Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine
Heroes & Villains => Match Threads & Player Ratings => Topic started by: Toronto Villa on May 26, 2018, 07:01:44 PM
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If one game beautifully summarized the miserable aspects of the Steve Bruce era it was this one. Devoid of a plan or ideas. Goodbye Steve.
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Got what we deserved today. Thanks and fuck off Steve.
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Prepare for a very very long stay in the lower leagues now. No way they go up next season using the youth. That first half has set us back years and years.
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We lost because we turned up trying to steal the game. Fulham deservedto win because they came to win the game.
Aston Villa should be a team that goes out to win. Get a manager who will try and do that.
Steve you failed, time to go.
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Bugger
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Didn't score a goal.. simple as that. I really don't know what we were going for in the first half. Went a man up and still didn't muster a clear cut chance. Threw a bunch of forwards on and they were all on their separate islands. It's a sad day.. I don't even want to think what our starting XI will look like come the first match next campaign.
Just gutted.. gutted :-\
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P45 for Bruce
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Fulham (team) better suited to premier league. But never in a million years the better side. Ref was a joke.
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They turned up, we didn't. They were better than us but didn't have to play at their best to win.
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The perfect microcosm of our season, 45 mins of aimless garbage, 25 of huff and puff with some hope to fool us then 20 of cluelessness when we can’t lay a glove on 10 men.
Hogan’s woeful header in injury time summed up his season as an individual and ours as a club. Very disappointing, not at all surprising.
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Fulham (team) better suited to premier league. But never in a million years the better side. Ref was a joke.
Of course they were.
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Far too negative, should have started Kodjia and BB. This is why we didn't get auto promotion, bye bye you dinosaur.
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we had, what, 15-20 minutes of genuine drive and intensity at the beginning of the second half? You can't keep that up for 90 but more than 20 shouldn't be too much to ask.
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The set up in the first half killed us. Our dour, negative approach has cost us big time. We can say goodbye to Johnstone, maybe Terry and who knows, perhaps even Grealish plus others who are getting too old.
With our ageing squad it was shit or bust today and no more parachute payments to help rebuild the squad.
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Too many times this season Ive seen Villa play like this .. negative and the manager and coaches havent got a clue what to do.
He should have played to win not to hope we get to penalties .
Bye SB , nice bloke but out of date .
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The team's failure to turn up for half the match was inexcusable. We got exactly what we deserved - & although it pains me to say: Fulham were worthy winners both on the day & over the course of the season. Bastards.
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Ref wasn’t the best, but there’s no excuses for not being able to beat 10 men with the squad we’ve got. Fucks sake, we shouldn’t have even been in the playoffs in the first place. I think the club need to come out and say what’s going on with players, manager etc.
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Too many times this season Ive seen Villa play like this .. negative and the manager and coaches havent got a clue what to do.
He should have played to win not to hope we get to penalties .
Bye SB , nice bloke but out of date .
Precisely. We didn’t come to win the game, we came to steal it. That is not acceptable for Aston Villa in Div 2.
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The perfect microcosm of our season, 45 mins of aimless garbage, 25 of huff and puff with some hope to fool us then 20 of cluelessness when we can’t lay a glove on 10 men.
nail on head
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Got what we deserved. Anyone who saw the two Boro games knows what an underwhelming team that was and that we needed a more aggressive mentality in the final. Instead, he goes with the same lineup with Grabban up top who is easily one of the worst strikers I have seen in some time - little movement, no aerial threat, does not pressure the defenders. What a fool Bruce is and what a wasted opportunity!
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Bollox. :-(
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That was never a game for Jedinak, but SB has always been tactically inept. We got what we deserved.
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some villa fans are idiots , listen to this one
Bruce did nothing wrong, Fulham played dirty and the ref was biased against us
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That was never a game for Jedinak, but SB has always been tactically inept. We got what we deserved.
We'd have been fucked without him i the first half.
Grabban, Snodgrass and Appleyard were all shit today.
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Got what we deserved. Anyone who saw the two Boro games knows what an underwhelming team that was and that we needed a more aggressive mentality in the final. Instead, he goes with the same lineup with Grabban up top who is easily one of the worst strikers I have seen in some time - little movement, no aerial threat, does not pressure the defenders. What a fool Bruce is and what a wasted opportunity!
It was so much better under the old regime of course.
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Lesson learned: do it via the top two automatic slots next time.
Wrong tactics to start with, letting them play around us. After they scored that was basically it. We don't come back from a goal down against decent sides and we really should have put 100% in from the start to make damn well sure we were the first to score.
Despite that, I would still keep Bruce. I like him, I give him much of the credit for making us no longer the basket case and I would trust him to build on this season and get us in the top two next uear.
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some villa fans are idiots , listen to this one
Bruce did nothing wrong, Fulham played dirty and the ref was biased against us
Who said that?
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Got what we deserved. Anyone who saw the two Boro games knows what an underwhelming team that was and that we needed a more aggressive mentality in the final. Instead, he goes with the same lineup with Grabban up top who is easily one of the worst strikers I have seen in some time - little movement, no aerial threat, does not pressure the defenders. What a fool Bruce is and what a wasted opportunity!
It was so much better under the old regime of course.
Drummond right now mate the old regime doesn’t matter one bit. We lost a game we really didn’t try to win. Bruce needs to be held accountable to that. It was very poor today.
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The first half was pretty much the same as the FA cup final 3 years ago. Complete gutless wankers who failed to turn up. The 2nd half was a bit better but thats saying absolutely fuck all. Why the fuck Bruce waited 5 minutes to get attacking players on after the sending off is completely beyond me. Why Jedinak started when its painfully obvious how much he struggles against mobile midfielders is beyond me.
Bruce has to go. He has comprehensively failed. Automatic promotion was the absolute minimum expectation.
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That was never a game for Jedinak, but SB has always been tactically inept. We got what we deserved.
Our best player in first half. 2 crucial interceptions/blocks.
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The team's failure to turn up for half the match was inexcusable. We got exactly what we deserved - & although it pains me to say: Fulham were worthy winners both on the day & over the course of the season. Bastards.
Even more bastards for not turning up at SHA on the final day. Bet they're organising the open top bus parade around Bordesley as we speak.
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We gave it everything for 20-25 mins after half time, unfortunately the goal never came. Grealish nearly got one of the great Wembley goals.
Unfortunately I think a number of our players were out on their feet by the time Fulham went down to 10.
Onomoah and Kodjia should have been on a lot earlier.
Fulham though deserved to win, played the better team football and are a better team.
We were far too reliant on Grealish for inspiration and our inability to keep the ball on a hot day was our undoing late on.
Johnstone 6, Elmo 5, Chester 5, Terry 5, Hutton 4, Snodgrass 4, Jedinak 6, Hourihane 6, Adamoah 6, Grealish 8, Grabban 4.
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The team's failure to turn up for half the match was inexcusable. We got exactly what we deserved - & although it pains me to say: Fulham were worthy winners both on the day & over the course of the season. Bastards.
Even more bastards for not turning up at SHA on the final day. Bet they're organising the open top bus parade around Bordesley as we speak.
For Fulham?
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Grabban up top who is easily one of the worst strikers I have seen in some time - little movement, no aerial threat, does not pressure the defenders.
He was very poor today but sorry, that is nonsense. He's scored 20 goals in 34 games this season playing for an appalling Sunderland side and a defensive Villa side.
If a 20 goal season is being one of the worst strikers, can we have another one next year?
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Well, that was shit. Abject. No guile. No apparent desire to run at them until they went down to 10 men, by which point it was too late as Jack was fucking wrecked from being kicked around the park all day and Snodgrass and Adomah were wrecked from trying but failing to be the players they were earlier in the season.
Hard to shake the feeling now that we're doomed to Championship football for a long time.
If Bruce doesn't step down I can't say I'll bother visiting VP very often next season. Just not interested in spending a fortune to travel over to watch that shite.
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That was never a game for Jedinak, but SB has always been tactically inept. We got what we deserved.
I actually thought Jedinak was fine, broke up play and did the job he was asked. Think we gave him a 3 year deal and he'll be here next season.
Key was we needed more energy alongside him, Hourihane as I feared really struggled today to press Fulham and get on the ball.
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We gave it everything for 20-25 mins after half time, unfortunately the goal never came. Grealish nearly got one of the great Wembley goals.
Unfortunately I think a number of our players were out on their feet by the time Fulham went down to 10.
Onomoah and Kodjia should have been on a lot earlier.
Fulham though deserved to win, played the better team football and are a better team.
We were far too reliant on Grealish for inspiration and our inability to keep the ball on a hot day was our undoing late on.
Johnstone 6, Elmo 5, Chester 5, Terry 5, Hutton 4, Snodgrass 4, Jedinak 6, Hourihane 6, Adamoah 6, Grealish 8, Grabban 4.
Pretty much a bang on summary of the game for me.
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That was never a game for Jedinak, but SB has always been tactically inept. We got what we deserved.
I actually thought Jedinak was fine, broke up play and did the job he was asked. Think we gave him a 3 year deal and he'll be here next season.
Key was we needed more energy alongside him, Hourihane as I feared really struggled today to press Fulham and get on the ball.
Hourie and Snodgrass were crap. No other word.
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Play for 25 of the 90 that's what you get, fuck all.
Bye Steve, nice guy that you are.
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The team's failure to turn up for half the match was inexcusable. We got exactly what we deserved - & although it pains me to say: Fulham were worthy winners both on the day & over the course of the season. Bastards.
Even more bastards for not turning up at SHA on the final day. Bet they're organising the open top bus parade around Bordesley as we speak.
For Fulham?
Yes probably, they'd give an invitation to them to come up here when they're doing their bus parade.
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Got what we deserved. Anyone who saw the two Boro games knows what an underwhelming team that was and that we needed a more aggressive mentality in the final. Instead, he goes with the same lineup with Grabban up top who is easily one of the worst strikers I have seen in some time - little movement, no aerial threat, does not pressure the defenders. What a fool Bruce is and what a wasted opportunity!
It was so much better under the old regime of course.
Nope. Was rubbish then, too...
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Fulham are a better side than us but you hope the Villa team that beat Wolves and Blues at home turn up and Fulham choke. I knew it was pretty much game over when they scored, how often do we come from behind, especially against the good teams? Not sure whether to stick with Bruce or not but as others have said, today showed our weaknesses with him in charge, i.e. we generally don't create and score enough especially against the good teams and if we don't hit the ground running in games we find it very hard to get going and get the result as the match goes on. We did have a good 20 mins or so but it still never really looked like we'd score. Not enough players forward.
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Grabban up top who is easily one of the worst strikers I have seen in some time - little movement, no aerial threat, does not pressure the defenders.
He was very poor today but sorry, that is nonsense. He's scored 20 goals in 34 games this season playing for an appalling Sunderland side and a defensive Villa side.
If a 20 goal season is being one of the worst strikers, can we have another one next year?
He's a funny one. Great at the start but faded towards the end of the season.
I'd still take him for next season as we will need a striker who can score in the bread and butter games and he's done that comfortably.
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That was never a game for Jedinak, but SB has always been tactically inept. We got what we deserved.
I actually thought Jedinak was fine, broke up play and did the job he was asked. Think we gave him a 3 year deal and he'll be here next season.
Key was we needed more energy alongside him, Hourihane as I feared really struggled today to press Fulham and get on the ball.
Hourie and Snodgrass were crap. No other word.
Fulham were smart enough to double up on Snoddy and at least two on Jack. Tactically they got it spot on. Today was all about the midfield and they dominated it for most, restricted us for them rest.
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Need to finish top 2. Play offs will kill you.
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Fulham are a better side than us but you hope the Villa team that beat Wolves and Blues at home turn up and Fulham choke. I knew it was pretty much game over when they scored, how often do we come from behind, especially against the good teams? Not sure whether to stick with Bruce or not but as others have said, today showed our weaknesses with him in charge, i.e. we generally don't create and score enough especially against the good teams and if we don't hit the ground running in games we find it very hard to get going and get the result as the match goes on. We did have a good 20 mins or so but it still never really looked like we'd score. Not enough players forward.
Once in 62 games apparently, piss poor.
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Bag of shit.
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Fulham are a better side than us but you hope the Villa team that beat Wolves and Blues at home turn up and Fulham choke. I knew it was pretty much game over when they scored, how often do we come from behind, especially against the good teams? Not sure whether to stick with Bruce or not but as others have said, today showed our weaknesses with him in charge, i.e. we generally don't create and score enough especially against the good teams and if we don't hit the ground running in games we find it very hard to get going and get the result as the match goes on. We did have a good 20 mins or so but it still never really looked like we'd score. Not enough players forward.
We are very average and limited away from VP as our record shows.
If we could play 45 games at Villa Park and the one away game at Boro we'd go up but until we can choose our fixtures we need to be more positive and on the front foot in away games next season.
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Once we went behind that was it. Shit game both sides were poor, they just too their chance
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Nightmare. The FFP sh*t will hit the fan now... :'(
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Fulham are a better side than us but you hope the Villa team that beat Wolves and Blues at home turn up and Fulham choke. I knew it was pretty much game over when they scored, how often do we come from behind, especially against the good teams? Not sure whether to stick with Bruce or not but as others have said, today showed our weaknesses with him in charge, i.e. we generally don't create and score enough especially against the good teams and if we don't hit the ground running in games we find it very hard to get going and get the result as the match goes on. We did have a good 20 mins or so but it still never really looked like we'd score. Not enough players forward.
This is it Bruce if we can get ahead in a game the team can hang on but if we go behind we are generally useless , once again when behind he chucked on 2 strikers and we lost shape ..AGAIN !!!
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Fulham's game plan appeared to be outpass us to pull the defence out of shape (which they did to score) and to kick Jack Grealish into the car park (which they also did). Our other most creative player, Snodgrass, was well marked and had an off day as a result. I would have been interested to see how differently if would have been refereed if Fulham were playing Arsenal, Spuds or Manure.
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ffs dont ruin my day even more with Liverpool winning
had Bruce gone yet?
snodgrass gone
grabban gone
JT gone
Johnstone gone
who else ? maybe Jack and Chester, the only decent players we own
I dont want SB here no more ..... do not want another season watching that
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Nightmare. The FFP sh*t will hit the fan now... :'(
Aye, but the Dogheads have shown what having a progressive young(ish) manager & some creative accountancy can do. Hopefully the suits at VP will have taken note...
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The very predictable line-up cost us getting promoted. I could have picked who would've started today at the final whistle vs Boro. Bruce picking players on sentiment rather than form or the surprise element is the reason why we'll be in the Championship for a third season.
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Once we went behind that was it. Shit game both sides were poor, they just too their chance
happens all the time with SB no plan B and his plan A aint the best
i enjoyed wolves and blose and liked the bristol city win but wasnt a lot else
on my 5th gin now and need more
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I think Johnstone is the least likely of those to be here but you never know with any of them really. I actually think Grabban will be here and I'd be happier with Terry having another season with us in the championship than the PL.
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Sad.
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Predictable rubbish from Bruce you just knew he’d set up to play like that, the first half cost us the game.
With FFP I can see us being down here for years, half that team will be gone I can’t see us being anywhere near promotion next season.
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Predictable rubbish from Bruce you just knew he’d set up to play like that, the first half cost us the game.
With FFP I can see us being down here for years, half that team will be gone I can’t see us being anywhere near promotion next season.
Don't worry, Bruce deserves another chance despite failing.
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That first half will haunt us.
Melting into my shoes.
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Too easy to blame Bruce entirely but his set up in the first half was mystifying. Interesting summer ahead Greatly disappointed like everyone
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get Marcelo Gallardo in and Juan Pablo Angel as assistant :)
we need a big change down VP now , younger and dynamic
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Too easy to blame Bruce entirely but his set up in the first half was mystifying. Interesting summer ahead Greatly disappointed like everyone
It took him to the red to make a change. Almost 40 mins.
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get Marcelo Gallardo in and Juan Pablo Angel as assistant :)
we need a big change down VP now , younger and dynamic
No, you are not getting the job!
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well we certainly need change and undoubtedly we'll get it because of our financials Act decisively Dr T and quickly. The clock's already ticking.
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First half terrible. Second half decent. The red card seemed to help them more than us. The better team won and went up.
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I’m devastated about this.
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get Marcelo Gallardo in and Juan Pablo Angel as assistant :)
we need a big change down VP now , younger and dynamic
I don't mind SB but in these times you need a football coach who can facilitate a game plan. Bruce is a master of disciple and shape.. unfortunately with how potent attacking football has become we might have to consider turning the corner with a more modern manager who has an attacking/possession oriented philosophy. Fulham did it with a squad on the cheap. We can too.
I think next year will be rough.
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I don't think the handball was a pen in a million years, trying to remove Albert's shorts was though which they aren't mentioning.
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Those tactics cost us first half, far too negative and paid them far too much respect. We didn't turn up.
The football team won. They play football, we dont.
Bottlers. Gutted.
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Too easy to blame Bruce entirely but his set up in the first half was mystifying. Interesting summer ahead Greatly disappointed like everyone
Way we played first half is how we've played against better teams all through the season, occasioningly something comes off but equally we've been very poor in away games against our rivals.
I wasn't surprised he picked that team, he's just not a manager who will shake up a team for a one off game where a specific plan is required. Very naive or lazy to think what worked v Boro would work the same today as they played completely differently.
As the first half showed we need much more energy in central midfield today.
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What Fulham, and earlier Wolves, have shown is that you don't need a dinosaur manager who "knows the league" to get grind out results to get you promoted. You can actually coach your team, play some decent football, bring through some young players, and still get promoted. The whole Bruce thing was misconceived in my view. We needed a full top to bottom, grass roots rebuilding job with a long term strategy to develop a house style based on good technique and tactical nouse, bringing through young players playing the Villa way. With the first team as the flagship. Bruce is not that kind of manager and never will be. Anyone who thinks he deserves another shot is incredibly blinkered in my view, and far too ready to happy to accept mediocrity. I'll be glad to see the back of him.
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On a lighter note, it was nice to see Mortimer, Morley, Withe, Cowans, Bremner and Mcnaught all sat together in the ground.
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The very predictable line-up cost us getting promoted. I could have picked who would've started today at the final whistle vs Boro. Bruce picking players on sentiment rather than form or the surprise element is the reason why we'll be in the Championship for a third season.
Started who else though really?
Kodjia and Hogan havent scored a goals in years.
