Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine
Heroes & Villains => Heroes Discussion => Topic started by: Londonvilla on July 10, 2022, 12:20:22 AM
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What have we learnt from the first preseason game?
Last season was underwhelming. In the words of Steve Bruce, I expected us to be there or thereabouts, for a top 8 finish and we underperform, considering the quality of our squad. The most disappointing thing was the lack of identity and style of play. It was as if Stephen Gerard was trying to find a style of play with the available players rather than implementing his style and making the players play that way. (Sounds harsh, but we should have finished higher in the league.)
This is why I was interested in seeing how we would perform in our first preseason game. Would there be clues as to how our new first-team coach would set the team up?
So, below are the top three things I took from today’s performance.
Our players fall into two categories. The first is those players who cannot retain possession of the ball (they dribble till they lose it or pass it straight back to the opposition) and those who retain possession at all costs and play high-risk passes when they’re in the final third. Unfortunately, two of my favourite players fall into the first category. Mings and Watkins, even when they’re at their best, give control of the ball away far too easily. Traoré, Bailey and El Ghazi, on their day, can be magic, but in general, their first instinct and not to retain possession, and as a result, we lose control of games more quickly when they are in the team. It was fantastic to see our young players who played in the middle of the park try to keep control of the game by keeping the ball moving using a simple pass-and-move philosophy. Brighton doesn’t have better players than us, but they play better football because the dribblers in their team try to keep possession, and their central defenders don’t kick the ball aimlessly down the left-wing.
The second thing I noticed was the fact that for the first time, we had people trying to play the number six position who dropped in between the central defenders, giving us the angles to play out from the back. Marvellous dropped in there at times, and in the first half, Finn Azaz (who looked very good) did the same. You can’t play out from the back unless a midfield player is willing to drop back and help create the angles needed to progress the ball up the field. This midfield player needs to receive the ball on the half-turn and not with his back to the opposition goal because he will have limited options for moving the ball out of defence. Don’t get me wrong, we didn’t do it very well, but we did it better than we were doing for most of last season. I never want to see Tyrone hoof the ball up the field because he has no options.
The third thing I noticed was that last season, we played with a flat three in midfield, and when our full-backs bombed forward (they were living in the final third), our two wider midfield players would cover for the full-back on their side. This was a waste of the talents of our midfield players, who were good at times but could have been better if they were playing in another formation. Today we played with a minimum of four people behind the ball at any one time. (Mostly right back, two central defenders and one defensive midfield player.) It was clear that both full-backs never got forward together in either the first or second half; it was either one or the other. If you look at Liverpool, they pressed teams to death by playing both full-backs high up the pitch, forcing teams to play risky balls through the middle of the park and then their midfield pressed, putting challenges to win the ball back. Like Manchester City, if they fail to win the ball back. They then use tactical fouling to stop attacks. The way Kaine Kesler Hayden was playing was similar to how Liverpool’s Trent Alexander plays in that he didn’t seem to care about defending. Also, there were times in the second half when Ashley Young was the furthest villa player up the pitch. So it will be interesting to see if we press heavily from the front, leaving three/four players to cover. (It was fun watching young Chrisene cut inside when running through looking for a pass in the final third in the way that Ajax under Erik ten Hag played.)
Overall, I enjoyed watching football again and thought Cameron Archer looked like a natural-born killer. Bertrand Traore tried to curb his instinct of dribbling first rather than passing and, as a result, played quite well. Finn Azaz looks like a tidy player; no wonder he won the league to Young player of the season. Feeney looks a real player and will be pushing our centre-halves for a starting place next season. (You read it here first.) If O’Reilly can gain one-half stones in weight, he will be outstanding against teams who play a low block because he retains possession and uses it smartly. In Sanson, I am convinced that there is a player in there, and it’s a shame we can’t seem to get the best at him.
Anyway, I’m probably overthinking all of this, and there may not be any real takeaway from this game; however, what would be your main conclusions from today’s performance?
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What we learnt is that we have over half the likely starters still on holiday and that Walsall are happy to fill the ground up for this regular friendly.
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What we learnt is that we have over half the likely starters still on holiday and that Walsall are happy to fill the ground up for this regular friendly.
Thanks for that great analysis .....nice to hear from a top brain
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I wouldn’t read too much into a friendly we always win. And recently by a lot. Many players missing. It was good to see a number of the kids get a run out and we still have the Euro winners to come in. Australia will be a nice test. And by the end we will have one more in and hopefully at least one more.
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Thanks for your observations, LondonVilla: interesting to hear your perspectives.
