Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine
Heroes & Villains => Heroes Discussion => Topic started by: Oh Andy on March 06, 2011, 07:36:26 PM
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I know we have our local rivals that hate us but what do fans further a field think of us.
According to this Bolton fan we are like magnolia painted woodchip........Cheeky Fucker.
The Magnolia Match
On that glorious day when the fixture list comes out, all shiny and new, and a new season beckons full of promise and expectation, there are games that you scan for, games that you instantly flag and place in your diary, games around which your life will be built in the coming months. Villa is never one of those games.
There is something stultifyingly mundane about Villa - they are the magnolia-painted woodchip of the footballing world, the rice-pudding of the premier league. Outside of the West Midlands they have no deadly enemies, least of all us. Even if we beat them, nobody comes running to TW to see if the Spy has done a number on them, eager to rub their noses in it. If they were a chocolate, they would be one of those ones in green wrappers in the Roses box that people only eat because they hate the coffee ones and there's nowt else left.
It's not because they are a poor team - indeed they finished sixth three seasons running - maybe it's to their credit that they can be quite good and do it without the arrogance that attracts hatred - but how those fans must long for some recognition - even if it is the recognition that they have got up another team's nose - irritated opposing fans enough to hate them. How we LOVE to be so utterly despised by West Ham fans - it's what makes football worthwhile!
So - here it is, just around the corner, that fixture that nobody noticed all those months ago - the one that we have to get over with before the more interesting stuff the following weekend. TW moderators have been out and about on the streets paying people to sign up to the Forum and post something on the Villa match thread, and it still barely stretched to two pages - as many pages as the behind-closed-doors reserves friendly match against Molde inspired.
Anyway - as I said, here it is, like a giant dollop of ordinaryness barring our way, blocking the sun and spreading it's own aura of grey numbness over our lives.
Houllier rested eight players for the cup game against Citeh, much to the disgruntlement of Villa fans. Should we be flattered? Villa are in a bit of a relegation scrap, so it was either a masterstroke of league prioritisation or a demotivating blunder of epic proportion. We are no strangers to the strategy ourselves, and back then Wigan were the beneficiaries, so let's hope it is the latter.
Coyle's policy on resting players will also come under scrutiny. CYL has conveniently been rested for a few games meaning that Owen could avoid the tricky striker decision by putting Elmo out wide. It will be interesting to see if this continues. Sturridge's goal-scoring surely makes him immune from a benching, and SKD is the captain. The Moo will be keen to play against former a West Midland foe, but then Coyle seems to be favouring wee Mark recently, all of which competition for places is a nice conundrum to have - something that can't be said for the back four where we only have four fit players!
So - yay! hey everyone - the Villa game is finally here!! (yawn) I think I'll alphabetise my sock drawer....
3-1 to the Whites.
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I posted this in the pre-match thread.
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Pot calling the kettle black, They're hardly Monet, coming from most other teams I'd see their point.
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Blackburn hate us.
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Sounds about right to me. Why would anyone care about us outside of the Midlands?
How does that song go? "15 years, won fuck all...", of course no-one will notice us, but do we care?
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Can recall various games with Man Ure and Liverpool fans treating us all to a rousing ditty of 'shit on the Villa,' Arsenal's lot with 'you used to be a big club.' We might not be high up on their hate list, but we do register. Everton fans for some reason have a major dislike for us too.
Bolton? Meh. They're just the red headed stepson you pat on the head and feel sorry for.
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Judging by their fans yesterday the reason the thread did not expand to more than two pages is that most of them would have difficulty in picking up a pen let alone working out what a computer is for.
::)
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As I said in the pre match thread, it may be true that we are a boring club to most but coming from Bolton it's a fuckin insult.
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Can recall various games with Man Ure and Liverpool fans treating us all to a rousing ditty of 'shit on the Villa,' Arsenal's lot with 'you used to be a big club.' We might not be high up on their hate list, but we do register. Everton fans for some reason have a major dislike for us too.