Onomoah the only one to count himself a bit unlucky, though he had about 3-4 months when he didnt try a leg
The quality in our squad was exposed a bit the longer the season went on
None of our midfielders would get their game with Fulham for example
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I don't think the handball was a pen in a million years, trying to remove Albert's shorts was though which they aren't mentioning.
He didn't fall down so ref probably felt there wasn't a decision to be made.
Rarely see penalties given to players who remain upright as harsh as it is.
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Bye bye Mr Bruce,had my doubts all along,so wish i was wrong.
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maybe he should have gone over? The outcome might have taken it to extra time
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The better team won - I wish Fulham good luck.
Obviously feel down however, its really not the end of the world. In fact, it could turn out to be one of those days we look back on in a few years time and see as an important step in the eventually recovery and evolution of the club.
Consider - had we gone up its almost certain Bruce would remain manager and while the money would have helped bring some new players in, the general style of play and tactics would not have changed - they never really have under Bruce at whatever club he's been at. We likely would have to then change managers and we'd be in a relegation scrap - not a time to re-build and continue the improvement of the club.
Instead, we now have the chance to thank Bruce for what he's done in improving the club, but appoint a real football manager who can bring the better balance, style, and development that would hopefully both see us win promotion next year but with a manager who can take us up with confidence we could live in the PL.
Yes I appreciate the money equation however, I don't think Dr Tony allowed Bruce to run away with his money and have to believe he'll dig again to keep his project on track.
So a sad day yes, but lets not over-react. No one died today. Life goes on. And in August, we'll be ready and prepared with a fresh, young, and exciting manager, a squad good enough to gain promotion, the best ground and and as always, the very best fans in this division. Keep the faith.
UTV
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maybe he should have gone over? The outcome might have taken it to extra time
It was first half I think unless there was another incident.
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A microcosm of our season.
Didn't turn up until it was too late.
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Shite, but where do we go now?
I believe we have a last parachute payment of £15m so with our gates and if we dont spend too much cash on new players whats the issue with FFP?
Excuse my ignorance but I try to keep to the football rather than the peripherals....
For what its worth I think we will go straight uo next year with this squad
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Tony Xia on twitter -
Gutted. 💔Sorry for all fans for this difficult moment. Have to stay stronger. UTV
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
£80m and we fucking love to hoof it up field to the opposition or out of play. Goal keeper won't be our most difficult position to fill
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
The other faint scrap of silver lining is not giving Micah Richards the world's least-deserved salary raise. He must be raging
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
Snodgrass actually won a few headers first half, our one tactic that actually worked in the first 50 minutes.
Lazy coaching though.
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Safe to say the team with the better tactics won not necessarily the better team
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
Indeed, ridiculous.
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Safe to say the team with the better tactics won not necessarily the better team
They're a good team. You don't go 20 odd games unbeaten at any level without being pretty decent.
Think Fulham and Wolves will be comfortable next season. Cardiff with their style the ones in serious relegation danger.
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I think I need to stay off here for 24 hours, get over the disappointment and get some perspective. At the moment I'm looking at years of lower league oblivion.
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I'd like to see Dean Smith given a chance now. Far more dynamic and positive....
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The game (http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/football/11386457/aston-villa-0-1-fulham)
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I think I need to stay off here for 24 hours, get over the disappointment and get some perspective. At the moment I'm looking at years of lower league oblivion.
Probably wise. Switched off WM minute before it end as didn't want to hear the moronic callers and totally ignoring anything of the CL final so football amnesty this evening.
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Absolutely gutted, shocking 1st half, it looked like we were scared of them. Subs made far too late and our attacking was very one paced. Grabban, Hourihane, Snodgrass and Adomah all big disappointments. Well done Fulham deserved win.
Looking to the likes of O'Hare, Green, Davis and RHM next season for our push for promotion.
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Safe to say the team with the better tactics won not necessarily the better team
They're a good team. You don't go 20 odd games unbeaten at any level without being pretty decent.
Think Fulham and Wolves will be comfortable next season. Cardiff with their style the ones in serious relegation danger.
Wahay! Yet another slice o' positive news to lift the spirits. I can see Colin's face now - as the diving Prem tossers are awarded yet another dodgy penalty against his hoofers. :)
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Half arse club who used to be famous. How it feels.
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I've never felt so dejected after a game
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Deserved nothing. Get rid of Bruce now. Sitting here drowning my sorrow with Villa in Denmark😥
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I've never felt so dejected after a game
I felt worse after the Arsenal thrashing in the FA Cup Final.
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That was a shocker. The first half just showed how inept Bruce can be. He got it so so very wrong.
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Result puts us back 5 years - minimum .
We’re fucked
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Deserved nothing. Get rid of Bruce now. Sitting here drowning my sorrow with Villa in Denmark😥
Feel for you mate. Home now. Alot of dejected villa fans out tonight in Tokyo, myself included. Fuck.
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Obviously our game plan was dependant on Fulham not taking the lead. Once they did i feared it was game over. Yet again i end up saying i'm glad i couldn't get a ticket.
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The typical first half Bruce tactics lost us any chance, I thought we had more of the play second half when he was forced to play a more attacking set up. They were the better footballing side no doubt with a manager that has drilled his team well we are a one dimensional side with a manager who knows no other way. Oh well we will look a totally different outfit next season.
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I'd like to see Dean Smith given a chance now. Far more dynamic and positive....
He'd be able to work with the youth and find some gems in the lower leagues.
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
no he wont
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What is Rounds remit?
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
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Looking to the likes of O'Hare, Green, Davis and RHM next season for our push for promotion.
to be fair cant see them being worse than some of the villa players this second half of the season
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
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Blose beat Fulham quite comfortably three weeks ago. We didn't employ the same tactics, but we were never going to. We know full well that these players are capable of much better.
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Ok, we lost but I don’t buy this years of oblivion ahead nonsense, let’s face it of those out there today the only 3 that would struggle to replace are Johnstone, Chester & Jack the rest are like the manager very much journeymen.
I sincerely hope this signals a change of manager for one who doesn’t wet himself about the opposition, first half today was a case in point, Adomah & Snodgrass were deployed as extra full backs so we had no ambition to score a goal.
Exclude Wolves whose model was iffy but Fulham & Cardiff hardly spent a fortune, they trusted youngsters and signed players who fit the way they want to play not just a random bunch of experienced pros.
We need a younger, fitter team, not be scared to blood youngsters because frankly this league is bang average and it’s no great risk giving u23’s chances -not be scared to rotate (any decent manager would have taken Adomah/Hourihane out months ago in same way as Onomah/Davis were, but they are kids so don’t get the slack) -need a way of playing thats geared towards attacking - if Jack is willing to give it another year then great, if not then the new coach needs to work out a way to play and then within budget sign players that fit that way.
Next season I expect nothing less than top 2, the same as I did this season so it was already a failure, today it became an abject failure.
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No midfield, no ideas, no plan A , no plan B
GOOD BYE BRUCE. THE END.
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
The other faint scrap of silver lining is not giving Micah Richards the world's least-deserved salary raise. He must be raging
Post of the day
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
I agree....he’s made us better not worse, unlike the previous 4 or 5 managers that couldn’t do it
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The gig would finish Dean's career within weeks.Time to look further afield as Wolves did
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How many times did we launch it forward for Snodgrass of all people to try and win in the air ?
When it was obvious Snodgrass was being marked out of the game why did we not move him to the other flank ? Why not change things around but then this is Bruce zero flexibility.Again we make subs and they added little, we have a very poor record of subs coming on and making a difference. Bruce is ok setting up a team to take the lead and see it out but going behind we are very poor ..Bolton ,Norwich , QPR and today cases in point
If you have Jedinek in MF sitting then the 2 other mfs need to be able to carry the ball , Jack can but Houriane is too safe with the ball and not mobile enough to get forward when we counter ...which is how Bruce sets us up to play despite the lack of pace throughout the team !
The last sub was Bruce as its reliable self stick on another striker and cause he team to lose all shape and as we have seen every single time he has done it this season he ended up creating even less !
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Bruce’s bradford moment?
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
I agree....he’s made us better not worse, unlike the previous 4 or 5 managers that couldn’t do it
More resources and against inferior competition.
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Yes Bruce’s “lob strikers on” tactic has never worked and is even more dumb against 10 men.
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The most frustrating thing today was that we didn't give it our best shot.We had the chance today but instead of grabbing that chance with both hands we decided to wait and see if Fulham would hand the game to us but any villa could have told you Fulham weren't going to do that. Their manager decided to grab the chance today with both hands.
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Bruce’s bradford moment?
He's had a few.
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First half awful today. Too negative by Bruce and we were made to pay! 2nd half too little too late. Poor game management by Bruce. Given a lesson by Fulham manager esp after they went down to 10 men. We had 11 days to prep for today and Bruce set the team out no differently to the majority of games this Ssn. We didn't play in the 1st half to win the game! As is the case with Bruce we were playing the percentages game and got found out, the Fulham manager playing Bruce at his own game 2nd half.
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Yes Bruce’s “lob strikers on” tactic has never worked and is even more dumb against 10 men.
In defence of him in terms of the game most managers would do it.
Mourinho last week finished with Alexis, Lukaku, Martial and Mata as a front four. Fergie always threw four strikers on at the end of games Man. United were losing.
If it comes off it looks glorious. Of course the problem is you still need players who can get the ball to them as we found out in last fifteen minutes.
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
He has failed and failed miserably. He built a squad based that had no future beyond this season. We had to go up this time. In no way does he deserve to keep his job.
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That’s the point. This game was an end point either way. The squad was built to be promoted last year or this one. That plan has failed, it’s start again now.
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
The problem is for it to be a viable tactic you have to train for it, so the players know what's expected and how to work together. Given we barely look like a team that trains together with our primary tactic expecting us to be effective at a tactic that we've made up on the fly is fanciful at best.
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
Sometimes. Other times Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer and Sheringham all finishing a CL final puts you down in history and then no one blinks when you keep doing it every time you're losing in last 10 minutes.
It works the other week. People would be going nuts on here if Kodjia or Hogan had been an unused sub against ten men.
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We’re also desperately static and slow.
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Bruce proved himself to be what he is. A conservative football manager that even with more resources than he has ever had in all of his career cannot break himself him away from the pinch a win mentality. We played to do just that inevitably.
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
Sometimes. Other times Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer and Sheringham all finishing a CL final puts you down in history and then no one blinks when you keep doing it every time you're losing in last 10 minutes.
It works the other week. People would be going nuts on here if Kodjia or Hogan had been an unused sub against ten men.
It rarely works and it didn’t in 99. Cole didn’t finish the games as Solskjaer replaced him. Too many forwards just get in each others way
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We got beaten by the better side today and the better side all season. As someone said earlier, they came to win it while we came to steal it and their goal was well worked after a build up of sustained pressure. In comparison, our best chance was at the end of the Grealish freak run, we really created nothing from anything you could point too from work on the training ground. We looked skittish at the back and I thought Snoddy had a shocker with Grabban so isolated it just meant the ball just never stuck so we were deep in midfield. That's tactical and that's the annoying part.
Fulham played how they have most of the season first half and so did we. 2nd half you felt if we'd scored we'd have maybe gone on to win but for all the huff and puff we went nowhere. Top 3 went up.
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
Sometimes. Other times Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer and Sheringham all finishing a CL final puts you down in history and then no one blinks when you keep doing it every time you're losing in last 10 minutes.
It works the other week. People would be going nuts on here if Kodjia or Hogan had been an unused sub against ten men.
It’s different though, with 10 minutes against 10 men we very obviously needed to stretch them. We made it much easier by compressing the game.
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We’re also desperately static and slow.
This absolutely summed it up for me today:the players’ decision-making is painful - Grealish aside - and the movement is ponderous. Players like Snodgrass and Adomah need 3 or 4 touches every time to get it under control, or just because they want to try and impress. Or something.
The game is all about pace and control, and too many of the games I’ve been to these last two seasons have not featured these 2 critical facets. We’ve won a good number of games but through sheer force of persistence and will.
Wolves and Fulham move the ball like a ‘good’ footballing side; it’s the way games are won.
I’m saddened today because I thought we would adopt the appro@ch we took against Wolves; we didn’t. We sat back and gave Cairney and Sessegnon the time to structure the game.
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What Fulham, and earlier Wolves, have shown is that you don't need a dinosaur manager who "knows the league" to get grind out results to get you promoted. You can actually coach your team, play some decent football, bring through some young players, and still get promoted. The whole Bruce thing was misconceived in my view. We needed a full top to bottom, grass roots rebuilding job with a long term strategy to develop a house style based on good technique and tactical nouse, bringing through young players playing the Villa way. With the first team as the flagship. Bruce is not that kind of manager and never will be. Anyone who thinks he deserves another shot is incredibly blinkered in my view, and far too ready to happy to accept mediocrity. I'll be glad to see the back of him.
That’s the Villa Engine we keep hearing about.
Which is why Bruce has to go. O’Hare, Green, Davis, RHM nowhere near the squad. Complete opposite approach to what around and Wyness are pushing.
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All of us were crying out for change way before half time.But no,Bruce was convinced that what hadn't worked would work.
Woeful tactics.Thanks to the traveller kids that smashed our coach window on the way back to really put a cap on a shit day.
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It seems that Bruce has run out of game plans.
To use the same approach against Fulham in final at Wembley, that he used again Boro in the semis was criminal.
Fulham are a completely different animal to Boro and he should have had a game plan to beat them.
Even we we did move away from that fucking boring, negative approach in the first half, our attack was pretty much the same as always.
Jack work some magic, feed Adomah who ‘might’ get a decent cross into the box and hope to fuck someone gets on the end of it.
That’s it.
No variation, no guile, no fucking through balls to someone runn8ng on through midfield (like their goal).
Steve, you are a decent bloke and you have a great job to stabilise the ship.
Now it’s time to call it a day and move on. I don’t want to see you sacked, let’s call it mutual consent, shake hands and say goodbye.
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It was a Typical Bruce performance, defend a nil nil and have no idea what to do when we go a goal down.
The first half was a disgraceful performance, defensive, timid and dull.
Throwing Hogan on was a joke.
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Yet again showed up like a rabbit in headlights. This time against the mightly Fulham. New era of Leeds/forest glory. Made even better seeing brummie reds watch Liverpool
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
Sometimes. Other times Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer and Sheringham all finishing a CL final puts you down in history and then no one blinks when you keep doing it every time you're losing in last 10 minutes.
It works the other week. People would be going nuts on here if Kodjia or Hogan had been an unused sub against ten men.
It’s different though, with 10 minutes against 10 men we very obviously needed to stretch them. We made it much easier by compressing the game.
Don't get me wrong I accept the point, just that in a big game losing 1-0 most managers would put on all their forwards and hope one comes up with something. Last five minutes any normal tactics or formations have to go out of the window as you don't have a second chance.
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We’re also desperately static and slow.
This absolutely summed it up for me today:the players’ decision-making is painful - Grealish aside - and the movement is ponderous. Players like Snodgrass and Adomah need 3 or 4 touches every time to get it under control, or just because they want to try and impress. Or something.
The game is all about pace and control, and too many of the games I’ve been to these last two seasons have not featured these 2 critical facets. We’ve won a good number of games but through sheer force of persistence and will.
Wolves and Fulham move the ball like a ‘good’ footballing side; it’s the way games are won.
I’m saddened today because I thought we would adopt the appro@ch we took against Wolves; we didn’t. We sat back and gave Cairney and Sessegnon the time to structure the game.
We stood off them in much the same way we stood of Arsenal 3 years ago, but this was Fulham. They were miles better than us in the middle of the park.
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You're so right Andy. The tactics against Boro wouldn't work against Fulham. Jedi shouldn't have started, Kodjia deserved a start. It cost us against QPR when he didn't freshen things up this is why he has to go.
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It’s why it doesn’t work.
Sometimes. Other times Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer and Sheringham all finishing a CL final puts you down in history and then no one blinks when you keep doing it every time you're losing in last 10 minutes.
It works the other week. People would be going nuts on here if Kodjia or Hogan had been an unused sub against ten men.
Hogan had a good chance when he came in. We didn't have another attacking option at that point really. BB coming in for Hourihane at that point wouldn't have improved things.
Not sure where Andre Green disappeared to but he needs to emerge from hibernation/injury over the summer. Would definitely prefer Davis on bench over Hogan.
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It seems that Bruce has run out of game plans.
To use the same approach against Fulham in final at Wembley, that he used again Boro in the semis was criminal.
Fulham are a completely different animal to Boro and he should have had a game plan to beat them.
Even we we did move away from that fucking boring, negative approach in the first half, our attack was pretty much the same as always.
Jack work some magic, feed Adomah who ‘might’ get a decent cross into the box and hope to fuck someone gets on the end of it.
That’s it.
No variation, no guile, no fucking through balls to someone runn8ng on through midfield (like their goal).
Steve, you are a decent bloke and you have a great job to stabilise the ship.
Now it’s time to call it a day and move on. I don’t want to see you sacked, let’s call it mutual consent, shake hands and say goodbye.
Couldn't put it better
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Fulham seemed well set up to exploit our weaknesses, in particular Albert and Hutton didn’t seem to know who they were each supposed to be picking up in the first half, and left far too much space for them to get behind us.
For all our bluster in than twenty minute period in the second half, did we force a meaningful save? Don’t think we can have many complaints, sadly Fulham deserved it for me, and Bruce should shuffle off and ply his befuddled tactics elsewhere.
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You're so right Andy. The tactics against Boro wouldn't work against Fulham. Jedi shouldn't have started, Kodjia deserved a start. It cost us against QPR when he didn't freshen things up this is why he has to go.
I honestly don't think Jedinak was the problem, he broke up play when he could today. I wasn't confident Hourihane would be as effective today as v Boro, think Bjarni or even Onomah would've been a bolder and better pick.
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Long time reader of the forum who doesn't post. However, I don't think I've ever been so angry after a Villa match.
The first half was abysmal, Bruce's 'keep it tight' mentality has both stopped us from automatic promotion and from having a chance to win this game.
It may have been one of the worse refereeing performances I've seen in my 44 years.
That said, we should never have been in the play offs in the first place. With the resources available to Bruce not getting promotion is an abject failure. He seems to think he's managing Hull, Wigan or Blues. We should have ripped this division a new one and gained automatic promotion along with Wolves. His inherently conservative nature has been our undoing.
I like Bruce as a person and I sympathise with his family problems but it's time to go, one year too late but nobody can change the past.