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I think you are being harsh on Watkins. He took his goal very well and there was very promising link ups with Ings and Buendia.
Archer’s touch was found wanting more than once but give him a chance and he’ll be lethal. Certainly worth keeping in our squad this season. Until Jan at least.
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Your first point LV is spot on, one of if not the biggest problem we have as a team is the ease at which we give up possession and has been a problem for too long.
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Good analysis I thought, the midfield looked noticeably better drilled when we had possession in our own third.
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Lets be honest its an annual favour to Walsall. A chance for a bigger number of Villa fans to watch an away game. It was all about fitness nothing more. The only thing I would say football wise is that O'Reilly looked good and Mings was Mings. It's wrong to look into this fixture as some sort of plan. Still better than watching the training session at Villa Park when that friendly got cancelled.
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I did a BE-frown on reading the thread title, thimking that whatever you had to say should be in the post-match thread and not be a selfish topic on its own.
Having read through your sound analysis, I realise it was a cut above our post-match breeze-shooting and you were dead right to set-up a breakaway discussion.
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I think you are being harsh on Watkins. He took his goal very well and there was very promising link ups with Ings and Buendia.
Archer’s touch was found wanting more than once but give him a chance and he’ll be lethal. Certainly worth keeping in our squad this season. Until Jan at least.
Lol.....your right I think I was a little harsh
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I did a BE-frown on reading the thread title, thimking that whatever you had to say should be in the post-match thread and not be a selfish topic on its own.
Having read through your sound analysis, I realise it was a cut above our post-match breeze-shooting and you were dead right to set-up a breakaway discussion.
The thing I can't work out is do we have the players to play a passing game like Brighton or should we play on the break like Leicester.
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I did a BE-frown on reading the thread title, thimking that whatever you had to say should be in the post-match thread and not be a selfish topic on its own.
Having read through your sound analysis, I realise it was a cut above our post-match breeze-shooting and you were dead right to set-up a breakaway discussion.
The thing I can't work out is do we have the players to play a passing game like Brighton or should we play on the break like Leicester.
If we can play both ways depending on the opposition we'll finish well above both of them.
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Bit late to the party but that’s a good analysis LV. The two halves were very different. The first half seemed to be about keeping the ball and I agree that in Azaz we have a gem who did exactly that - no risks just keep the ball. Second half saw the top half interplay that we know our players are capable of. Risks were taken but at time the one twos between Buendia, Watkins and Ings were sublime. But also the press was higher up the pitch
So to answer your question yes I thought we saw Gerrard trying out two different styles in one game which suggests he doesn’t have one way of playing in his head
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Good interesting analysis as I only saw the goals and read some of the comments in the match thread.
Last season was underwhelming. In the words of Steve Bruce, I expected us to be there or thereabouts, for a top 8 finish and we underperform, considering the quality of our squad. The most disappointing thing was the lack of identity and style of play. It was as if Stephen Gerard was trying to find a style of play with the available players rather than implementing his style and making the players play that way. (Sounds harsh, but we should have finished higher in the league.)
I disagree with this though as my feelings were the opposite. Gerrard was trying to implement or force his Rangers style of play on the players that weren’t suited or unaccustomed to it. It’s a balancing act as each manager has his own style but there was no gradual transfer of formations. Instead of looking at the skill sets of the players and picking a formation / tactic that they were comfortable with, it was straight into the Rangers tactic imo.
Even after a couple of longer breaks where the added time on the training pitch should have paid dividends we looked worse.
Hopefully with more of his own players and a full pre season will see an improvement.
Perhaps this should have gone in the Gerrard thread.
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What I learned from it:
Azaz is a better player than I expected, I suspect he'll go to a championship club for the season.
Kesler looks like he might be ready to cover for Cash, and Young as insurance makes it a simple chocie to keep him around and look to move Guilbert on.
Chrisene doesn't look quite as far along, he's got loads of potential but he needs some senior football.
Seb revan looked lost for a big part of the first half, hopefully was just nerves and he can be much better than he showed.
Feeney looks like a fantastic prospect, high hopes for him.
Cam is a great finisher but he was struggling to get into the game, not really his fault but a sign that we need him to train with the first team squad a lot more.
Sanson has everything to be a regular for us, that he isn't suggests the problem isn't with what he does on the pitch.
Carlos looks a top class defender, him and Mings could become an excellent pairing.
Not much to say on the other seniors, I don't think any of them did anything to change existing opinions on them, there were however some signs of fantastic link up play between Watkins, Ings and Buendia.