Bolton? Meh. They're just the red headed stepson you pat on the head and feel sorry for.
What it is with Everton? I used to work with an Evertonian who could'nt stand us, never could get my head round it
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Can recall various games with Man Ure and Liverpool fans treating us all to a rousing ditty of 'shit on the Villa,' Arsenal's lot with 'you used to be a big club.' We might not be high up on their hate list, but we do register. Everton fans for some reason have a major dislike for us too.
Bolton? Meh. They're just the red headed stepson you pat on the head and feel sorry for.
What it is with Everton? I used to work with an Evertonian who could'nt stand us, never could get my head round it
Winning just once in 25 years at Villa Park probably hasn't helped.
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Funny, I feel exactly the same about Bolton.
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Can recall various games with Man Ure and Liverpool fans treating us all to a rousing ditty of 'shit on the Villa,' Arsenal's lot with 'you used to be a big club.' We might not be high up on their hate list, but we do register. Everton fans for some reason have a major dislike for us too.
Bolton? Meh. They're just the red headed stepson you pat on the head and feel sorry for.
What it is with Everton? I used to work with an Evertonian who could'nt stand us, never could get my head round it
Genuinely don't know, and it's part of the reason why I shy away from the 'I like Everton' type threads that used to do the rounds here a while back.
You could attribute some of it to our new found wealth around 2006+, where they believed they had some divine right to be challenging for 4th/5th and suddenly felt threatened, but I think it predates even that. Heard various Bluescouse refer to us as 'dirty Villa' (perhaps they just meant Postma though) and such like long before that period.
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Two words:
Dean Holdsworth.
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Bolton Wanderers, way too boring for words.
Do their 'fans' ever sing ?
The Prem would not be worse off without them - indeed would anyone notice or care if they went down ?
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Bolton fans are deluded if they think they don't play long ball anymore.
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"Have they ever won the European Cup?"
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The hatred with Everton stems from 83-84 Milk Cup Semi when we had running battles around Goodison. We landed early and took their main boozer the Blue House. Seriously annoyed them for years.
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I love how now that Bolton is no longer a similie for 'route 1' football they feel like they are the Barcelona of the premier league.
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Bolton are having a good season. I hope they enjoy it, because the second Owen Coyle gets a sniff of a bigger job, he will be gone.
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Can recall various games with Man Ure and Liverpool fans treating us all to a rousing ditty of 'shit on the Villa,' Arsenal's lot with 'you used to be a big club.' We might not be high up on their hate list, but we do register. Everton fans for some reason have a major dislike for us too.
Bolton? Meh. They're just the red headed stepson you pat on the head and feel sorry for.
What it is with Everton? I used to work with an Evertonian who could'nt stand us, never could get my head round it
Genuinely don't know, and it's part of the reason why I shy away from the 'I like Everton' type threads that used to do the rounds here a while back.
You could attribute some of it to our new found wealth around 2006+, where they believed they had some divine right to be challenging for 4th/5th and suddenly felt threatened, but I think it predates even that. Heard various Bluescouse refer to us as 'dirty Villa' (perhaps they just meant Postma though) and such like long before that period.
I think Everton just don't like anyone. Especially over the last few years with this 'peoples club' bollocks they seem to have got it into their heads that they're the last exponents of proper, non-Premier League newfootie supporters.
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We're so boring he was inspired to write about us.
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I think "The Bish" writes similar wind-up articles about other clubs. I wouldn't worry too much with his take on things
.Can recall various games with Man Ure and Liverpool fans treating us all to a rousing ditty of 'shit on the Villa,' Arsenal's lot with 'you used to be a big club.' We might not be high up on their hate list, but we do register. Everton fans for some reason have a major dislike for us too.
Bolton? Meh. They're just the red headed stepson you pat on the head and feel sorry for.