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And for all the Alan Hutton fans out there:he's shit.
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We supposedly had nearly two weeks to prepare for today's match. What exactly did Bruce do in terms of getting them ready to implement his tactics and style of play against a half-decent Fulham side? More of the same, lads!
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We knew exactly how he would set up the team and so did Fulham.
They knew all they had to do was score first and that’s what they did.
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We knew exactly how he would set up the team and so did Fulham.
They knew all they had to do was score first and that’s what they did.
So did we.
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Fulham seemed well set up to exploit our weaknesses, in particular Albert and Hutton didn’t seem to know who they were each supposed to be picking up in the first half, and left far too much space for them to get behind us.
For all our bluster in than twenty minute period in the second half, did we force a meaningful save? Don’t think we can have many complaints, sadly Fulham deserved it for me, and Bruce should shuffle off and ply his befuddled tactics elsewhere.
Grealish's shot was going in but the defender deflected it towards the keeper who saved. Grealish should have done better with the chance in first half too.
As good and all Fulham were, Hutton's walkabout handed them the winning goal.
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Fulham seemed well set up to exploit our weaknesses, in particular Albert and Hutton didn’t seem to know who they were each supposed to be picking up in the first half, and left far too much space for them to get behind us.
For all our bluster in than twenty minute period in the second half, did we force a meaningful save? Don’t think we can have many complaints, sadly Fulham deserved it for me, and Bruce should shuffle off and ply his befuddled tactics elsewhere.
Grealish's shot was going in but the defender deflected it towards the keeper who saved. Grealish should have done better with the chance in first half too.
As good and all Fulham were, Hutton's walkabout handed them the winning goal.
It did, it was a terrible lapse of concentration, the point though was there was one team trying to score and it was not us.
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Their goal was because Hutton allowed himself to get sucked in and Adomah didn't track the run. Training ground stuff really.
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
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The performance of the back 4 was horrific all first half.
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I'd like to see Dean Smith given a chance now. Far more dynamic and positive....
He'd be able to work with the youth and find some gems in the lower leagues.
And help us finish tenth.
Big whoop.
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
Spot the Blues intruder.
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
Took longer than I expected.
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Apart from the football, i wasnt convinced with what seemed to be the Fulham fans uniform of over tight polo shirt, pin stripe shorts and black leather slip-on loafers (no socks) and fake gold rolex:
(https://thumb.ibb.co/gN2mwT/IMG_20180526_150334.jpg) (https://ibb.co/gN2mwT)
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
Spot the Blues intruder.
He probably caught something embarrassing off his sister.
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
Spot the Blues intruder.
Still giddy after their heroic 20th place finish
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
Spot the Blues intruder.
One of the few silver linings is that we'll get to stuff these embarressing idiots again next season.
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So predictable...Jedinak should never have started. Just cos it worked vs Boro doesn't mean it will work vs Fulham...Wolves at home followed by QPR and Reading followed by Norwich...he just doesn't learn.
I like him as a bloke, but he has to go. 2 Seasons, awful football, failure and tactically inept...there's absolutely no logical reason for him to stay.
We could likely lose, Grabban, Onomah, Terry, Snodgrass, Johnstone, Axel. Bids could come on for Kodija, Jack and Chester...there's no future for Jedinak, Hutton, Whelan, McCormack, Gabby, Richards, Samba.
It was a huge gamble and it's not paid off....time to rebuild yet again under a progressive manager who can get a tune out of Green, Davis, Hogan, Bree, O'Hare, Lydon, RHM, Jack, Thor, Conor, Kodija, Adomah and others...there's still a lot of talent there, but it can't be wasted yet again by negative approaches, stifling tactics and no plan B, or C.
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While the players are licking their wounds tonight and thinking about what could have been, they should think on this.....
If they hadn’t played like a bunch of ****** against QPR, Bolton, Norwich maybe they wouldn’t have had to go through today.
It’s not just losing today that means we are stuck in this division for another year.
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While the players are licking their wounds tonight and thinking about what could have been, they should think on this.....
If they hadn’t played like a bunch of c***s against QPR, Bolton, Norwich maybe they wouldn’t have had to go through today.
It’s not just losing today that means we are stuck in this division for another year.
It's not, you are quite right...I'm not sure I totally blame the players for those results though. We've got a big talented squad...it hasn't been utilized correctly at all.
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I know. What a CRYING shame. Never mind eh?
Oh man, who has a pic of Francis blarting after those pens?
Also. the blues clown pics please.
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(http://images.supersport.com/galleries/Bimringham-Fans-Pain-540.jpg)
(https://i2-prod.birminghammail.co.uk/incoming/article1320192.ece/ALTERNATES/s1227b/2001-Blues-V-Liverpool--Worthington-Cup-Final-2001-Trevor-Francis-cries-with-Andrew-Johnson-at-the-end-after-he.jpg)
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Just back. Haven't read the rest of the thread yet but don't suppose I could add anything that hasn't already been said. Didn't see the point in playing Jedinak against a team that plays football on the floor rather than lumping balls at the defence, but the fact is we just didn't turn up in the first half, and although we played better in the second they still created more chances, and we got what we deserved. Nothing. For all I say about loathing what the Premier League has become, how much more competetive the Championship is, and if a team finishes third after 46 games they deserve to go up rather than face a lottery designed to line the coffers of the suits, I still feel deflated facing the prospect that we are drifting further and further from the top table and it could be some time before we dine there again. This summer is going to be very interesting
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(http://images.supersport.com/galleries/Bimringham-Fans-Pain-540.jpg)
(https://i2-prod.birminghammail.co.uk/incoming/article1320192.ece/ALTERNATES/s1227b/2001-Blues-V-Liverpool--Worthington-Cup-Final-2001-Trevor-Francis-cries-with-Andrew-Johnson-at-the-end-after-he.jpg)
Fantastic. Well played sir.
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Don't know if it's the hope or frustration that kills me. I do know one thing though. If we don't get our act together next season from the word go we could be playing second fiddle to the noses under monk. Now that would fuckin kill me.
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What Fulham, and earlier Wolves, have shown is that you don't need a dinosaur manager who "knows the league" to get grind out results to get you promoted. You can actually coach your team, play some decent football, bring through some young players, and still get promoted. The whole Bruce thing was misconceived in my view. We needed a full top to bottom, grass roots rebuilding job with a long term strategy to develop a house style based on good technique and tactical nouse, bringing through young players playing the Villa way. With the first team as the flagship. Bruce is not that kind of manager and never will be. Anyone who thinks he deserves another shot is incredibly blinkered in my view, and far too ready to happy to accept mediocrity. I'll be glad to see the back of him.
That’s the Villa Engine we keep hearing about.
Which is why Bruce has to go. O’Hare, Green, Davis, RHM nowhere near the squad. Complete opposite approach to what around and Wyness are pushing.
It is the Villa engine but without the flagship of the first team. Not much point in building a sound technical basis from the ground up only to have a massive bottleneck at the top of the pyramid where only experienced plodders get a look in and the dynamic youth aren't trusted. Which is why I fully agree, Bruce out.
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(http://images.supersport.com/galleries/Bimringham-Fans-Pain-540.jpg)
(https://i2-prod.birminghammail.co.uk/incoming/article1320192.ece/ALTERNATES/s1227b/2001-Blues-V-Liverpool--Worthington-Cup-Final-2001-Trevor-Francis-cries-with-Andrew-Johnson-at-the-end-after-he.jpg)
I always thought David Mellor was a Chelsea fan...
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Don't know if it's the hope or frustration that kills me. I do know one thing though. If we don't get our act together next season from the word go we could be playing second fiddle to the noses under monk. Now that would fuckin kill me.
That won't happen, whatever happens their squad will be miles behind ours and their FFP situation is worse. Granted we'll be needing to cut our cloth but they are truly financially fucked. I'm not sure Monk will hang around that long once he realises the hand he's being dealt.
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Quite a milestone. comfortably beaten by a small team. Another few years in this division with God knows who in control good night
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No corner kicks, just can't get my head around that one.
We must be the only team in history to play two major finals at Wembley and not have a corner in either game.
Mad against ten men for 20 odd minutes and us hitting endless crosses into the box for about 10 minutes.
Would've fancied Terry/Chester to nick one from a set piece.
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Disappointed. The guff in first half replaced by huff puff second. Very frustrating to watch. As there was always the hope at one nil the game would turn.
Why didn't begin first half with more gusto and too cagey I guess ultimately cost us. Grabban isolated no movement off the ball for midfielders in support and Hourihane anon and never playing a forward pass. Snoddy and Albert not supported by players when in possession.
Need a manager who basically gets players moving around and giving the player on the ball 2 options to pass too. Simple really.
There was a piece of play in first half when JT carried ball forward but had no option at all.
Was a gross out first half and taylor ref didn't help things
Jack grealish is a hero and was outstanding in effort and
I feel most for him. The run where he did outrageous skill and nearly scored would have been one of the best solo goals to be seen in the championship ever.
He seems not to have ultimate power for his shooting but good things happen with him.
SJ in goal super annoying how he veers goalkicks towards snoddy and that part of pitch everytime.
His kicking is pretty limited and never like the ball being passed back.
I upset like all of us what happened and disappointed that another season of championship football follows.
Deflating really as it make or break in many ways. To move on Bruce and coaching team have to be shifted.
Dean Smith mentioned on here and respect to Bruce and seemingly decent guy but would give Smith the gig for both his villa passion and how he feels game should be played
Chris wilder at Sheffield United is also a fan of Sheffield United and knows what it means. They were a refreshing watch and Smith could have same impact with the villa. Progressive in football and passionate.
Today the lack of attacking play and goal threat ultimate cost us.
Thanks to the players and to the support there at Wembley today. Would have liked more support but I think the fans wanted something to shout about and like many clubs especially in England getting behind and encouraging only comes if team is displaying some attacking. We didn't so villa support wasn't always there. The situation made it tense and was a shame all round. 2nd half sparked some intrigue but would have loved to hear a constant racket and noise from the villa faithful the whole match.
Based on second half I feel villa deserved a goal as Fulham were well ahead after 1st 45 mins.
I honestly thought if we had scored we would have gone on to win.
It's shocking really with that squad not only that we were unable to be promoted but also some of the poor football.
It's not encouraging to see a lack of cohesion in the attacking team play (minus grealish) . And it's not good to see the predictable play. It's like man utd Cup final and Mourinho tactics. When it works brilliant when it doesn't criticised and rightly so.
If Bruce stays next season is it continuity for more of the same and stability because a change could be both great but could be a fail.
I just so deflated what happened today.
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First half summed up our season.....too slow and utter shite, we got what we deserved unfortunately!
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Not really going to add much that hasn't been said. I like Bruce as a man, and he should be applauded for not only steading a sinking ship, but by moving it forwards, however I don't believe he has the forward thinking football in him or his coaching team to move us forward.
Any chance we had today really against a very decent Fulham side was to score first, but we sat back hoping to play them on the break. Their movement for the first goal killed us as Hutton and Adomah were ball watching. What Hourihan was doing too I don't know. I really don't understand why Grealish was played so deep, especially with Grabban so isolated up front, it needed Bjarnason in with Jedinak holding and pushing Grealish forward, Hourihan did nothing really in the game of note.
Time to bring in Dean Smith, with a coaching team who will bring on the likes of Davis, Green, O'Hare etc and play front foot football. Bruce, as nice a bloke as he is I'm afraid just isn't the man - especially if we lose some of these 'experienced lads' he has talked up all week.
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You knew it was over when he chucked Hogan on, fitting really I suppose.
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I guess the ultra cautious first half approach could have worked, but it was far too risky against probably the best team in the Championship and asking attacking players to principally defend didn't work. Adomah was lost at tracking Fredericks and Snodgrass couldn't get into the game. How Fredericks stayed on I will never know (what does the 4th official do?), but in fairness to him, he went round every Villa player at the end before celebrating.
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You knew it was over when he chucked Hogan on, fitting really I suppose.
As soon as they scored I knew we didn't stand a chance. I called it learning from experience.
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Just back. We deserved nothing.
That first half was utterly pathetic. Lewis Grabban was playing 15 yards inside his own half as a centre forward! We couldn't have parked a bigger bus if we'd tried.
Once Fulham were ahead I knew it was curtains. The game management over the last twenty minutes was just awful, as was that referee.
A massively different Villa awaits. Go get Dean Smith.
Steve Bruce, the man I respect, the football manager needs to go, right now.
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When we do play, we play decent football. The hoof, hoof, hoof to snodgrass and grabban doesn’t/didn’t work!
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Potato played it wrong the first half.
Second half showed we c/should’ve finished higher with a bit more ambition.
Potato successfully got us here, but he successfully saw us lose the final.
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Last season Newcastle went out to win every game and expected to win every game. They got promoted. If we had that attitude, we’d be promoted.
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Fucks sake, we shouldn’t have even been in the playoffs in the first place.
Er... what?!
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Fucks sake, we shouldn’t have even been in the playoffs in the first place.
Er... what?!
I think he means that we should have finished top 2.
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Really gutted. Not sure where we stand next season. I like this side but think it's come to an end and we will see quite a different Villa next season. I have to admit, I'm not looking forward to it. I don't think Bruce is cut out to lead us any further.
Another bad day at Wembley.
Up the Villa.
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You knew it was over when he chucked Hogan on, fitting really I suppose.
As soon as they scored I knew we didn't stand a chance. I called it learning from experience.
I can't be arsed to work it out as it would depress me, but I wonder what our record is under Bruce when we go 1 down.
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Last season Newcastle went out to win every game and expected to win every game. They got promoted. If we had that attitude, we’d be promoted.
yep, what did it for me was Bruce looking like he didn't give a shit in the post match interviews when we blew automatic promotion in March.. okay, he obviously had other things on his mind, but i expected him to be livid rather than "meh". Must have rubbed off on the players to a point and something you wouldn't get from FSW, or MON, or Houllier or gregory for that matter.
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At the start of the season everyone agreed automatic promotion was the only acceptable goal. Bruce has failed to deliver that. I respect him hugely for his conduct, especially at such a difficult time in his own life but Villa have utterly squandered the advantage that parachute payments gave us. Where does that leave us as a club for the next few seasons?
I have the misfortune of being born in the only era when Villa have been consistently rubbish. Not meaning to sound all doom and gloom but I'm trying to prepare myself for us being down here for a long time.
Gutted tonight. Well done Fulham, through gritted teeth.
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wasn't going to post on this thread as i guess your all pretty peeved off right now but looking at the game today fulham edged it . as for next season if you can build a team around grealish you should walk the league . swansea and stoke are no great shakes either but will be interesting to see if SB will be your manager
for those that went to wembley how was your experience ? hated it when we got beat by blackpool around 7 years ago now but the view , cost of getting to wembley was a downer for me . when the millenium stadium hosted the play offs fans from around the country wanted it to be kept there at the time
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wasn't going to post on this thread as i guess your all pretty peeved off right now but looking at the game today fulham edged it . as for next season if you can build a team around grealish you should walk the league . swansea and stoke are no great shakes either but will be interesting to see if SB will be your manager
for those that went to wembley how was your experience ? hated it when we got beat by blackpool around 7 years ago now but the view , cost of getting to wembley was a downer for me . when the millenium stadium hosted the play offs fans from around the country wanted it to be kept there at the time
We'll probably be more like you after you lost to Blackpool in 2010...think you lost Bothroyd, Bellamy, Joe Ledley and Chopra all in one go from that side.
Took you a few years to recover from that and build another decent team capable of promotion.
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When we do play, we play decent football. The hoof, hoof, hoof to snodgrass and grabban doesn’t/didn’t work!
Agreed, that mazy run form Grealish came from good control and crossfield ball from Grabban.
Given the way we play it can only be lazy coaching and drills on the training ground all week.
If we were coached to pass and move on the training ground every day it simply wouldn't fall apart on matchday.
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You knew it was over when he chucked Hogan on, fitting really I suppose.
As soon as they scored I knew we didn't stand a chance. I called it learning from experience.
I can't be arsed to work it out as it would depress me, but I wonder what our record is under Bruce when we go 1 down.
Shit is the answer.
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Last season Newcastle went out to win every game and expected to win every game. They got promoted. If we had that attitude, we’d be promoted.
yep, what did it for me was Bruce looking like he didn't give a shit in the post match interviews when we blew automatic promotion in March.. okay, he obviously had other things on his mind, but i expected him to be livid rather than "meh". Must have rubbed off on the players to a point and something you wouldn't get from FSW, or MON, or Houllier or gregory for that matter.
He just gambled he'd get us up through the play offs like he did with Hull and SHA.
He's finished in the top 6 five times in the championship. This was first time he's failed to get a team promoted from that position.
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The answer to everything tonight is shit. I'd convinced myself we were going to do it. Never bloody learn.
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When we do play, we play decent football. The hoof, hoof, hoof to snodgrass and grabban doesn’t/didn’t work!
Agreed, that mazy run form Grealish came from good control and crossfield ball from Grabban.
Given the way we play it can only be lazy coaching and drills on the training ground all week.
If we were coached to pass and move on the training ground every day it simply wouldn't fall apart on matchday.
Its an indictment that that was really our only decent chance, a mazy run that had nothing, absolutely zero to do with tactics and training ground work and more to do with one individuals talent.
Fulham on the other hand played through us for their goal. You could see that was something they work on all the time. I still can't believe we just sat in, defended deep from the lone striker back and just waited for something to happen in the 1st half rather than having a crack.
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When we do play, we play decent football. The hoof, hoof, hoof to snodgrass and grabban doesn’t/didn’t work!
Agreed, that mazy run form Grealish came from good control and crossfield ball from Grabban.
Given the way we play it can only be lazy coaching and drills on the training ground all week.
If we were coached to pass and move on the training ground every day it simply wouldn't fall apart on matchday.
Its an indictment that that was really our only decent chance, a mazy run that had nothing, absolutely zero to do with tactics and training ground work and more to do with one individuals talent.
Fulham on the other hand played through us for their goal. You could see that was something they work on all the time. I still can't believe we just sat in, defended deep from the lone striker back and just waited for something to happen in the 1st half rather than having a crack.
We are always lax in Wembley final, it seems to be the law. Too young to remember us turning up in the mid 90s and actually believing we'd win and play our normal game as we did in 1996.
We just have the air of a plucky underdog now hoping to enjoy the day which is ironic considering many thought that would be Fulham.