I don't think we can read anything into how Gerrard wants to play from it, 10 changes at half time and both teams being a mix of kids and seniors meant a lot of the play was off the cuff and the laack of familiarity was the biggest negative (as mentioned specifically about Cam who was the biggest victim of it).
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+5 substitution rule will be MASSIVE to how well teams do in the 22/23 season. Anwar El Ghazi proved himself to be a A* professional and contributed to a comfortable victory. We should not be letting players of his calibre leave for pittance when we will need positive players coming from the bench.
I think selling Trezeguet will come back to haunt us ,let's hope we don't make the same mistake with Anwar , two players who have had BIG game changing contributions over the past few years. He should be rewarded with a new contract not left out in the cold .
As for others
Cameron Archer looked very comfortable and everyone else was OK , hard to tell against Walsall . The Australian tour will be VERY interesting as I imagine villa support will be very limited and obviously Leeds have a big following in that part of the world so we will be up against it that's for sure
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Why the bollocks should Leeds have more support there than us?
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Hangover from the Kewell/Viduka years?
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I disagree with this though as my feelings were the opposite. Gerrard was trying to implement or force his Rangers style of play on the players that weren’t suited or unaccustomed to it. It’s a balancing act as each manager has his own style but there was no gradual transfer of formations. Instead of looking at the skill sets of the players and picking a formation / tactic that they were comfortable with, it was straight into the Rangers tactic imo.
I agree with this. For the first several months Gerrard was praising the players for buying into his coaching team's style of play. The fact that we didn't make significant progress last season rather proves your point that the squad he inherited wasn't suited to that way of playing.
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Hangover from the Kewell/Viduka years?
We had Brett Holman and Shane Lowry.
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Hangover from the Kewell/Viduka years?
We had Brett Holman and Shane Lowry.
As well as Bosnich and latterly Jedinak.
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What I learned from it:
Azaz is a better player than I expected, I suspect he'll go to a championship club for the season.
Kesler looks like he might be ready to cover for Cash, and Young as insurance makes it a simple chocie to keep him around and look to move Guilbert on.
Chrisene doesn't look quite as far along, he's got loads of potential but he needs some senior football.
Seb revan looked lost for a big part of the first half, hopefully was just nerves and he can be much better than he showed.
Feeney looks like a fantastic prospect, high hopes for him.
Cam is a great finisher but he was struggling to get into the game, not really his fault but a sign that we need him to train with the first team squad a lot more.
Sanson has everything to be a regular for us, that he isn't suggests the problem isn't with what he does on the pitch.
Carlos looks a top class defender, him and Mings could become an excellent pairing.
Not much to say on the other seniors, I don't think any of them did anything to change existing opinions on them, there were however some signs of fantastic link up play between Watkins, Ings and Buendia.
I don't think we can read anything into how Gerrard wants to play from it, 10 changes at half time and both teams being a mix of kids and seniors meant a lot of the play was off the cuff and the laack of familiarity was the biggest negative (as mentioned specifically about Cam who was the biggest victim of it).
Good points
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It's very well known that Leeds have big support in Australia. Will probably outnumber us 70-30 from what I understand.
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DISGRACE!
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Why the bollocks should Leeds have more support there than us?
It's a hangover from the limited televised football in the 70's I've been told. There's a generation that got captured because Leeds were a big noise at the time. It surprised me when I settled here a few years ago how many of them there are.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
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I must admit, the thought that another club might, possibly, have more supporters than us at a friendly on the other side of the world will keep me awake tonight.
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There's plenty of Villa going up from Melbourne. I don't think we'll be under-represented. Hopefully this will be a weight off Mr Woodhall's mind and he can wrestle with whatever other nightmares keep him awake at night.
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Hangover from the Kewell/Viduka years?
We had Brett Holman and Shane Lowry.
As well as Bosnich and latterly Jedinak.
And Chris Herd
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...that if we come across a league 2 team in one of the cup competitions we should win comfortably?
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I can't imagine why Leeds would be popular in the country that instigated the White Australia Policy.
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I think we'll have a fair few Villa fans is Aus. Not that it makes any difference whatsoever in a pre-season friendly, it's hardly going to be a cauldron on intimidation either way..
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Out of interest is there a cup for the winners of the pre-season tournament or is it purely friendly matches?it would be nice to win something and the players go into the new campaign with a winning mentality.
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I am reliably informed that both Bouncer and Mrs. Mangle were big Villa fans.
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Just a few friendlies, I think. As an aside, it's a shame they just have to have us pictured in training gear rather than our famous colours on the website because, yet again, we couldn't be bothered to release the kit on time.
