the first 30 years or so of our existence.
-For most of the individual domestic honours won in the English game, we're up near the top of the list in each
See above
- We've supplied more England internationals than any other club
Nice stat but overall that's meaningless in ateam game. Our best pl,ayers that have become England internationals have ended up leaving of late.
-We're one of only four English sides to pot the EC
So are Nottingham Forest. Nice for us and the record books but what does it mean today? Apart from being able to wind up Arsenal and Chelsea fans?
That sounds plenty big enough to me, and if Tottenham, Citeh or any other side outside of the very elite had that kind of record their spin dept would never let the media forget it. Whilst our own fans are so keen to do us down others will be more than happy to do the same.
I don't think we are keen to do us down as you say. Its us Villa fans that perpetrate the idea of us being big even though its not reciprocated too often when you speak to fans of other clubs.
You'll hear them talking about Acorns, Gabby, Randy Lerner, and when they went to Villa PArk for the semi in some year, or against their club in whatever season and that the grounds big.
But that's it. For a while they were waxing lyrical about our team and how exciting we were with our young English players. That being what got us into the public eye. and kept us there (allied with the Acorns thing). Remember here we were talking about us being a secret and that we were bubbling over? Whatever happened to that? The fizz went flat and MON hasn't done a great deal to help IMO.
That said, I'm still hoping for a good transfer window.
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We're still (just about) one of those sides who can struggle/ go off the radar for a few years but when we look like we're about to bounce back generate column inches.
Similar to Everton, in that regard. When either of us do well it's a big club returning to former glories, rather than a plucky underdog upsetting the natural order.
That could change if we continue to tread water though.
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The most noticeable thing about this thread is that all our big-club justification seems to be based on history. And modern football supporters don't care much about history.
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Modern football fans? Those under 20?
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The most noticeable thing about this thread is that all our big-club justification seems to be based on history. And modern football supporters don't care much about history.
That's true to an extent.
The biggest sides or the sides with the most ambition talk about what they are going to achieve.
The others console themselves with history and past glories- if they have a history worth talking about.
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Sky don't care about history pre 1991.
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Most non-Villa fans I know don't mind or quite like us as a club. I dont think they see us as being big or important enough to dislike us. They also seem to rate O'Neill, as indeed, did I before he joined us and before I took a closer look at his record and methods.
As for ideas above our station, maybe we do put too much emphasis on our history but when you look at our potential why shouldn't we be ambitious? We are the biggest and most successful club in a region with a dearth of successful football clubs, we have a catchment area of probably 5 millon people within 50 miles of VP, maybe more. Not enough of those people see us as an attractive enough proposition to commit to supporting us. If we had a good exciting team playing scintillating football with good technique, with a few top players to raise the profile, it should see us easily fiiling the stadium and having a waiting list for tickets. A bit like Arsenal did when they brought Wenger in, or like
Newcastle for a few seasons under Keegan the first time. Unfortunately I dont think we will tap into that potential with Martin O'Neill's unambitious, safety first approach to transfers, and his workmanlike one-dimensional football.
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I live and work in Reading and the view of Villa there is they are a good team with a good manager, and plenty of good young English players. They recognise how difficult it is to break into the top 4 in this Sky era but they see Villa as one of the few clubs capable of doing so.
Martin O'Niell's reputation is still very much intact there.