The performance really wasn't a shock today given how SB generally sets us up away from VP (and in a few home games).
Amongst all the talk of experience it was forgotten our creaking legs really struggle against midfields that can press and will do quick passing triangles around us.
Fulham did that, scored and then comfortably closed out the game even after going down to 10.
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HQ your club is unique in terms of size . we are a big club but you lot are huge with a huge fan base
when i look back at the season now warnock has performed miracles he really has
as mentioned in other threads would much prefer AV to come up with us rather than those posh happy clapper gits from west lundun .
looking at the league next season lots of local derbys for you to look forward too now with WBA and stoke in the mix even shrewsbury too .
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Very disappointed obviously. We lost it in the first half and as bettter as we were in the second, I wasn't that overly confident we would score. A massive opportunity wasted.
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wasn't going to post on this thread as i guess your all pretty peeved off right now but looking at the game today fulham edged it . as for next season if you can build a team around grealish you should walk the league . swansea and stoke are no great shakes either but will be interesting to see if SB will be your manager
for those that went to wembley how was your experience ? hated it when we got beat by blackpool around 7 years ago now but the view , cost of getting to wembley was a downer for me . when the millenium stadium hosted the play offs fans from around the country wanted it to be kept there at the time
Dont find it too bad. Park at Stanmore. Some west African dude let us park in his drive for free. Tinnies from Sainsburys and sandwiches from home. Live in Leyland a good 4 hrs from London and back by 11:30. Getting away from Wembley a lot quicker than VP! Ps if you do go for Johnston can we have your lad in goal?
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As with the FA Cup final three years earlier, I found myself standing in a queue waiting outside Wembley for a train feeling thoroughly dejected and wondering just where Aston Villa are going as a club. Although the thought of Villa being in the Premier League next season was a pretty daunting one, not going up today feels like a massive step backwards.
I can’t help but think that the club is now at a major crossroads and some major decisions are going to have to be made in a pretty short timeframe. Do we simply keep Steve Bruce at the helm, try and trim the squad a bit (easier said than done as we know) and continue pretty much business as usual as we have over the past 18 months or is this the point at which we look to totally remodel the club, knowing that results may suffer for a time as a result?
As for the game today, awful first half, but as with many of the games this season we picked it up in the second half. Things just didn’t fall for us in the final third and it didn’t help that there were a number of below par performances from our forward players. I felt that Bruce began making substitutions about 10-15 minutes too late and even then, went down the Lambert route of throwing on forwards without any real plan which dampened the momentum we had built up.
As for Fulham, I thought Cairney was excellent in midfield for them and I thought Mitrovic also had a very good game. He held the ball up really well and caused Chester and Terry problems with his physicality, That said, I thought they began to buckle a bit in the second half, but we just couldn’t capitalise on it.
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One thing I noticed, at least second half, was that Agnew was standing next to Bruce exchanging ideas. It made me wonder where was Calderwood or even fucking Clemence, as they seemed to be the only two that had Bruce's ear all season.
Bruce said in his pre-match press conference that more than worrying about the transfer window, his first thought was to have a holiday, something he really needed. He's stuck in there like a trooper, and I'll always respect him for that but when you're struggling, either with poor performances, results or just emotionally knackered, you rely on those around you carrying the baton. I've struugled to understand who Bruce was sharing his heavy load.
He's without doubt a very decent man, an old school, salt of the earth type, when you hear him talk about his father, completely no-frills, wouldn't be arsed with the bollocks that is Wembley, you see a man that has stuck to his roots. Our problem is those days have long gone and tonight we count the cost of relying on somebody, no matter how decent and a great representative of the traditions of our club, a man that was so out of his depth in modern football, at least one with ambitions of successfully returning to the PL.
Wyness was right to appoint a manager who could deal with the size of Aston Villa. The problem was the said manager wasn't the right fit to deal with the minimum of expectation this club and its fans require. We wanted stability, understandably so, but stability in Aston Villa terms is being a PL club, not a club stable in the bloody Championship.
If I'm honest, despite trying to convince myself, thanks much to the wonderful faith and enthusiasm on here, that we could win today. We all referenced the Wolves game of how good we can be. Sadly, as the season shows, that was an exception, not the rule. To expect the same today was asking for a massive seismic shift. Right now I feel like I've just suffered an earthquake but like every victim that has lost their home, their possessions, we'll have to keep strong and rebuild. It may take longer than we planned.
26th May, 2018 - yet another chapter in the what seems never ending story of 'Aston Villa - The Missed Opportunities'.
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It has nothing to do with previous Wembley appearances. We finished 4th and we confirmed our 4th spot today.
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
I agree....he’s made us better not worse, unlike the previous 4 or 5 managers that couldn’t do it
This is still the best Villa team for a number of years. Unless we can get Guadiola, Klopp, Pellegrini etc. then he deserves at least until Christmas. He wasn't adventurous enough yesterday until it was too late. There wasn't enough movement off the ball. So many times, Jack or Grabban were looking for someone to pass to and nobody was available.
Villa's best performances have come when players have been willing to keep moving into spaces so that the ball can keep moving forward. How many times did an attempt to keep passing the ball end up with Johnstone, who is the worst kicker of a football that I have ever seen? Pity as he is a decent goalkeeper.
We need to keep as many of these players as possible (especially Jack) and go again.
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tomd as an outsider looking in shall we say your team needs an injection of pace . far too slow moving the ball from the back to front whilst fulham looked every inch the man city of the championship as warnock mentioned in the week .
whilst we took the route 1 option wolves and fulham looked a prem side in terms of passing football .
leylandalbion what a strange name for a villa fan by the way -lol glad you enjoyed wembley but me experience is that's it's far over priced and the view is awful and no you ain't nicking out goalie either !
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Saw Neil Etheridge play many times live for Walsall. Great pick up for you guys. At Walsall he was always very slow taking goal kicks or even clearing the ball from backpasses so looks like Warnock told him to speed up judging by his Cardiff games!
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
I agree....he’s made us better not worse, unlike the previous 4 or 5 managers that couldn’t do it
How many times did an attempt to keep passing the ball end up with Johnstone, who is the worst kicker of a football that I have ever seen? Pity as he is a decent goalkeeper.
You clearly never saw Mark Bosnich then.
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Why do I get the sinking feeling Bruce will still be in charge next season?
I have that horrid feeling.
Who’s out there that will do a better job?
For me, we should stick with him.
I agree....he’s made us better not worse, unlike the previous 4 or 5 managers that couldn’t do it
How many times did an attempt to keep passing the ball end up with Johnstone, who is the worst kicker of a football that I have ever seen? Pity as he is a decent goalkeeper.
You clearly never saw Mark Bosnich then.
The problem with the comparison is our managers made allowances back then once it was clear he wasn't getting better, and had him make short kicks or passes to a defender to play it out from the back.
Bizarrely, Bruce has been entirely OK with him kicking it out wide to whoever's marking Snodgrass (as I think Dave called out earlier), or indeed straight the hell out of play. It's hard to forgive such a disdain for basic tactical adjustments as that over a long period of time. I'd file that next to foul throws in a short list of things that should just be addressed as soon as they happen more than once.
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This is still the best Villa team for a number of years. Unless we can get Guadiola, Klopp, Pellegrini etc. then he deserves at least until Christmas.
It's this short term thinking that scares the shit out of me. So at Christmas we replace him with who..Alan Curbishley? Planning must start at the most advantageous time for the club otherwise we return to the "oh, he needs at least three windows" bollocks that has cursed us for far too long. I'm tired of being shit. Aren't you?
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Now is the time to replace him. We have a bit of time to see who is out there and give the person the freedom to pick his staff before the window opens. None of this give Bruce until January bollocks then we end up picking up the leftover scraps of whoever hasn't been employed or recently fired. Start the search next week.
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HQ a bit of hit and miss for me regarding etheridge
some days he looks the bees kness then others not so
i ain't complaining though .
onto more pressing matters any of you lot looking forward to the world cup ? obviously for me gutted Wales didn't qualify but looking forward to 3 more weeks of footie along with catching a few glamorgan cricket games .
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Next week? I would hope, having just missed out on a 160 million pound deal, we have already a contingency plan.
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Just got home, still a bit too angry to post sensibly, tomorrow can wait. Referee, what a ****** though eh?
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tomd as an outsider looking in shall we say your team needs an injection of pace . far too slow moving the ball from the back to front whilst fulham looked every inch the man city of the championship as warnock mentioned in the week .
whilst we took the route 1 option wolves and fulham looked a prem side in terms of passing football .
leylandalbion what a strange name for a villa fan by the way -lol glad you enjoyed wembley but me experience is that's it's far over priced and the view is awful and no you ain't nicking out goalie either !
I think the point about pace is a fair one DC, but it also doesn’t help that three of the four players in wide positions are on their ‘wrong’ side. It means that one of the full-backs and both wingers are forever having to cut back inside as they it allows them on to to their stronger foot.
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Just got home, still a bit too angry to post sensibly, tomorrow can wait. Referee, what a c*** though eh?
Not to mention his Assistant. Stamping on Jack, right under his eyes and the twat did nothing. As much as I admired Fredericks, I really hope his balls fall off, twice.
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Just got home, still a bit too angry to post sensibly, tomorrow can wait. Referee, what a c*** though eh?
Not to mention his Assistant. Stamping on Jack, right under his eyes and the twat did nothing. As much as I admired Fredericks, I really hope his balls fall off, twice.
Didn't really see it but heard about it after from Madrid fans in the pub after, all said a straight red.
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Just got home, still a bit too angry to post sensibly, tomorrow can wait. Referee, what a c*** though eh?
Not to mention his Assistant. Stamping on Jack, right under his eyes and the twat did nothing. As much as I admired Fredericks, I really hope his balls fall off, twice.
Didn't really see it but heard about it after from Madrid fans in the pub after, all said a straight red.
If you'd seen it, and knowing you, you'd have been on the pitch to rip his head off. That was another major disappointment today, how we as a team let them get away with it. See how Fulham reacted to Jack's late 'challenge'.
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Played 90+ minutes and did their keeper tip it around the post once? Maybe he did, but I don't recall.
Football won today.
Good luck Fulham. Bit cheeky that they were trying to knobble Jack, but welcome to the real world. They (and every other sinner) knew he was our only real threat. We tried to kill the game as a spectacle and live off the scraps. Rubbish.
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tomd as an outsider looking in shall we say your team needs an injection of pace . far too slow moving the ball from the back to front whilst fulham looked every inch the man city of the championship as warnock mentioned in the week .
whilst we took the route 1 option wolves and fulham looked a prem side in terms of passing football .
leylandalbion what a strange name for a villa fan by the way -lol glad you enjoyed wembley but me experience is that's it's far over priced and the view is awful and no you ain't nicking out goalie either !
Fulham aren't a particularly good side, the idea that they're the Man City of the Championship is laughable although I imagine Warnock thinks that about any side that put 3 passes together.
The game was lost because of Bruce's negative tactics in the first half. We were more than capable of a win today.
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Playing "safety first" in the first half was the Bruce nail in the coffin from kick off.
Please leave.
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Very disappointed, but I spent a great afternoon with the Boston Lions Villa Supporters, a great bunch of Villa lads & girls. Special mention to Ross who runs the club, you are a gent & it’s amazing what you and the others do, excellent work. Glad to meet you all, just wish the result was better. Up the Villa, Up the Boston Lions
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Just got home, still a bit too angry to post sensibly, tomorrow can wait. Referee, what a c*** though eh?
Not to mention his Assistant. Stamping on Jack, right under his eyes and the twat did nothing. As much as I admired Fredericks, I really hope his balls fall off, twice.
Didn't really see it but heard about it after from Madrid fans in the pub after, all said a straight red.
If you'd seen it, and knowing you, you'd have been on the pitch to rip his head off. That was another major disappointment today, how we as a team let them get away with it. See how Fulham reacted to Jack's late 'challenge'.
Yep I noticed this and I thought it spoke volumes. About 5 of them charged at both Grealish and the Ref while our lads really didn't seem nearly as animated the other way around. They set the tone all afternoon and they pushed us around, fucking Fulham, and fair play to them. Even near the end when Hourihane got his knock and went off he did so with no urgency, there was under 10 mins left and he left like he was trying to waste time. Our whole game management was noticably poor in comparison. Very surprised at that.
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Fucking useless tossers!
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Played 90+ minutes and did their keeper tip it around the post once? Maybe he did, but I don't recall.
Football won today.
Good luck Fulham. Bit cheeky that they were trying to knobble Jack, but welcome to the real world. They (and every other sinner) knew he was our only real threat. We tried to kill the game as a spectacle and live off the scraps. Rubbish.
Tru dat. We've been a plodding outfit under Bruce and pathetic display yesterday. I bought into the whole hard to beat mentality when we appointed him but yesterday was the most disappointing performance for me as a Villan.
Nice guy but will be glad when he is gone.
How was the atmosphere? Watching on tv it was very sad seeing the 82 team watch on in the dying minutes.
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no more self pity. this coming season IS the biggest for a long time. Big changes ahead. Roll on August!
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Sick as a pig. As many have already said the game was a microcosm of the entire period of Bruce management. Negative, erratic, stop start, good bits, bad bits, no consistency, no game plan.
I dread the thought of the board bottling it and letting Bruce have more time to serve up more of the same. These last few seasons have been very hard to endure. Four consecutive finals lost at Wembley.
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Sick as a pig. As many have already said the game was a microcosm of the entire period of Bruce management. Negative, erratic, stop start, good bits, bad bits, no consistency, no game plan.
I dread the thought of the board bottling it and letting Bruce have more time to serve up more of the same. These last few seasons have been very hard to endure. Four consecutive finals lost at Wembley.
Well said Brian. I cannot see how Bruce would improve on this year given his approach, he’s had his chance. I’ve seen Villa 13 times at Wembley and that was the most nervous I’ve felt first half, I can’t go through that again!
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Having slept on it I feel much worse now. We feared this will happen and it did. Almost to a man/boy/girl we agreed before the match that if we play like we did v Boro we will lose and that we did. Not a single corner not a single decent chance in 90 mins of football. Deserved nothing got nothing.
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I don’t think even Arsenal dominated us in the 2015 cup final like Fulham did in the first 30 mins yesterday. And we allied them to do this. Just go please Bruce.
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Having slept on it I feel much worse now. We feared this will happen and it did. Almost to a man/boy/girl we agreed before the match that if we play like we did v Boro we will lose and that we did. Not a single corner not a single decent chance in 90 mins of football. Deserved nothing got nothing.
I've kind of slept on it, mate. Albeit a very broken, restless sleep.
Today is not a good day.
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Agree WV agree Aftab. I go right back to 57 and we/I cannot remember going to Wembley in such a fearful state of mind. I/we seemed to be trapped in the cross hairs of the Lambert legacy of diminished expectations and let-Bruce-have-a-crack-at-it-we-know-he-is-a-dinosaur-but-he-is-a-good-bloke football no man's land. The Slough of Despond into which Pilgrim fell.
This Pilgrim sure is Despondent this morning.
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Having slept on it, I feel even worse today. Absolutely gutted. To lose in that manner after playing all season just seems like a massive waste of everyone's time. If we'd thrown the kitchen sink at it, hit the post, bar etc and lost you could hold your hands up and say we had a go but it wasn't to be. We did nothing, we lost with a whimper. That first half was gutless, spineless and cowardly by the manager. Terrified of Fulham. Fucking Fulham.
We better get used to Championship life because we're going to be down here for a long time.
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Sad, angry but not surprised. I hope Xia doesn't share the same apathy as Bruce and so many of the players.
Did anyone else notice Terry mouthing 'sorry' to the fans yesterday?
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It’s becoming a familiar scenario for me. A day which starts with excitement and high spirits from fans that starts to unravel once the ref starts the game. We had an absolutely and utter twat sitting behind us. Screaming obscenities at the Villa all match despite having his young boy with him. He saved his most vile rants for Grealish who he wanted taking off as he ‘hadn’t turned up’. I daren’t challenge these idiots at my age. Mind you, I met some very committed Norwegian Villa fans before the match, they were a credit to the club.
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I don’t think even Arsenal dominated us in the 2015 cup final like Fulham did in the first 30 mins yesterday. And we allied them to do this. Just go please Bruce.
Poor as we were in the 1st half yesterday i don't think i've ever seen before, or am ever likely to see again, a team chase quite as many shadows as we did that day against Arsenal. Fulham were the better side no doubt but against Arsenal it was like watching a decent Sunday men's side play the local Primary School team.
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It’s becoming a familiar scenario for me. A day which starts with excitement and high spirits from fans that starts to unravel once the ref starts the game. We had an absolutely and utter twat sitting behind us. Screaming obscenities at the Villa all match despite having his young boy with him. He saved his most vile rants for Grealish who he wanted taking off as he ‘hadn’t turned up’. I daren’t challenge these idiots at my age. Mind you, I met some very committed Norwegian Villa fans before the match, they were a credit to the club.
Yes ahh that chap shouting obscenities sounds like William. He does get vociferous during a match. Something about high expectations as a royal Prince!
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Just got home, still a bit too angry to post sensibly, tomorrow can wait. Referee, what a c*** though eh?
Not to mention his Assistant. Stamping on Jack, right under his eyes and the twat did nothing. As much as I admired Fredericks, I really hope his balls fall off, twice.
Didn't really see it but heard about it after from Madrid fans in the pub after, all said a straight red.
If you'd seen it, and knowing you, you'd have been on the pitch to rip his head off. That was another major disappointment today, how we as a team let them get away with it. See how Fulham reacted to Jack's late 'challenge'.
Happened on the opposite side of the field to us but just seen a gif someone posted, disgusting that nobody saw it.
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Better team won. We were too predictable and Grabban on his own up front doesn't work against decent sides. Bruce's sides typically need the first goal and we didn't get it. Better second half but should have got Onamah and Kodja on sooner. Bringing Hogan on was pointless and his missed header proved again he isn't good enough.
Grateful to Bruce in many ways this season but time for Dean Smith and some new ideas please.
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I didn't go yesterday full of confidence but so disappointed with the first half, a game of such importance and we didn't turn up. Well done to the Villa fans who created a great atmosphere around Wembley for hours before the game.
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We would ruin Dean Smith's career. This job is far too big for him at the moment. We need to look further afield like Wolves and Fulham. Let's get someone in who gets results by playing decent football, fed up of dinosaurs at our club who think the only way to get results is to grind them out.