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon/icon-festival-of-events
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I am reliably informed that both Bouncer and Mrs. Mangle were big Villa fans.
What about Mr Udagawa?
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Just a few friendlies, I think. As an aside, it's a shame they just have to have us pictured in training gear rather than our famous colours on the website because, yet again, we couldn't be bothered to release the kit on time.
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon/icon-festival-of-events
Very strange how they've used images of the other teams from 'game shots' and we have players modeling the latest training gear
Beggers belief what some people do at the Club when forwarding official photography/documents over to the organisers. Need to up our game
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Just a few friendlies, I think. As an aside, it's a shame they just have to have us pictured in training gear rather than our famous colours on the website because, yet again, we couldn't be bothered to release the kit on time.
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon/icon-festival-of-events
The photos of the other teams are of last season's kits. There is no reason we couldn't have done the same. It has nothing to do with when the new kit was released.
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Just a few friendlies, I think. As an aside, it's a shame they just have to have us pictured in training gear rather than our famous colours on the website because, yet again, we couldn't be bothered to release the kit on time.
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon/icon-festival-of-events
The photos of the other teams are of last season's kits. There is no reason we couldn't have done the same. It has nothing to do with when the new kit was released.
Ah, okay. Weird then.
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What we learnt is that we have over half the likely starters still on holiday and that Walsall are happy to fill the ground up for this regular friendly.
Thanks for that great analysis .....nice to hear from a top brain
That's a bit insulting Londonvilla. Steve67 is correct. It was a match to get some fitness under us and also help Walsall as we do every year. We have learned nothing of note but do appreciate your in depth analysis.
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Hangover from the Kewell/Viduka years?
Those two, yes, and it coincided with the premier league getting far more air time on free to air TV. Roundball football gathered a lot of momentum in that period, when the conversation was previously dominated by the oval ball codes. A lot of new fans without prior allegiances jumped on Leeds as a result.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Worried?
I'm more concerned that a trip to Australia alienates the common man, let's face it, who can afford to go there at those prices?
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Worried?
I'm more concerned that a trip to Australia alienates the common man, let's face it, who can afford to go there at those prices?
Certainly not the people who've had to pay so much extra for their season tickets in the T6 sections.
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Just a few friendlies, I think. As an aside, it's a shame they just have to have us pictured in training gear rather than our famous colours on the website because, yet again, we couldn't be bothered to release the kit on time.
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon/icon-festival-of-events
The photos of the other teams are of last season's kits. There is no reason we couldn't have done the same. It has nothing to do with when the new kit was released.
Well there is, we have a new kit supplier. If we'd released the kit on time we could have had photos of players in the new kit in our famous colours rather than the shabby looking pics on the website.
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The Austalia tour mainly gives those fans out there a chance to see us when they normally wouldnt be able to which is great. Those in the UK who can afford to go, will. I think the club maybe could have arranged another freindly over here but with the early start, maybe that wasn't feasible.
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Just a few friendlies, I think. As an aside, it's a shame they just have to have us pictured in training gear rather than our famous colours on the website because, yet again, we couldn't be bothered to release the kit on time.
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon
https://optusstadium.com.au/icon/icon-festival-of-events
The photos of the other teams are of last season's kits. There is no reason we couldn't have done the same. It has nothing to do with when the new kit was released.
Well there is, we have a new kit supplier. If we'd released the kit on time we could have had photos of players in the new kit in our famous colours rather than the shabby looking pics on the website.
I suspect it's the club who have chosen to have those images used, there's a bunch of reasons why that could be the case but I agree the timing of the official reveal of the kit is probably a big part of it. I'm not sure why we couldn't show the kit weeks earlier even if we were never going to get it on sale any earlier than we did.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Er not agreeing, just saying why there might be more Leeds fans than might be expected. Nowhere near as many as Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea mind.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Er not agreeing, just saying why there might be more Leeds fans than might be expected. Nowhere near as many as Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea mind.
I know it's not cool and trendy to be seen agreeing with the Flin.
It won't damage your social credit score ,don't worry
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Er not agreeing, just saying why there might be more Leeds fans than might be expected. Nowhere near as many as Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea mind.
I know it's not cool and trendy to be seen agreeing with the Flin.
It won't damage your social credit score ,don't worry
BUURRRRRN THEM!!!! ;D
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This needed a wider audience so here it is. https://heroesandvillains.info/2022/07/11/what-did-we-learn-from-the-first-pre-season/
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Congrats, Londonvilla! Mr Woodhall rarely if ever promotes H&V topics to the front page.