What it is with Everton? I used to work with an Evertonian who could'nt stand us, never could get my head round it
Genuinely don't know, and it's part of the reason why I shy away from the 'I like Everton' type threads that used to do the rounds here a while back.
You could attribute some of it to our new found wealth around 2006+, where they believed they had some divine right to be challenging for 4th/5th and suddenly felt threatened, but I think it predates even that. Heard various Bluescouse refer to us as 'dirty Villa' (perhaps they just meant Postma though) and such like long before that period.
I think Everton just don't like anyone. Especially over the last few years with this 'peoples club' bollocks they seem to have got it into their heads that they're the last exponents of proper, non-Premier League newfootie supporters.
I like the way our rivalry with Everton seems to have hotted up. I think a lot of it also has to do with the history of the fixture, its having been played more than any other. It's certainly a match I love us to win.
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I think Everton's more because were a similar sort of club, great history and a similar fanbase. ALways at similar sort of level.
As for the Bolton fan, they play at the average modern lego land, and enjoying sucess (7th in the league i believe) and are playing football thats making the whole of Bolton take notice of.
We have a few rivals outside the midlands. Always get the man utd, liverpool, everton, chelsea gobbing off and singing "sotv". Personally couldnt care less, just like to set the record straight
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I agree with Alex.
I also think it is a lot to do with the founding of the football league thing - essentially, that Villa were there at the beginning so there is no historical basis to patronise us.
And.. we have a far better name than they could have thought of at the time in the 1870's. Envy will always sting those in opposition.
And goodness knows they have a lot to be envious about. Without ever going out of the North west, but also with Villa...
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Of the seven teams who have been fixtures in the premier league since its inception, ourselves and Everton are probably somewhat considered the 'bastard sons' having never seriously won anything like most of the others and not having the 'glamour' of Spurs.
Evertons hatred of us is basically a 'tallest Dwarf' syndrome.
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We're so boring he was inspired to write about us.
He was writing on a forum about our forthcoming game, bit difficult to write about a forthcoming game against Villa without writing about Villa I would have thought.
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We're so boring he was inspired to write about us.
He was writing on a forum about our forthcoming game, bit difficult to write about a forthcoming game against Villa without writing about Villa I would have thought.
There's a time for logic Dave. And that was it.
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I think we have to take this one on the chin, we are of little consequence to fans outside the West Midlands, but do we honestly care? I have the same sentiment towards Sheffield Wednesday but I doubt their fans are overly concerned what the rest of the world thinks of them. It's our club and up yours to the rest.
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Oh to be a fan of sexy... Bolton.
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I went to Bolton once, and the big problem when I got there, was that it was there.
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I went to Bolton once. Once!
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Always remember the Cup semi in 2000
I drove to Wembley (big mistake) and found myself in a huge queue of traffic approaching the stadium
I was alongside this minibus full of Bolton fans and they had the slide door open facing me (it must have a been a nice day). The minibus was full of what I would term fairly harmless family types but this woman leaned out of the open slide door and gave me terrible abuse through my open car window in the broadest Bolton accent possible.
I just looked at her deadpan, waited for her to finish and said to her 'I'm sorry, I didn't understand a word of that. Do you speak English as I'm looking for Wembley and am not sure where it is?'
Doesn't translate on here as very funny I know but it was priceless as put downs go and completely shut her up. She just didn't know what to say in responsse...
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I went to Bolton once. Once!
To be fair it probably took you a couple of weeks to get out of the car park there.
I remember going to the old ground with my Port Vale supporting friend for a Weds night game. I can honestly say that I have never been so cold and so wet in my life. I vowed never to go back and I haven't.
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There's a lovely view from the Reebok. Provided you don't look at Bolton
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There's a lovely view from the Reebok. Provided you don't look at Bolton
There are some nice mountains which form quite a pleasant backdrop to the reebok / kfc / harvester / tesco extra etc
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It's just Manchester's West Bromwich. They dont want theirs either.