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Woke up today and have never I recall felt this bad. When their goal went in a feeling of doom descended around me. Not one corner. Got what we deserved.
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I'm clutching at straws but maybe it's a blessing in disguise. We finished 4th and don't deserve to go up playing "don't lose" football. At last Bruce won't be in the Prem wasting money to pretty much play that kind of negative football. Yes we'll lose players but there is still more than enough players and kids in there for a decent manager to get a tune out of them.
He can't possibly stay, he just can't. The next appointment is going to be absolutely huge.
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The fact that we scored one goal in all three play off games says a lot. In the four consecutive finals we have lost at Wembley, if you accept yesterday as a final tie, we have scored one goal. 0-1 Chelsea, 1-2 Manure, 0-(fill in a number) Arse and 0-1 Mighty Fulham. We can't score goals against decent opposition in big games.
On the subject of scoring goals, everybody was shouting for Kodjia yesterday as Grabban played like a poor man's Savo, let us not forget that this erstwhile saviour of our bacon defied the Villa doctors and got crocked for a season in the ACN. Had he respected the club that pays his very substantial wages and picks up the equally expensive tab for the medical treatment that keeps him in the game, he could have scored the goals in the 2017/18 season that won us automatic promotion. His contribution to the campaign just concluded so in gloriously has been a big fat zero.
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Gutted. Like many have said it feels worse the next morning. I saw so many in tears as I walked out both young and old.
I've always disliked the safety first approach by Bruce and yesterday it did for him. First half was pathetic. The second half we pushed further up the pitch and suddenly Fulham were on the back foot, so why not from the beginning??? We didn't mange the last 20 mins against 10 men and once Hogan came on I knew that was it.
However, yet again at Wembley, the ref has made a criminal decision not to send off a Fulham player for the stamp on Jack in the first half. If that happens we go on and win the game.
I wouldn't be surprised if Bruce walks its been a hard season for him. Let's get a manager who plays football on the floor and on the front foot.
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I'm clutching at straws but maybe it's a blessing in disguise. We finished 4th and don't deserve to go up playing "don't lose" football. At last Bruce won't be in the Prem wasting money to pretty much play that kind of negative football. Yes we'll lose players but there is still more than enough players and kids in there for a decent manager to get a tune out of them.
He can't possibly stay, he just can't. The next appointment is going to be absolutely huge.
This where I am as well.
As disappointed as I am with the result and the fact we are staying down, I was not looking forward to seeing us going to Arsenal, UTD, Man City etc and many other places and playing the type of football to try and just not get walloped.
It’s been bad enough watching it in this division.
It’s now time to freshen up the squad and freshen up the management.
BUT, we have just got to ensure Jack gives us another year and build a team around him.
For me, the thought that yesterday’s result has cost us losing Jack is worse than not going up.
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Bruce conceded the first half with that incredibly defensive set up.
Much better in the second half, but he waited way to long to make a change. Onomah for Hourihane should have been made at half time, at the very latest.
Though the second half was better, it was all very huff and puff. We looked like a team with zero pace, which is what we are.
There were some absolute fucking twats around us, screaming obscenities at the other end of the ground for the whole match, in the case of the brainless fucking gibbon on front of us and screaming abuse at Bruce in the case of the pissed twat behind us.
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First half killed us. Subs should have been made at half time. Jedi was the wrong choice we were set up like we were defending a lead
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The fact that we scored one goal in all three play off games says a lot. In the four consecutive finals we have lost at Wembley, if you accept yesterday as a final tie, we have scored one goal. 0-1 Chelsea, 1-2 Manure, 0-(fill in a number) Arse and 0-1 Mighty Fulham. We can't score goals against decent opposition in big games.
On the subject of scoring goals, everybody was shouting for Kodjia yesterday as Grabban played like a poor man's Savo, let us not forget that this erstwhile saviour of our bacon defied the Villa doctors and got crocked for a season in the ACN. Had he respected the club that pays his very substantial wages and picks up the equally expensive tab for the medical treatment that keeps him in the game, he could have scored the goals in the 2017/18 season that won us automatic promotion. His contribution to the campaign just concluded so in gloriously has been a big fat zero.
Brian, regarding Kodjia, he didnt have too much choice about going to the ACN. He was called up and he had to go. It's a bit harsh and a tad churlish to bring that up. We didnt go up because overall we didnt deserve too.
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It's the end of another chapter in the history of Aston Villa. Let''s hope the start of the next chapter is about planning ahead and getting in a manager, coaches and scouting system that believe in playing football....yes the beautiful game.
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Meh.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
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identify them and ban them. Total fuckwits.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
All clubs do to be fair. I used to think we had fewer than most but I am not altogether certain anymore.
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The writing was on the wall in both games against Boro. They were piss poor and we struggled and didn't manage a goal from open play in two games. We knew we had to up it massively and play a lot better against Fulham, but we didn't. When you set up to keep it tight and you concede first you're buggered, especially when you have no plan B like us.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I didn't know that stupidity of the highest level
I might be in a group of none here but I was quite impressed with the Fulham fans yesterday
with all the stuff about there ticket allocation I thought they supported there team well and did fill there end
in fact they made more noise and supported there team far better than the Liverpool and Arsenal fans did at Wembley against us imo
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
Agreed, absolutely disgraceful. I was walking past exactly as that happened, and there were women and young kids on that bus. Those chucking beer cans should be ashamed of themselves, but no doubt they were too pissed to even remember doing it !
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There were some very pissed people one bloke in the green man was wasted. Was covered in cuts and bruises from falling over
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I took my 6 year old boy with me and as soon as we got off the coach I knew it was a mistake. Villa fans pouring drinks over women with children then we went under a subway by the fan park and they let off flares we couldn’t see anything and the smell was awful I just had to get out quick.
Then when we were queuing to get in Wembley there were blokes pushing in and shouting it was all quite intimidating. I was glad to get home to be honest.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I didn't know that stupidity of the highest level
I might be in a group of none here but I was quite impressed with the Fulham fans yesterday
with all the stuff about there ticket allocation I thought they supported there team well and did fill there end
in fact they made more noise and supported there team far better than the Liverpool and Arsenal fans did at Wembley against us imo
I was talking to a group of Fulham fans on the tube. They all supported spurs except one.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I didn't know that stupidity of the highest level
I might be in a group of none here but I was quite impressed with the Fulham fans yesterday
with all the stuff about there ticket allocation I thought they supported there team well and did fill there end
in fact they made more noise and supported there team far better than the Liverpool and Arsenal fans did at Wembley against us imo
Still a bunch of clappy wankers
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I didn't know that stupidity of the highest level
I might be in a group of none here but I was quite impressed with the Fulham fans yesterday
with all the stuff about there ticket allocation I thought they supported there team well and did fill there end
in fact they made more noise and supported there team far better than the Liverpool and Arsenal fans did at Wembley against us imo
The prick who threatened me on the escalator at Baker Street with his clapper can piss right off.
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Admittedly I wasn't there but the fact that they did better than the most overrated supporters in world football or the Tarquins on one of their many routine Wembley visits is a fairly low bar.
Plus they needed clappers......
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Highlights clip?
Could not stomach to watch the whole game I recorded.
As for the game. Soon as we saw the line up I think we knew. Too many of our better players just did not turn up
Adomah
Snodgrass
Hutton
Hourihanne
Grabban
Without them firing we were doomed
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I did say I was probably in a party of one
I still don’t mind them, I would take a Fulham fan over most other London clubs fans anyday clappers or not
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The fact that we scored one goal in all three play off games says a lot. In the four consecutive finals we have lost at Wembley, if you accept yesterday as a final tie, we have scored one goal. 0-1 Chelsea, 1-2 Manure, 0-(fill in a number) Arse and 0-1 Mighty Fulham. We can't score goals against decent opposition in big games.
On the subject of scoring goals, everybody was shouting for Kodjia yesterday as Grabban played like a poor man's Savo, let us not forget that this erstwhile saviour of our bacon defied the Villa doctors and got crocked for a season in the ACN. Had he respected the club that pays his very substantial wages and picks up the equally expensive tab for the medical treatment that keeps him in the game, he could have scored the goals in the 2017/18 season that won us automatic promotion. His contribution to the campaign just concluded so in gloriously has been a big fat zero.
More that that we didn't have a corner yesterday which was the same in 2015. If you combine the four big finals we've played since 2000 I doubt we've had more than 5 shots on target over the four games.
Dunno what's happened to us but seems as a club we're content now to put in big performances in the semi finals and just enjoy the day out at Wembley and see what happens. You don't get trophies or promotion with that I'm afraid.
The mid 90s team remains the last Villa one with the right mentality when it come to the crunch.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I didn't know that stupidity of the highest level
I might be in a group of none here but I was quite impressed with the Fulham fans yesterday
with all the stuff about there ticket allocation I thought they supported there team well and did fill there end
in fact they made more noise and supported there team far better than the Liverpool and Arsenal fans did at Wembley against us imo
The prick who threatened me on the escalator at Baker Street with his clapper can piss right off.
did he threaten you with his clapper ?
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I had the misfortune to watch it in a pub as I think the only Villa fan and about a dozen Fulham "fans". They paid no attention to the game, looked up when they scored, cheered and went back to ignoring it.
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They paid no attention to the game, looked up when they scored, cheered and went back to ignoring it.
A bit like our team then.
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
I didn't know that stupidity of the highest level
I might be in a group of none here but I was quite impressed with the Fulham fans yesterday
with all the stuff about there ticket allocation I thought they supported there team well and did fill there end
in fact they made more noise and supported there team far better than the Liverpool and Arsenal fans did at Wembley against us imo
The prick who threatened me on the escalator at Baker Street with his clapper can piss right off.
did he threaten you with his clapper ?
I'm reading that and imagining Jeremy Paxman asking it of Michael Howard.
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All this chat about some people smashing windows and terrifying other people although discussion worthy isn't much to do with Fulham 1 Viila 0.
We set up to be tight and reliant on Grabban up front to be a hold up player and to occupy four weak Fulham defenders, well Dean Saunders his not. so that was a flaw in our plan, creativity we had Jack (read that how you like) they had one shot of any intent and scored, the referee may as well have put a white shirt on, as early on, any build up play we did make was stopped by fouling and the referee did not punish it, but first opportunity he got. chester was in the book.
So on here there were people stating it wasn't a big game and they could handle losing as "whats another year in the championship" well now we will find out.
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In the middle of immediate post match suicidal angst in a packed tube carriage I related very loudly to a tearful little Villa boy surrounded by Fulham's finest some of the jokes their Chairman Tommy Trinder used to tell about how rubbish his club was. Not a murmur out of any of them. Cheered the boy up though.
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let's look at the positives - lots of tasty local derbies to look forward to andI'm pretty sure we'll win more matches than we would have in the land of milk and honey
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What I found bizarre was that we simultaneously managed to have every player, possibly bar Grabben, behind the ball, but at the same time allowed them huge chasms of space between the midfield and the defence. That’s quite a failing.
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let's look at the positives - lots of tasty local derbies to look forward to andI'm pretty sure we'll win more matches than we would have in the land of milk and honey
The derbies are shit. They're against shithouse clubs who consider anything but a drubbing against us as a moral victory. Take this seasons game against the rags, we won 2-0, ended up with Adomah and Grealish out for the next game. They're shit, can't be arsed with 12 o'clock kick offs either because of morons.
Sorry but the land of milk and honey calls out to me more than the swamp of farts and piss that we are stuck in.
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come on, cheer up. The Wolves game was great and so was the home win against SH. I love those matches.
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Highlights clip?
Could not stomach to watch the whole game I recorded.
As for the game. Soon as we saw the line up I think we knew. Too many of our better players just did not turn up
Adomah
Snodgrass
Hutton
Hourihanne
Grabban
Without them firing we were doomed
Thought Adamoah and Hourihane were decent in the second half, both were hardly in it first half. Agreed on the other three.
Grabban doesn't seem interested playing up front by himself, woeful last three games. Nothing Snodgrass did came off yesterday, three times in the first half he had chances to slip Adamoah in behind the full back. Hutton had a shocker for the entire game and cost us the goal.
Looking back, Johanson should have finished it for Fulham during our good spell after another bad error from Chester. Mitrovic bullied Chester yesterday. I will give our lads credit for the 20-25 mins after half time, gave it everything but Fulham were far superior all over the pitch. They will do well next season as will Wolves.
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come on, cheer up. The Wolves game was great and so was the home win against SH. I love those matches.
It used to be better when we were beating them in the top 6 of the premier league though.
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Like many on here, feel more despondent this morning than I did last night.
My only hope is that a fundamental rebuild was needed whether we secured promotion or not, but hopefully it is now a more pressing inevitability facing yet another season in the 2nd Division. Dr X has to realise that Bruce has failed at the job he was brought in to do, and has been given enough time. We showed little yesterday to suggest a light touch would suffice. Root and branch is needed.
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Odd isn't it. When that goal went in you just knew that's how it would finish. Plan A out the window; now what about Plan B - oh, do we have a Plan B?
A few observations:
1. I dread to think what our season would have been like next year if we'd scraped through. We may have just avoided a 9-month nightmare. Unfortunately, we may be just about to endure another one in the Championship.
2. SB - love the man; loathe his 'tactics'. Safety first, keep it tight. Noses in front, defend. To an extent he's 'turned the club around' as we keep being told. But it's a bit like turning an enormous oil tanker around - there's no flair.
3. It's alright going on about Fulham being cute and targetting JG, but my god some of the tackles were criminal and Jack got very little protection.
4. Interesting to note that in the Sky interview with that lowlife Fredericks (yes that's what he is as it was a cowardly challenge) there was no mention of his stamp (a la 'were you a bit lucky to be on the pitch after that tackle?'). Likewise in the Guardian report this morning, lots of praise: Quote: 'Ryan Fredericks was again mightily impressive' with not a mention of his darker arts. OK, Fulham are the darlings of the 'proper football' brigade, but a red at that stage for one of their lynchpins WOULD have changed the game. What's worse, it happened right under the nose of the 4th official who ignored it like a passerby conveniently 'not seeing' an assault in the street because he doesn't want to get involved.
4. This thread is full of comments about the dangers of setting up as we did against Boro. I'd like to know what Bjarnasson has done to upset the manager. For a few games in mid-season he was a revelation sitting just in front of the back four; he also scored a couple of lovely goals. Yesterday, just when we needed that creative spark he was nowhere to be seen. Bunging on Onomah, Hogan and Kodjia alongside a tiring Grabban was never going to work.
5. Good luck Fulham.
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Like many on here, feel more despondent this morning than I did last night.
My only hope is that a fundamental rebuild was needed whether we secured promotion or not, but hopefully it is now a more pressing inevitability facing yet another season in the 2nd Division. Dr X has to realise that Bruce has failed at the job he was brought in to do, and has been given enough time. We showed little yesterday to suggest a light touch would suffice. Root and branch is needed.
I thought root and branch was what they planned to do when they bought the club. We've done what Lerner did which show we never fucking learn.
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Highlights clip?
Could not stomach to watch the whole game I recorded.
As for the game. Soon as we saw the line up I think we knew. Too many of our better players just did not turn up
Adomah
Snodgrass
Hutton
Hourihanne
Grabban
Without them firing we were doomed
Thought Adamoah and Hourihane were decent in the second half, both were hardly in it first half. Agreed on the other three.
Grabban doesn't seem interested playing up front by himself, woeful last three games. Nothing Snodgrass did came off yesterday, three times in the first half he had chances to slip Adamoah in behind the full back. Hutton had a shocker for the entire game and cost us the goal.
Looking back, Johanson should have finished it for Fulham during our good spell after another bad error from Chester. Mitrovic bullied Chester yesterday. I will give our lads credit for the 20-25 mins after half time, gave it everything but Fulham were far superior all over the pitch. They will do well next season as will Wolves.
Grabben has been poor I agree but he is just not that good at holding the ball up , Hogan was the same.Kodjia is the only striker we have you can do that but even then his link up play is limited ..however look at the players positions Grabben was miles away from anyone else at times and our FH tactic was lumping it to Snodgrass to head on !! Pathetic meanwhile they passed it around us like they were Real Madrid
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Yes, whilst Grabban was ineffective yesterday that was largely due to the tactics. We just don’t play to our strengths under Bruce, who thinks he has the tactical nouse to negate the opposition. Our best performances have been when we’ve just gone out and played our game.
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Odd isn't it. When that goal went in you just knew that's how it would finish. Plan A out the window; now what about Plan B - oh, do we have a Plan B?
A few observations:
1. I dread to think what our season would have been like next year if we'd scraped through. We may have just avoided a 9-month nightmare. Unfortunately, we may be just about to endure another one in the Championship.
2. SB - love the man; loathe his 'tactics'. Safety first, keep it tight. Noses in front, defend. To an extent he's 'turned the club around' as we keep being told. But it's a bit like turning an enormous oil tanker around - there's no flair.
3. It's alright going on about Fulham being cute and targetting JG, but my god some of the tackles were criminal and Jack got very little protection.
4. Interesting to note that in the Sky interview with that lowlife Fredericks (yes that's what he is as it was a cowardly challenge) there was no mention of his stamp (a la 'were you a bit lucky to be on the pitch after that tackle?'). Likewise in the Guardian report this morning, lots of praise: Quote: 'Ryan Fredericks was again mightily impressive' with not a mention of his darker arts. OK, Fulham are the darlings of the 'proper football' brigade, but a red at that stage for one of their lynchpins WOULD have changed the game. What's worse, it happened right under the nose of the 4th official who ignored it like a passerby conveniently 'not seeing' an assault in the street because he doesn't want to get involved.
4. This thread is full of comments about the dangers of setting up as we did against Boro. I'd like to know what Bjarnasson has done to upset the manager. For a few games in mid-season he was a revelation sitting just in front of the back four; he also scored a couple of lovely goals. Yesterday, just when we needed that creative spark he was nowhere to be seen. Bunging on Onomah, Hogan and Kodjia alongside a tiring Grabban was never going to work.
5. Good luck Fulham.
This post believe it or not, has cheered me up, I'm still depressed but thank you great post.
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Mike Parry slagging us fans off on Talksport...
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Odd isn't it. When that goal went in you just knew that's how it would finish. Plan A out the window; now what about Plan B - oh, do we have a Plan B?
A few observations:
1. I dread to think what our season would have been like next year if we'd scraped through. We may have just avoided a 9-month nightmare. Unfortunately, we may be just about to endure another one in the Championship.