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Congrats, Londonvilla! Mr Woodhall rarely if ever promotes H&V topics to the front page.
But he's more than happy if anyone wants to write them.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Er not agreeing, just saying why there might be more Leeds fans than might be expected. Nowhere near as many as Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea mind.
I know it's not cool and trendy to be seen agreeing with the Flin.
It won't damage your social credit score ,don't worry
BUURRRRRN THEM!!!! ;D
My Hot Dogs were cooked to perfection on BBQ this evening . Just sat by pond now with ice cold spring water
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Honestly, don't you get bored of all this nonsense?
It's not about how many "we'll take", it is clearly about Villa supporters who live over there.
Back in the day on here, there were two clearly defined camps - miserablists (which included me) and happy clappers (people of a more positive disposition), but you seem to have blown that apart and taken things to a new level - at exactly the time where there isn't actually anything miserable to be miserable about.
So, so tedious.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Er not agreeing, just saying why there might be more Leeds fans than might be expected. Nowhere near as many as Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea mind.
I know it's not cool and trendy to be seen agreeing with the Flin.
It won't damage your social credit score ,don't worry
I have no credit. I just don’t care to be co-opted into whatever psychodrama is going on with you.
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Thank you for certifying that Hillbilly.
Possibly could be 80-20? Or even worse. This won't be a good look for us as a club.
I know there's lots of jokes around regarding Leeds support but in certain parts of the world they have incredible backing that outnumbers ours even with them being in the Championship for so long .
We need to break into other markets,I understand and our supporter base in England is looking VERY strong. Maybe we can get some Liverpool / Gerrard fans to wave a claret and blue scarf for us so it don't look so one sided support wise.
We will probably take max 50?from the UK with a majority heading out to Rennes instead. The club should have put a package together for individuals who wanted to go but don't have the confidence in booking a big trip DIY . Think they have missed a trick there. I'm not the only one worried either
Worried?
I'm more concerned that a trip to Australia alienates the common man, let's face it, who can afford to go there at those prices?
Me, at great expense.
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It's not cheap even if you live here. The tickets might be reasonable but the cost of flights and accommodation is eyewatering. It would be cheaper to get a hospitality package next time I'm over in Brum.
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It's not cheap even if you live here. The tickets might be reasonable but the cost of flights and accommodation is eyewatering. It would be cheaper to get a hospitality package next time I'm over in Brum.
You are right Hillbilly it isn't cheap. I had a friend who was going to fly down to Brisbane from Townsville, but his return flights would have been AUD$700 so he isn't coming. He isn't a Villa fan so I don't blame him.
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Congrats, Londonvilla! Mr Woodhall rarely if ever promotes H&V topics to the front page.
Yes, a well written piece. Well done.
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I think we'll have a fair few Villa fans is Aus. Not that it makes any difference whatsoever in a pre-season friendly, it's hardly going to be a cauldron on intimidation either way..
Have you not seen Mad Max?
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Congrats, Londonvilla! Mr Woodhall rarely if ever promotes H&V topics to the front page.
He made me so happy but its a team effort so I would like to thank Didier Six whose 15 appearances for the villa made me think that dreams can come true
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It's not cheap even if you live here. The tickets might be reasonable but the cost of flights and accommodation is eyewatering. It would be cheaper to get a hospitality package next time I'm over in Brum.
You are right Hillbilly it isn't cheap. I had a friend who was going to fly down to Brisbane from Townsville, but his return flights would have been AUD$700 so he isn't coming. He isn't a Villa fan so I don't blame him.
Yes even domestic travel is expensive these days. Had been hoping to get to Townsville after the Bris game but flight costs turned out prohibitive. And couldn’t persuade my uneducated family that a 1700 mile return drive to watch the Roar reduced to rubble was the best use of a road trip.
From NZ there’s nothing to suggest more Leeds support will be travelling. In Aust, maybe it comes down to whether parochial locals more fondly remember Kewell than Bosnich (who is still occasionally on TV). And if turns out there’s more local dirty whites then no problem, to grow as many Aussie fans as other clubs you do have to occasionally visit. None of that is remotely a bad look for the club.
Big picture for AVFC is probably that it’s commercially profitable to tour, helps to raise brand profile and sell merch in far flung places, and partly a bonding lads trip (as SG’s interview said) in a fairly hospitable climate. Being able to run a mini tournament with likes of Leeds, Palace, Manure already downunder ensures even match-ups too.
#boubacarscoresondebut
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Congrats, Londonvilla! Mr Woodhall rarely if ever promotes H&V topics to the front page.
Yes, a well written piece. Well done.
Thanks