2. SB - love the man; loathe his 'tactics'. Safety first, keep it tight. Noses in front, defend. To an extent he's 'turned the club around' as we keep being told. But it's a bit like turning an enormous oil tanker around - there's no flair.
3. It's alright going on about Fulham being cute and targetting JG, but my god some of the tackles were criminal and Jack got very little protection.
4. Interesting to note that in the Sky interview with that lowlife Fredericks (yes that's what he is as it was a cowardly challenge) there was no mention of his stamp (a la 'were you a bit lucky to be on the pitch after that tackle?'). Likewise in the Guardian report this morning, lots of praise: Quote: 'Ryan Fredericks was again mightily impressive' with not a mention of his darker arts. OK, Fulham are the darlings of the 'proper football' brigade, but a red at that stage for one of their lynchpins WOULD have changed the game. What's worse, it happened right under the nose of the 4th official who ignored it like a passerby conveniently 'not seeing' an assault in the street because he doesn't want to get involved.
4. This thread is full of comments about the dangers of setting up as we did against Boro. I'd like to know what Bjarnasson has done to upset the manager. For a few games in mid-season he was a revelation sitting just in front of the back four; he also scored a couple of lovely goals. Yesterday, just when we needed that creative spark he was nowhere to be seen. Bunging on Onomah, Hogan and Kodjia alongside a tiring Grabban was never going to work.
5. Good luck Fulham.
This post believe it or not, has cheered me up, I'm still depressed but thank you great post.
Yes well said Martyn, sorry we didn't get to meet up yesterday. Still too gutted to say anything much, need time to focus on other stuff. The what could have been, tactics and fairer refereeing decisions, it's just painful to think about it.
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Mike Parry slagging us fans off on Talksport...
He is the fake scouse accent bloke who grew up in Chester
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Mike Parry slagging us fans off on Talksport...
He is the fake scouse accent bloke who grew up in Chester
The same man who also had a pop at a fellow journalists alcohol problems a while back. He's a massive twat.
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Isn’t Fredericks also the one who got Kodjia sent off at their place last season? Horrible little shit.
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Highlights clip?
Could not stomach to watch the whole game I recorded.
As for the game. Soon as we saw the line up I think we knew. Too many of our better players just did not turn up
Adomah
Snodgrass
Hutton
Hourihanne
Grabban
Without them firing we were doomed
Thought Adamoah and Hourihane were decent in the second half, both were hardly in it first half. Agreed on the other three.
Grabban doesn't seem interested playing up front by himself, woeful last three games. Nothing Snodgrass did came off yesterday, three times in the first half he had chances to slip Adamoah in behind the full back. Hutton had a shocker for the entire game and cost us the goal.
Looking back, Johanson should have finished it for Fulham during our good spell after another bad error from Chester. Mitrovic bullied Chester yesterday. I will give our lads credit for the 20-25 mins after half time, gave it everything but Fulham were far superior all over the pitch. They will do well next season as will Wolves.
Grabben has been poor I agree but he is just not that good at holding the ball up , Hogan was the same.Kodjia is the only striker we have you can do that but even then his link up play is limited ..however look at the players positions Grabben was miles away from anyone else at times and our FH tactic was lumping it to Snodgrass to head on !! Pathetic meanwhile they passed it around us like they were Real Madrid
True our football in first 30 mins or so yesterday was awful, like our first half v Boro at Villa Park let's be honest. Our midfield two are so technically limited all it took was a simple press from Fulham for us to revert back to Johnstone to hoof towards Snodgrass and give Fulham the ball back.
Wouldnt fault Grabban too much in the first half but in the second when we had the ball he was anonymous. Another one that let the game pass him by. Kodjia at least gave us a presence when he came on.
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I can only speak from experience and whilst we obviously have a few dickheads, my experience of our fans was very positive yesterday. I took my 9 year old lad travelling by train and despite it being a boozy atmosphere at times people gave up their seat for him and made sure he got to the front of the toilet queue, all totally unprompted.
At the final whistle he was inconsolable, crying his eyes out and loads of fans came up to give him a hug and cheer him up. The people around us in the stadium were fantastic too. And a few different Fulham fans offered some very nice words after which I didn’t really want to hear, but their intentions were good.
Shame about the result. We go again.
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When has throwing all the forwards on for the last 10 minutes when chasing the game EVER worked for us?
Why would anyone keep doing it?
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Mike Parry slagging us fans off on Talksport...
Why? What did the fans do to deserve a public slagging?
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When has throwing all the forwards on for the last 10 minutes when chasing the game EVER worked for us?
Why would anyone keep doing it?
It was nonsense.
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Isn’t Fredericks also the one who got Kodjia sent off at their place last season? Horrible little shit.
That's him, mate. What goes around, comes around with people like him, though.
Sorry we couldn't win for your lad. I'm sure he'll have something to cheer in the not too distant future. I remember being a kid and being mortified whenever we lost.
Up the Villa.
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Thanks for the comments Tony Erdington. Got a few things off my chest. Very therapeutic this forum.
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When has throwing all the forwards on for the last 10 minutes when chasing the game EVER worked for us?
Why would anyone keep doing it?
It was nonsense.
I'd normally agree but in a game like that and being 1-0 down, I understood it.
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Sickening awful feeling this morning, how can you set a team up to play like that, first half, then, as if by magic, resolve the issue to play the way we did in the 2nd half, what could Bruce have said to the players at half time, to change things so much, had we have played that way for the whole 90 we would have slaughtered Fulham, feel so sorry for Jack Grealish, head and shoulders above everybody else on the park, totally brutalized, completely unprotected by the referee, clearly Fulham set out to do a job on him and they did, no way should Fredericks have been allowed to stay on after the stamping incident. Not sure if Southgate can make late inclusions into the England squad but there is no question Grealish should be on the plane going to Russia.
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When has throwing all the forwards on for the last 10 minutes when chasing the game EVER worked for us?
Why would anyone keep doing it?
It was nonsense.
I'd normally agree but in a game like that and being 1-0 down, I understood it.
It worked brilliantly.
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It has genuinely left me feeling numb and pretty much lost for words
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When has throwing all the forwards on for the last 10 minutes when chasing the game EVER worked for us?
Why would anyone keep doing it?
It was nonsense.
I'd normally agree but in a game like that and being 1-0 down, I understood it.
It worked brilliantly.
No it didn't and it hardly ever does but in a game as big as that where we needed a goal, I can see why he did it. Thanks for the unsurprising sarcasm though.
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Fuck off villa
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The game summed up Steve Bruce to a T. We all know we HAVE to score the first goal or we are done for. Sets us up too negatively then it’s a mountain to climb. Too cautious and ultimately not good enough despite second half effort.
A terrible start to the season, the December form then the QPR/Bolton/Norwich debacles have cost us. Too inconsistent and we don’t deserve to go up.
Huge summer of change ahead. Hopefully a more dynamic, pace led, energetic approach with a forward thinking set up base around youth is to come
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That's the spirit.
Well posted Martin, especially about Bjarnasson. When the heat of the day and the legendary strength sapping of the Wembley pitch started to take its toll on both sides Birkir would have given us a lift because he is very fit and has a great engine.
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Well this feels even worse than relegation.
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Not seen it mentioned but we didn't even take advantage of a marginal gain like the sun being in their keeper's eyes for the whole of the first half but moving from that same goal during half time across to the stands meaning Johnstone didn't have to deal with it in the second half. We couldn't play through Fulham in the first half so it was crying out for a few cracks at goal from distance to give their keeper something to deal with.
I also don't know how injury time wasn't at least close to double the allotted five minutes at the end. There were six subs, a Fulham keeper taking his time over every goalkick, one of their strikers who was subbed-off booked for taking his time to leave the field, every restart from Fulham taking ages and two or three of their players going down injured. Not to mention the guts of five minutes between their player being sent off and the game resuming with all the drinks being handed around. The ball must have spent less than five minutes in play for the last quarter of the game. I know we would have done the same in Fulham's position to disrupt any momentum but given their refreshing approach to playing the game generally, it made feel more begrudging of their superiority.
In a way the worse thing to happen was the sending off as all our impetus disappeared due to the stoppages and Fulham's gamesmanship.
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Unlike some, i'd got over it by about 9pm when we got back to Birmingham in all honesty.
I've said all along that i don't miss the premier league and i don't. The only benefit i could see from promotion is to the clubs financial state, but ignoring that and looking at it purely from my own selfish viewpoint, in terms of just enjoying going to the match it wouldn't have improved anything for me personally.
My, nephew who's just turned 16 was and probably is still absolutely gutted mind. Maybe it's an age thing, but as much as i love the club i just can't get THAT bothered by anything football related these days. I haven't watched more than five PL matches in total since we got relegated so i genuinely have no idea what we're missing either. All i want in my life from football these days is to enjoy going to the match and to feel like the team are trying, and they have been all season. Sadly for us there were three better teams and that's life.
But back to yesterday, the first half performance was unforgivable. I see Bruce is getting the usual pelters from the usual people but there's no way he sent that lot out to play that badly. Not one player came out of that first half with any credit to me. To a man they were all sub par.
Second half they clearly did follow Bruce's half time instruction and at least showed some urgency and fight, but you can't only do that for 45 minutes against a very good Fulham side and expect to win. So at the end i had no complaints about the result.
Looking forwards, we can go one of two ways as i see it.
We can try and do this quick fix patch up job once again, and bring in another set of experienced pros or we can take a few steps back and take a broader view of the state of the side and implement a new longer term strategy which involves a more youthful set up and a lot more patience.
Of the current squad, i would have the following clear out assuming we can find buyers for the ones not on loan or out of contract of course
Bunn - Bye, surely out of contract anyway ?
Gollini - Bye
Hutton - Bye
Samba - Bye
Terry - Bye
De Laet - Bye
Richards - Fuck off and goodbye
Elphick - Bye
Jedinak - Bye, no other reason than he's only going to get slower and worse and the thought of him being used as a centre back scares the shit out of me
Whelan - Bye, as above really. Only going to get slower
Snoddy - Bye, unless we can get him for a really cheap fee and on low wages
Onomah - As above
Gardner - Bye
Gil - Bye
Lansbury - Still have completely no idea if he can be of use due to his lack of playing time
Gabby - See Richards above
Ross - See Gabby above
Grabban - Unless the fee was cheap then bye. I'm not convinced by him truth be told despite his fairly impressive goal scoring record this season
Could be a busy summer. But i can't wait for August to come around and have another crack at it.
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I also don't know how injury time wasn't at least close to double the allotted five minutes at the end. There were six subs, a Fulham keeper taking his time over every goalkick, one of their strikers who was subbed-off booked for taking his time to leave the field, every restart from Fulham taking ages and two or three of their players going down injured. Not to mention the guts of five minutes between their player being sent off and the game resuming with all the drinks being handed around. The ball must have spent less than five minutes in play for the last quarter of the game. I know we would have done the same in Fulham's position to disrupt any momentum but given their refreshing approach to playing the game generally, it made feel more begrudging of their superiority.
In a way the worse thing to happen was the sending off as all our impetus disappeared due to the stoppages and Fulham's gamesmanship.
We hardly helped by taking ages over throw ins, where a player right next to the ball that had gone out waited for Hutton to trot along at donkey's pace to take a throw 5 yards that he could've taken himself on numerous occassions
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A realistic list of 18 but only 7 of which have much game time this season. Speaks volumes when you see it in black and white.
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Unlike some, i'd got over it by about 9pm when we got back to Birmingham in all honesty.
I've said all along that i don't miss the premier league and i don't. The only benefit i could see from promotion is to the clubs financial state, but ignoring that and looking at it purely from my own selfish viewpoint, in terms of just enjoying going to the match it wouldn't have improved anything for me personally.
My, nephew who's just turned 16 was and probably is still absolutely gutted mind. Maybe it's an age thing, but as much as i love the club i just can't get THAT bothered by anything football related these days. I haven't watched more than five PL matches in total since we got relegated so i genuinely have no idea what we're missing either. All i want in my life from football these days is to enjoy going to the match and to feel like the team are trying, and they have been all season. Sadly for us there were three better teams and that's life.
But back to yesterday, the first half performance was unforgivable. I see Bruce is getting the usual pelters from the usual people but there's no way he sent that lot out to play that badly. Not one player came out of that first half with any credit to me. To a man they were all sub par.
Second half they clearly did follow Bruce's half time instruction and at least showed some urgency and fight, but you can't only do that for 45 minutes against a very good Fulham side and expect to win. So at the end i had no complaints about the result.
Looking forwards, we can go one of two ways as i see it.
We can try and do this quick fix patch up job once again, and bring in another set of experienced pros or we can take a few steps back and take a broader view of the state of the side and implement a new longer term strategy which involves a more youthful set up and a lot more patience.
Of the current squad, i would have the following clear out assuming we can find buyers for the ones not on loan or out of contract of course
Bunn - Bye, surely out of contract anyway ?
Gollini - Bye
Hutton - Bye
Samba - Bye
Terry - Bye
De Laet - Bye
Richards - Fuck off and goodbye
Elphick - Bye
Jedinak - Bye, no other reason than he's only going to get slower and worse and the thought of him being used as a centre back scares the shit out of me
Whelan - Bye, as above really. Only going to get slower
Snoddy - Bye, unless we can get him for a really cheap fee and on low wages
Onomah - As above
Gardner - Bye
Gil - Bye
Lansbury - Still have completely no idea if he can be of use due to his lack of playing time
Gabby - See Richards above
Ross - See Gabby above
Grabban - Unless the fee was cheap then bye. I'm not convinced by him truth be told despite his fairly impressive goal scoring record this season
Could be a busy summer. But i can't wait for August to come around and have another crack at it.
Great post.
Other than ‘can’t wait till August’ I could have written that post, word for word.
I also was ok by the time I got home and thinking quite positively.
Yes the PL is where we need to be, but I honestly don’t miss it either.
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How on earth did you manage to get back to Birmingham by 9? Do you have a private jet?
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How on earth did you manage to get back to Birmingham by 9? Do you have a private jet?
I left on the final whistle. On the road by 7:25
Back in Shirley at 9:15
Pissed by 11 😜
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Thanks for the comments Tony Erdington. Got a few things off my chest. Very therapeutic this forum.
I find walking around the house randomly uttering 'hijos de puta', 'que te la pique un pollo', 'bande de branleurs' and 'cul d'olla' works very well too.
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Fulham were the media's choice because they play good football, apparently. I can't help but think a lot of people with second hand opinions on Fulham's style of play will be a bit surprised next season, as they're an incredibly cynical side that like to dish it out.
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Thanks for the comments Tony Erdington. Got a few things off my chest. Very therapeutic this forum.
I find walking around the house randomly uttering 'hijos de puta', 'que te la pique un pollo', 'bande de branleurs' and 'cul d'olla' works very well too.
Yeah but not all the posters on here are multilingual. S0 - me cago en la madre que les pario.
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Que?
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Que?
It means I shit on the mother that gave birth to them. Kings of subtlety the Spaniards
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Right then, time for a few observations.
Firstly, the standard of officiating in this division and yesterday is at best amateur and at worst criminally inept, how can a player be assaulted, because that's what it was if it wasn't done on a football pitch, under the nose of the fourth official and no action be taken? Time after time in the first half hour Grealish was fouled and yet the only player in the book was Chester for dissent.
Secondly, half time entertainment was to watch 2 youths play FIFA 18 on a PlayStation, you have got to be fucking kidding me?
Thirdly, let's be brutally honest, the Premier League outside of the big 5 or 6 teams is utterly shit, 12 equally fucking useless teams spending beyond their means to stay above the line season in, season out just doing enough to stay on the gravy train. That's what football has become and to be honest, it's shit. Fulham will bob along the bottom 6 for the next few seasons.
Fourthly, rather ironically, that's 4 Wembley finals on the trot we've lost and in the process have failed to score a goal from open play, 4 finals and we've scored 1 goal from a penalty, it's not fucking good enough, there still remains an air of oh well, unlucky Villa stinking out the place, the lack of shits given needs sorting.
Lastly, I've had it with 1 up top, cling on and nick a goal, yesterday should have been about setting Fulham the questions to be answered and that was completely reversed, they knew just as we all did we'd play Grabban alone up front and he was completely isolated and ineffectual, just like he was in the 2 semi finals.
As for Steve Bruce, I said as we walked back to the station yesterday he'd be gone by the end of the weekend for personal family reasons and I wouldn't blame him one bit.
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Why dress it up. He has had personal tragedy. It is what life holds. Personally I extend sincere condolences. Professionally he has been extremely well paid to meet a target but he has fallen short. He has to be replaced for professional and commercial reasons.
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Right then, time for a few observations.
Firstly, the standard of officiating in this division and yesterday is at best amateur and at worst criminally inept, how can a player be assaulted, because that's what it was if it wasn't done on a football pitch, under the nose of the fourth official and no action be taken? Time after time in the first half hour Grealish was fouled and yet the only player in the book was Chester for dissent.
Secondly, half time entertainment was to watch 2 youths play FIFA 18 on a PlayStation, you have got to be fucking kidding me?
Thirdly, let's be brutally honest, the Premier League outside of the big 5 or 6 teams is utterly shit, 12 equally fucking useless teams spending beyond their means to stay above the line season in, season out just doing enough to stay on the gravy train. That's what football has become and to be honest, it's shit. Fulham will bob along the bottom 6 for the next few seasons.
Fourthly, rather ironically, that's 4 Wembley finals on the trot we've lost and in the process have failed to score a goal from open play, 4 finals and we've scored 1 goal from a penalty, it's not fucking good enough, there still remains an air of oh well, unlucky Villa stinking out the place, the lack of shits given needs sorting.
Lastly, I've had it with 1 up top, cling on and nick a goal, yesterday should have been about setting Fulham the questions to be answered and that was completely reversed, they knew just as we all did we'd play Grabban alone up front and he was completely isolated and ineffectual, just like he was in the 2 semi finals.
As for Steve Bruce, I said as we walked back to the station yesterday he'd be gone by the end of the weekend for personal family reasons and I wouldn't blame him one bit.
Not sure about him walking (I hope so but could see him being bullish about it), but the rest of this is spot on. The bit about Wembley finals haunted me all evening yesterday and still lingers this morning. When it comes to the "shit or get off the pot" moments, invariably we end up falling off and shitting ourselves instead.
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Right then, time for a few observations.
Firstly, the standard of officiating in this division and yesterday is at best amateur and at worst criminally inept, how can a player be assaulted, because that's what it was if it wasn't done on a football pitch, under the nose of the fourth official and no action be taken? Time after time in the first half hour Grealish was fouled and yet the only player in the book was Chester for dissent.
Secondly, half time entertainment was to watch 2 youths play FIFA 18 on a PlayStation, you have got to be fucking kidding me?
Thirdly, let's be brutally honest, the Premier League outside of the big 5 or 6 teams is utterly shit, 12 equally fucking useless teams spending beyond their means to stay above the line season in, season out just doing enough to stay on the gravy train. That's what football has become and to be honest, it's shit. Fulham will bob along the bottom 6 for the next few seasons.
Fourthly, rather ironically, that's 4 Wembley finals on the trot we've lost and in the process have failed to score a goal from open play, 4 finals and we've scored 1 goal from a penalty, it's not fucking good enough, there still remains an air of oh well, unlucky Villa stinking out the place, the lack of shits given needs sorting.
Lastly, I've had it with 1 up top, cling on and nick a goal, yesterday should have been about setting Fulham the questions to be answered and that was completely reversed, they knew just as we all did we'd play Grabban alone up front and he was completely isolated and ineffectual, just like he was in the 2 semi finals.
As for Steve Bruce, I said as we walked back to the station yesterday he'd be gone by the end of the weekend for personal family reasons and I wouldn't blame him one bit.
The Fulham "Matchday Announcer" sounded like he had a script aimed at six year olds.
"This is OUR City, and we need to let them over there know that".
Well, that's us told then.
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How on earth did you manage to get back to Birmingham by 9? Do you have a private jet?
Piece of piss. Came out the ground on the final whistle, had a piss then walked to Wembley Stadium station, got in the queue and was on the train back to Moor Street within 15 minutes. Had to stand up the entire journey mind
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I thought all the officials yesterday were Premier League level?
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
[/quote
Very glad I didn't take Charlie in the end (he vetoed it in favour of sightseeing only in the summer).
From the fucking rail shambles with Chiltern where they cancelled all services from the Black Country, that had already been booked, but didn't tell anyone. To them changing train times back without telling anyone. To the farce of letting too many people on the platform and then telling those who couldn't get on to either stand all the way or leave station and start at the back of the queue again. And that is before we get to the dozy fuckers who kept pulling the emergency chord on the train on the way back meaning ten minute hold ups at every station and everyone missing their local connections.
There was pushing and shoving by pissed up idiots to get into the ground with kids getting knocked by the wayside, people that pissed before the game they had collapsed on Wembley Way.
We had the usual wankers blocking the toilets up so they could smoke, people spending all game puffing on the vaping pipes in the ground and, as always at a big game with a late kick off, our gobby daytripping crowd constantly slagging the players (as well as anyone who didn't want to stand up and holler incoherently towards the pitch at all times) and these were the pricks playing up on the train.
Whilst we had a good day in Central London before the game I won't be doing another one. I can't be doing with being surrounded by such bell ends and I guess they were responsible for what CT saw.
It would have put Charlie off for life.
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Right then, time for a few observations.
Firstly, the standard of officiating in this division and yesterday is at best amateur and at worst criminally inept, how can a player be assaulted, because that's what it was if it wasn't done on a football pitch, under the nose of the fourth official and no action be taken? Time after time in the first half hour Grealish was fouled and yet the only player in the book was Chester for dissent.
Secondly, half time entertainment was to watch 2 youths play FIFA 18 on a PlayStation, you have got to be fucking kidding me?
Thirdly, let's be brutally honest, the Premier League outside of the big 5 or 6 teams is utterly shit, 12 equally fucking useless teams spending beyond their means to stay above the line season in, season out just doing enough to stay on the gravy train. That's what football has become and to be honest, it's shit. Fulham will bob along the bottom 6 for the next few seasons.
Fourthly, rather ironically, that's 4 Wembley finals on the trot we've lost and in the process have failed to score a goal from open play, 4 finals and we've scored 1 goal from a penalty, it's not fucking good enough, there still remains an air of oh well, unlucky Villa stinking out the place, the lack of shits given needs sorting.
Lastly, I've had it with 1 up top, cling on and nick a goal, yesterday should have been about setting Fulham the questions to be answered and that was completely reversed, they knew just as we all did we'd play Grabban alone up front and he was completely isolated and ineffectual, just like he was in the 2 semi finals.
As for Steve Bruce, I said as we walked back to the station yesterday he'd be gone by the end of the weekend for personal family reasons and I wouldn't blame him one bit.
Pretty much how I feel too, although, *pedant alert*, Chester was booked for an earlier foul on Mitrovic, the ref played advantage and booked him at the next break in play. Still shit for missing Fredericks' assault on Grealish
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In this century Wembley has become something of a hoodoo venue. Since 2000 Villa's record there is appalling!
Had a look at previous years.
Played 7 games. Won 1 in the 90 minutes - Liverpool. Drew one 0-0 aet and won on penalties - Bolton FA cup semi.
Lost 5. Scored 3 goals (inc 1 penalty). Conceded 13.
I think that is correct, if someone wants to check.
Conclusion - Villa need to get promoted automatically.
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Had a bloke in Block 128 in front of us trying to have a fight with another bloke about 6 seats down because he thought he was a Fulham fan
The alleged Fulham didn't say a word and kept his powder dry but the arsehole kept going on and on. I half wanted someone to knock his lights out to give us all some peace
Then some clearly pissed knuckle dragging types walking through the train barriers at a snails pace and giving grief to anyone that tried to pass them to get on the train
We do undoubtedly have a lot of twat fans. But so do every club i've ever encountered sadly
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Another one on fan behaviour. Both my train journeys, there and back, were delayed due to idiots pressing the emergency button. On return journey Transport Police has to board the train all the way from Banbury to Moor Street. Not good.
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Another one on fan behaviour. Both my train journeys, there and back, were delayed due to idiots pressing the emergency button. On return journey Transport Police has to board the train all the way from Banbury to Moor Street. Not good.
You must have been on the same train as me coming back.
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Think it’s a bit unfair to blame the referee for missing the stamp on Grealish, unless he had a mirror positioned at the side of the pitch there is no way he could see it. Bruce is reacting to the original foul rather than the stamp which he doesn’t appear to see.
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Another one on fan behaviour. Both my train journeys, there and back, were delayed due to idiots pressing the emergency button. On return journey Transport Police has to board the train all the way from Banbury to Moor Street. Not good.
You must have been on the same train as me coming back.
And the one I got back in April 2015.
There some drunken twats singing about Fred West too
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Think it’s a bit unfair to blame the referee for missing the stamp on Grealish, unless he had a mirror positioned at the side of the pitch there is no way he could see it. Bruce is reacting to the original foul rather than the stamp which he doesn’t appear to see.
I wasn't blaming the referee, the fourth official is stood in the technical area 3 yards from the incident and he didn't see it?
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Another one on fan behaviour. Both my train journeys, there and back, were delayed due to idiots pressing the emergency button. On return journey Transport Police has to board the train all the way from Banbury to Moor Street. Not good.
You must have been on the same train as me coming back.
And the one I got back in April 2015.
There some drunken twats singing about Fred West too
Sounds like we were all on the same train!
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I wake up this morning depressed enough, and then I think of our "fans" smashing the windows on that London bus full of totally innocent Fulham fans.
I know every club has them, but we carry some grade A fucking idiots.
[/quote
Very glad I didn't take Charlie in the end (he vetoed it in favour of sightseeing only in the summer).
From the fucking rail shambles with Chiltern where they cancelled all services from the Black Country, that had already been booked, but didn't tell anyone. To them changing train times back without telling anyone. To the farce of letting too many people on the platform and then telling those who couldn't get on to either stand all the way or leave station and start at the back of the queue again. And that is before we get to the dozy fuckers who kept pulling the emergency chord on the train on the way back meaning ten minute hold ups at every station and everyone missing their local connections.
There was pushing and shoving by pissed up idiots to get into the ground with kids getting knocked by the wayside, people that pissed before the game they had collapsed on Wembley Way.
We had the usual wankers blocking the toilets up so they could smoke, people spending all game puffing on the vaping pipes in the ground and, as always at a big game with a late kick off, our gobby daytripping crowd constantly slagging the players (as well as anyone who didn't want to stand up and holler incoherently towards the pitch at all times) and these were the pricks playing up on the train.
Whilst we had a good day in Central London before the game I won't be doing another one. I can't be doing with being surrounded by such bell ends and I guess they were responsible for what CT saw.
It would have put Charlie off for life.
Same mate. I won't go next time. Too many fucking Neanderthals. So many of them , cheering as the windows of a bus get smashed by loads of cans and bottles. I actually felt embarrassed.
For those that moan about 12 o clock kick offs, there's your answer.
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Think it’s a bit unfair to blame the referee for missing the stamp on Grealish, unless he had a mirror positioned at the side of the pitch there is no way he could see it. Bruce is reacting to the original foul rather than the stamp which he doesn’t appear to see.
I wasn't blaming the referee, the fourth official is stood in the technical area 3 yards from the incident and he didn't see it?
I agree, i didn’t say you did blame the referee, others did!
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It is always evening games with a big allocation where the embarrassing fucking ballbags in our support surface. Absolute fucking peasants.
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Right then, time for a few observations.
Firstly, the standard of officiating in this division and yesterday is at best amateur and at worst criminally inept, how can a player be assaulted, because that's what it was if it wasn't done on a football pitch, under the nose of the fourth official and no action be taken? Time after time in the first half hour Grealish was fouled and yet the only player in the book was Chester for dissent.
Secondly, half time entertainment was to watch 2 youths play FIFA 18 on a PlayStation, you have got to be fucking kidding me?
Thirdly, let's be brutally honest, the Premier League outside of the big 5 or 6 teams is utterly shit, 12 equally fucking useless teams spending beyond their means to stay above the line season in, season out just doing enough to stay on the gravy train. That's what football has become and to be honest, it's shit. Fulham will bob along the bottom 6 for the next few seasons.
Fourthly, rather ironically, that's 4 Wembley finals on the trot we've lost and in the process have failed to score a goal from open play, 4 finals and we've scored 1 goal from a penalty, it's not fucking good enough, there still remains an air of oh well, unlucky Villa stinking out the place, the lack of shits given needs sorting.
Lastly, I've had it with 1 up top, cling on and nick a goal, yesterday should have been about setting Fulham the questions to be answered and that was completely reversed, they knew just as we all did we'd play Grabban alone up front and he was completely isolated and ineffectual, just like he was in the 2 semi finals.
As for Steve Bruce, I said as we walked back to the station yesterday he'd be gone by the end of the weekend for personal family reasons and I wouldn't blame him one bit.
Not sure about him walking (I hope so but could see him being bullish about it), but the rest of this is spot on. The bit about Wembley finals haunted me all evening yesterday and still lingers this morning. When it comes to the "shit or get off the pot" moments, invariably we end up falling off and shitting ourselves instead.
Obviously not been to a play off final before, but it just felt different to the cup finals we’ve been to previously. It feels a lot different this morning as well. In a cup final, unless you have been relegated, you have got your league place sorted for the next season. With the play off final, it just feels like the rug has been completely pulled away on the season.
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Mike Parry slagging us fans off on Talksport...
Obviously someone who has spent far too long in Alan Brazil's company.
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Mike Parry and Alan Brazil. I wouldn't wipe my arse with those pair of twats.
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i always thought they were the fat slags. Twats!
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Why dress it up. He has had personal tragedy. It is what life holds. Personally I extend sincere condolences. Professionally he has been extremely well paid to meet a target but he has fallen short. He has to be replaced for professional and commercial reasons.
Totally agree. I would never attack the man on a personal level as I think he is a decent man. But on his performance as Villa manager I think he has fallen short and an amicable parting of the ways would be best.
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Had a bloke in Block 128 in front of us trying to have a fight with another bloke about 6 seats down because he thought he was a Fulham fan
The alleged Fulham didn't say a word and kept his powder dry but the arsehole kept going on and on. I half wanted someone to knock his lights out to give us all some peace
Then some clearly pissed knuckle dragging types walking through the train barriers at a snails pace and giving grief to anyone that tried to pass them to get on the train
We do undoubtedly have a lot of twat fans. But so do every club i've ever encountered sadly
Had similar outside.
Following four young Fulham fans, they kept quiet and didn't flaunt the win.
This thug twat started having a pop at them. I told him to shut the fk up and leave the lads alone. They thanked me, but, were obviously weary and turned and walked back. He started to have a pop at me then, so I just told him to stop being a prick and walked off. Typical bully, dint fancy taking on a grown up! Under no illusions he'd have probably beat the shite out of me 😊
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We do have a significant number of Herberts.
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the difference between the two teams was Fulham are able to pass the ball first time without taking a controlling touch. it was like pinball watching them play.
If we had started with a high tempo pressing game and nipped it in the bud early on maybe it could of been different.
Only Kenian Davis can hold the ball up. Grabbon did nothing. He doesn't even press. I would not be considering signing this guy on a perm.
Snodgrass and Adomah were unbelievably poor.
Adomah must have got a rollocking at half time because he did step it up 2nd half but was still poor.
It's the worst feeling in the world to lose a playoff. just heart breaking
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Didn't see or hear any drama in or around the ground yesterday, before or after, went for several (far too many) Guinness afterwards near Paddington and mixed with Villa, Fulham, Liverpool, Madrid and other fans and again no drama. That said we sat and had a few cold ones in the shade around 4pm and there were same absolute states staggering around, clearly been let out for the day and unable to moderate their intake.
My absolute highlight of the day was bumping into Ian Taylor as he walked around the ground at about 3:30 with his wife/partner/girlfriend, made my day that did.
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Hourihane - Offers nothing. Should have started with Birkir
Grabban - Same. Apart from a purple patch after we signed him, he's been toothless. Wembley would have been a perfect match to bring in the fully fit Kodjia.
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I seen it kick off between 2 Villa fans by the stairs on the way out of the stadium. It was a very violent exchange between the two of them, thankfully, it was broken up after some great effort to keep them both apart. It all started over the one bumping into the other. Pathetic pair of twats.
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There was a truly horrible crush outside door K after the match.
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Saw a few drunken Villa fighting amongst themselves down the bottom of the hill from the Green Man before the game. Police dealt with them quickly and abruptly. Ridiculous behaviour.
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As I was walking round to our designated gate, we had to do a "s'cuse us, mate" through the line of people at another. As we did so, a bloke literally fell on me. I don't know, it could have been the sun, but I had to catch him, and with the help of a couple of others, lower him safely to the floor. Some first aiders were thankfully on the scene before he reached the ground, so I let them get on with their job.
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I was worried that Bruce would play the same containing type side before the game despite Middlesbrough and Fulham playing completely different styles. I think he let sentiment take over.
I too would have played Kodija up top as he works the channels well and we would have stretched them more. Grabban on the left as Adomah has been out of form for a while. Bjarneson instead of Jedinak as he is more mobile and he helps us keep the ball. Fulham have little in the way of aerial threat, which is his biggest strength.
The fact he took so long to make any changes was the final nail really. He should have made them at half time.
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Just watching the Shrews Rotherham game and notice the number of players slipping over a la Grealish, Adomah and others several times yesterday. What's so different about that pitch to everyone else's?
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There was an idiot near us going back down Wembley Way who decided to start on a group of young Fulham fans.
I was really impressed when another Villa fan just flew in, got him his arm round the neck and just took him to the floor ( a proper rugby cloths lining!) and basically sat on him telling him to calm down.
I was really happy to see it was a Villa fan that did it because it send the message that it's not all of us that want to behave like idiots.
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My absolute highlight of the day was bumping into Ian Taylor as he walked around the ground at about 3:30 with his wife/partner/girlfriend, made my day that did.
[/quote]
Lucky man - I have to go to great lengths to make sure my wife and girlfriend never meet.
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Just watching the Shrews Rotherham game and notice the number of players slipping over a la Grealish, Adomah and others several times yesterday. What's so different about that pitch to everyone else's?
Not sure about today's match can imagine but can't watch any football after villa. Didn't entertain champs league final either.
What I did see is several villa players slip yester second half and think must have watered pitch half time as it was so warm. It provided distinctly tricky for Adomah and Grealish in particularly when dribbling at times.
Dam those boots and dam the watering!
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Yeah I noticed a few slips, one was at quite a crucial moment for our Jack I think.
I wonder if there is a requirement for ground staff to communicate that/when the pitch is watered?
There was a manager (forget who) livid recently for his perception of players wearing the wrong studs.
Those that re-watched it all tell me Jack should have been off as well as the other fella. Swings &.
One reflection is, given our grief at the loss, it makes we wonder how SB is right now.
The loss of such a collosal match in a club's history will way very heavily on his shoulders.
Likely trigger his other bereavements.
Crucially he also carries the burden that his tactics failed.
Like others, such mixed feelings. If we can get better we simply must.
The killer issue is if and who.
I'll support him for stabilising us and being a good man, but given the indubitable failure, with the reseources he's had, and soon less of them, the longer he's with us I fear that'll run out, and I'd not like to see us turn on him.
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Another one on fan behaviour. Both my train journeys, there and back, were delayed due to idiots pressing the emergency button. On return journey Transport Police has to board the train all the way from Banbury to Moor Street. Not good.
You must have been on the same train as me coming back.
And the one I got back in April 2015.
There some drunken twats singing about Fred West too
Sounds like we were all on the same train!
Blimey April 2015! No wonder it took so long to get to Moor Street.
Richard E it was roughly the 9.15 from Wembley.
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Yeah, me and Chelts got on at Marylebone at about 9:00.
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I saw no trouble at all, apart from the result it was all very pleasant
got chatting to a fella in weatherspoons who turned out to be Richl from this site and had a couple of beers together, thoroughly nice chap
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Yeah, me and Chelts got on at Marylebone at about 9:00.
And are arriving back to Moor Street some time tomorrow!
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Yeah, me and Chelts got on at Marylebone at about 9:00.
And are arriving back to Moor Street some time tomorrow!
As long as Aftab stops pressing the emergency button.
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Yeah, me and Chelts got on at Marylebone at about 9:00.
And are arriving back to Moor Street some time tomorrow!
As long as Aftab stops pressing the emergency button.
I wish he would. Clearly got the wrong end of the stick about how much FFP will cause us issues. I don't think Chiltern class that as an emergency.
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To be fair I was pretty impressed that the guys sitting opposite us were planning to go nightclubbing with Jesus when they reached town, although why they didn’t request his divine intervention to speed up the journey...
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We arrived at Wembley really early having stayed in London overnight - our plan for the day was to relax,enjoy the atmosphere and steer clear of the demon booze ! For me the upside for the day was noticing just how diverse our fan base is these days - ignoring the drunken idiots that plague us , more noticeably on sunny/ late kick off days - I was genuinely pleased to see groups of people of varying ethnicities all wearing claret and blue -likewise the generous ticket allocation allowed many diehards to bring along their families including relatives from both ends of the age spectrum - seeing youngsters kids excited at finding a free flag on their seat was great. Sadly as kick off approached ( and passed) there were a fair few drunken and abusive individuals literally falling into their seats - within minutes the inevitable "sit down ,we can't see" shouts were heard around us -
Sadly those children who were waving flags gleefully a few minutes earlier were now clinging on to them and looking bemused or at worst a bit frightened.Thankfully it calmed down around us and the six or so boozers vanished before half time to " top up" Our second half rally on the pitch focused attentions back on the pitch and at full time most just wanted to get back home or go back to the pub !! On the bus back to our hotel I met a nice bloke wearing a Villa shirt -we started talking and it was evident he lived in West London - he was born in Africa but moved to London when he was a child - he chose to support the Villa to be different from his schoolmates who favoured Liverpool, Man Utd etc......as he was getting off the bus he wished us a safe journey back to Formby - his parting comment was " we go again"
That brought smile to my face .........after all it is only a game
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After a couple of post match pints on the way back to get the minibus we bumped into a group of elderly Fulham fans comically satisfying all of the stereotypes you read about them. Plummy accents, dressed more suitably for the opera than football and spouting all the platitudinal stuff that you really don’t want to hear at that moment. I am not sure that all of our supporters would have reacted as civilly as we did.
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After a couple of post match pints on the way back to get the minibus we bumped into a group of elderly Fulham fans comically satisfying all of the stereotypes you read about them. Plummy accents, dressed more suitably for the opera than football and spouting all the platitudinal stuff that you really don’t want to hear at that moment. I am not sure that all of our supporters would have reacted as civilly as we did.
Did they make a quick brexit?
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To be fair I was pretty impressed that the guys sitting opposite us were planning to go nightclubbing with Jesus when they reached town, although why they didn’t request his divine intervention to speed up the journey...
There was no hope for the shitfaced 15 year old with him that they took in a titty bar earlier mind. By the way, I seem to have ripped you off for a tenner on cab fare!
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After the match I was sat amongst a small group of Fulham “folk” on the train back to Waterloo. Apparently Grealish was a disgrace and should have been sent off, they had more fans and were much louder than Villa, and them winning meant that justice was done. I some what agree with the last sentiment though and feel sorry for Shrewsbury losing out on promotion to a team that finished 8pts behind them.
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Yesterday highlighted that Villa have a lack of pace in the side and the painfully slow build up is only of benefit to the defender's.
A sad performance; Albert struggled badly but was not alone in this.
We are a very cautious side and Grealish apart I did not see much quality on display. Financially the club needs the promotion but it is hard to envisage that we would make much of a contribution other than helping to make the fixtures up.
Plenty of effort but not much speed of thought yesterday.
Fulham were cynical the 4th official was stricken with an optical disorder and many of the Fulham fans have the clap.
Steve Bruce has worked hard and I would like to see him take the club up but I am not convinced this will happen.
The ClapHeads won on the day but it is unlikely they will be able to find such support from the match officials in the Premiership and their season ticket holders will need extra penicillin if they expect to get 5 tickets for the Man Ute game.
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I think these drunken incidents happen all the time. Thing Is is all fun and games but when the result goes against you the mood can change very quickly
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I think these drunken incidents happen all the time. Thing Is is all fun and games but when the result goes against you the mood can change very quickly
No Phil my reference was after we won on v Liverpool. This was the first time I noticed that we had far too many utter pricks supporting Villa.
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I think these drunken incidents happen all the time. Thing Is is all fun and games but when the result goes against you the mood can change very quickly
No Phil my reference was after we won on v Liverpool. This was the first time I noticed that we had far too many utter pricks supporting Villa.
A transport policeman chatted to me on the way back to Kings Cross, he said it's the same with every big crowd. A small amount of idiot winners and a small amount of losers.
It's a toss of the coin who starts the trouble.
During the conversation a Fulham fan, probably sixty was making pig noises.
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To be fair I was pretty impressed that the guys sitting opposite us were planning to go nightclubbing with Jesus when they reached town, although why they didn’t request his divine intervention to speed up the journey...
There was no hope for the shitfaced 15 year old with him that they took in a titty bar earlier mind. By the way, I seem to have ripped you off for a tenner on cab fare!
I think it worked out as a fifty fifty split in the end which is fine.
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It's what happens when people drink all day, some cannot handle it and act up.
Our away following is always pretty boisterous, but only occassionaly moody. Boro and SHA stand out this season.
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It's what happens when people drink all day, some cannot handle it and act up.
Our away following is always pretty boisterous, but only occassionaly moody. Boro and SHA stand out this season.
On days like this a minority of our support is no different from the knuckle heads of SHA I ended up back at Wembley area about 3;30 and was in high spirits af the bottom of the hill but no matter how well oiled I was, I can handle my drink and was fully focused on the job ahead.
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Went with my son by coach from Northfield and had a drink at Wealdstone football club got the tube from Ruislip really enjoyed the day apart the result .had many great times watching villa but feel sorry for younger fans, need to get our act together and be more direct personally don't think Steve is the man to do it
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I think these drunken incidents happen all the time. Thing Is is all fun and games but when the result goes against you the mood can change very quickly
The bus that got smashed with the Fulham fans on happened well before 3pm.
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Our coach got the rear window bricked on the way back by Selcos.
Apparently by a bunch of traveller kids who appeared to be neither Villa nor pissed .
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We were in Flannerys on the high road and had a great time, no issues (my lad loves the twang and the lead singer was a top bloke, his old man was even better). My back went on the way to the ground and I apologise to anyone who saw an old git walking very strangely. My lad videoed it and my daughter says it looks like I was on that spice drug :-(
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Summed up the different attitude between the Fulham and Villa players when in the first half a ball was going out for a throw-in in line with our 6 yard box and a Fulham player sprinted after it and nearly stopped it going out of play, not ONE Villa player had reacted to the possibility that the Fulham player might have kept the ball in play!
It summed it up for me, they wanted it much more than us and fully deserved to win.
Time to re-group and start again without Bruce, but with some sort of forward-thinking coach/manager.
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Drinking in the Black Lion in Kilburn before the game with the London lions, all was fine and relaxed, though plenty of nerves. There was a big England flag outside with Villa Youth and the Football Lads Alliance badge which surprised me, as the group with the flag were not all white.
Chatted to Fulham fans on the tube - they were convinced they would not turn up. No Tarquinius, just normL fans who had never seen their team at Wembley. The only trouble I saw was on Wembley way where 2 Fulham twats were throwing first beer and then beer cans down at some Villa fans. Two went up to remonstrate and just as the Fulham fans were about to take a pasting the police intervened.
After the game back in Kilburn we shared a few drinks with Fulham fans as well as the hordes in the pub watching the Other Final. Again, all fine and dandy, with positive comments about our support. For the fans we met it was the best day of their life.
I got off the tube and got absolutely drowned walking home - torrential rain, thunder, lightning forks every 15 seconds. Summed up the bleeding day.
Oh, I hope we never play another London club at Wembley- Chelsea twice, Arsenal and now Fulham. 4defeats and not a goal scored.
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You forgot bloody Spuds, League Cup Final 1971. My first Wembley Final with Villa....scarred this here callow youth (was 15 at the time), as it still pains me to recall the cocky Cockernies beating us...
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You forgot bloody Spuds, League Cup Final 1971. My first Wembley Final with Villa....scarred this here callow youth (was 15 at the time), as it still pains me to recall the cocky Cockernies beating us...
Same for me, but I was a year older.
As for this time; ghastly.
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We were in Scotland for the 2000 FA Cup final and Mrs B cried herself to sleep that night. This was the first time I cried after a Villa loss....
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You forgot bloody Spuds, League Cup Final 1971. My first Wembley Final with Villa....scarred this here callow youth (was 15 at the time), as it still pains me to recall the cocky Cockernies beating us...
So basically in the finals we need to play teams from north or East Anglia.
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There was some talk on here that Fulham half of the ground will have 100s if not thousands of empty seats due to their allocation policy but that was not the case. There were very few of any empty seats and it was a sea of white in their half.
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Yeah, me and Chelts got on at Marylebone at about 9:00.
And are arriving back to Moor Street some time tomorrow!
As long as Aftab stops pressing the emergency button.
I wish he would. Clearly got the wrong end of the stick about how much FFP will cause us issues. I don't think Chiltern class that as an emergency.
The lady with the whistle (Guard I think?)was very fast and far more alert than Hutton so no way I was going to press the emergency button with her around.
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There were over 3000 empty seats.
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There were over 3000 empty seats.
M’lord
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There were over 3000 empty seats.
They weren't in the club allocations because they sold their full allocation too.
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Drinking in the Black Lion in Kilburn before the game with the London lions, all was fine and relaxed, though plenty of nerves. There was a big England flag outside with Villa Youth and the Football Lads Alliance badge which surprised me, as the group with the flag were not all white.
Chatted to Fulham fans on the tube - they were convinced they would not turn up. No Tarquinius, just normL fans who had never seen their team at Wembley. The only trouble I saw was on Wembley way where 2 Fulham twats were throwing first beer and then beer cans down at some Villa fans. Two went up to remonstrate and just as the Fulham fans were about to take a pasting the police intervened.
After the game back in Kilburn we shared a few drinks with Fulham fans as well as the hordes in the pub watching the Other Final. Again, all fine and dandy, with positive comments about our support. For the fans we met it was the best day of their life.
I got off the tube and got absolutely drowned walking home - torrential rain, thunder, lightning forks every 15 seconds. Summed up the bleeding day.
Oh, I hope we never play another London club at Wembley- Chelsea twice, Arsenal and now Fulham. 4defeats and not a goal scored.
I was in the black lion in Kilburn. That flag was the Democratic football alliance. It's not the racist bigots. They oppose them. The badge actually says "against all forms of extremism" Had my picture took in front of it with my pal who happens to be a black lad. Put the picture on our WhatsApp page and my brother (who Is a blue nose) got straight onto it and wanted to know why I was drinking with a load of bigots. I told him to look closely at the badge which he did and apologized to me straight away. Anyway onto the match ...... We were fucking crap. The End.
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Enjoyed the pre match atmosphere in Kilburn, some old faces about.
Like the Arsenal game, after 10 mins I feared this wasn’t going to be our day and we wouldn’t have scored if we’d have played till midnight.
No complaints, the better team won.
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
The other faint scrap of silver lining is not giving Micah Richards the world's least-deserved salary raise. He must be raging
\
Lad in the pub last night was adamant that Richards will be centre half next season and will be fantastic for us.....I know,me either
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On the bright side, at least we'll never again have to see Johnstone launching it at the head of whoever happens to be standing nearest to Snodgrass.
The other faint scrap of silver lining is not giving Micah Richards the world's least-deserved salary raise. He must be raging
\
Lad in the pub last night was adamant that Richards will be centre half next season and will be fantastic for us.....I know,me either
that would a Hutton like turnabout
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Went with my son by coach from Northfield and had a drink at Wealdstone football club got the tube from Ruislip really enjoyed the day apart the result .had many great times watching villa but feel sorry for younger fans, need to get our act together and be more direct personally don't think Steve is the man to do it
Our coach went there as well. The lovely weather made this a superb place for a pre match drink.
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Drinking in the Black Lion in Kilburn before the game with the London lions, all was fine and relaxed, though plenty of nerves. There was a big England flag outside with Villa Youth and the Football Lads Alliance badge which surprised me, as the group with the flag were not all white.
Chatted to Fulham fans on the tube - they were convinced they would not turn up. No Tarquinius, just normL fans who had never seen their team at Wembley. The only trouble I saw was on Wembley way where 2 Fulham twats were throwing first beer and then beer cans down at some Villa fans. Two went up to remonstrate and just as the Fulham fans were about to take a pasting the police intervened.
After the game back in Kilburn we shared a few drinks with Fulham fans as well as the hordes in the pub watching the Other Final. Again, all fine and dandy, with positive comments about our support. For the fans we met it was the best day of their life.
I got off the tube and got absolutely drowned walking home - torrential rain, thunder, lightning forks every 15 seconds. Summed up the bleeding day.
Oh, I hope we never play another London club at Wembley- Chelsea twice, Arsenal and now Fulham. 4defeats and not a goal scored.
I was in the black lion in Kilburn. That flag was the Democratic football alliance. It's not the racist bigots. They oppose them. The badge actually says "against all forms of extremism" Had my picture took in front of it with my pal who happens to be a black lad. Put the picture on our WhatsApp page and my brother (who Is a blue nose) got straight onto it and wanted to know why I was drinking with a load of bigots. I told him to look closely at the badge which he did and apologized to me straight away. Anyway onto the match ...... We were fucking crap. The End.
Cheers for clearing that up - I thought it was strange.
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Still not convinced they are what they claim to be, or don't claim to be.
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There were over 3000 empty seats.
They weren't in the club allocations because they sold their full allocation too.
Only areas of empty seats I could see were a few in the middle tier of the Fulham section and some in the blocks either side of the tunnel. Apart from that, there didn’t seem to be any at all really.
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It was comfortably the highest attendance for a Championship play off final for some time. About the only empty seats were the ones deliberately kept empty for segregation purposes.
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The fans turned up and were first class ......
The pity was the team thought the first half was simply a stroll ......
Second half much better but Jack apart we didn't create any clear chances
Next season will be hard as think we will be starting with a very different team
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It was comfortably the highest attendance for a Championship play off final for some time. About the only empty seats were the ones deliberately kept empty for segregation purposes.
I could see a few clusters of empty seats in the Fulham seating, which is where I presume the 5 tickets per season ticket holder policy encouraged the odd chancer to try to cash in. Hopefully they were left with an expensive waste.
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I think the game highlighted shortcomings we couldn't afford to take with us into the Premiership. On balance, Fulham deserved it. On merit Fulham and Wolves are the two best sides in this division and the ones most equipped to make a good fist of survival next year. They both have fairly young squads, whilst they've bought sensibly where they've had to spend a bit more. Wolves big spending succeeded where ours failed.
While we were slow, leggy and a bit one dimensional, they had energy. That pitch is big and it's one that will highlight sides which lack pace and we badly lacked pace.
'Experience' doesn't necessarily have to mean being 30 plus either. I would say Hourihane is a player with both youth on his side and experience. The kind we need to begin building our squad around. I think we can lose Jedinak, Whelan etc. It's now time to promote more of the U23 side and show more faith in them. Inject our side with some youth, energy and pace.
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I think the game highlighted shortcomings we couldn't afford to take with us into the Premiership. On balance, Fulham deserved it. On merit Fulham and Wolves are the two best sides in this division and the ones most equipped to make a good fist of survival next year. They both have fairly young squads, whilst they've bought sensibly where they've had to spend a bit more. Wolves big spending succeeded where ours failed.
While we were slow, leggy and a bit one dimensional, they had energy. That pitch is big and it's one that will highlight sides which lack pace and we badly lacked pace.
'Experience' doesn't necessarily have to mean being 30 plus either. I would say Hourihane is a player with both youth on his side and experience. The kind we need to begin building our squad around. I think we can lose Jedinak, Whelan etc. It's now time to promote more of the U23 side and show more faith in them. Inject our side with some youth, energy and pace.
Both Fulham and Wolves had clear way of playing and stuck with it. I remember Fulham taking huge risks passing the ball around at the back at Villa Park earlier in the season, but the manager obviously believed that was the way to play and they stuck with it. Our way of playing seemed to revolve around getting the ball to Grealish and Snodgrass and hoping they could produce something special. The latter had a pretty poor end to the season so that option became less effective.
I have to disagree about Hourihane. He has scored goals this season, but isn’t good enough to be a regular starter and Onomah should have been playing ahead of him in the final games of the season. We need someone in midfield with a bit more drive and dynamism, although I think Hourihane would be a decent option coming off the bench.
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Any empty seats in the Fulham end won't affect the attendance as it's tickets sold and they sold their full allocation. We were the ones that may not have sold out due to those late staff returns, although that would only be a couple of dozen or so. The unsold seats will be segregation, corporate etc.
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I think the game highlighted shortcomings we couldn't afford to take with us into the Premiership. On balance, Fulham deserved it. On merit Fulham and Wolves are the two best sides in this division and the ones most equipped to make a good fist of survival next year. They both have fairly young squads, whilst they've bought sensibly where they've had to spend a bit more. Wolves big spending succeeded where ours failed.
While we were slow, leggy and a bit one dimensional, they had energy. That pitch is big and it's one that will highlight sides which lack pace and we badly lacked pace.
'Experience' doesn't necessarily have to mean being 30 plus either. I would say Hourihane is a player with both youth on his side and experience. The kind we need to begin building our squad around. I think we can lose Jedinak, Whelan etc. It's now time to promote more of the U23 side and show more faith in them. Inject our side with some youth, energy and pace.
Both Fulham and Wolves had clear way of playing and stuck with it. I remember Fulham taking huge risks passing the ball around at the back at Villa Park earlier in the season, but the manager obviously believed that was the way to play and they stuck with it. Our way of playing seemed to revolve around getting the ball to Grealish and Snodgrass and hoping they could produce something special. The latter had a pretty poor end to the season so that option became less effective.
I have to disagree about Hourihane. He has scored goals this season, but isn’t good enough to be a regular starter and Onomah should have been playing ahead of him in the final games of the season. We need someone in midfield with a bit more drive and dynamism, although I think Hourihane would be a decent option coming off the bench.
Completely agree about Hourihane, he has been a passenger and we really could not afford that against Fulham.
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I think the game highlighted shortcomings we couldn't afford to take with us into the Premiership. On balance, Fulham deserved it. On merit Fulham and Wolves are the two best sides in this division and the ones most equipped to make a good fist of survival next year. They both have fairly young squads, whilst they've bought sensibly where they've had to spend a bit more. Wolves big spending succeeded where ours failed.
While we were slow, leggy and a bit one dimensional, they had energy. That pitch is big and it's one that will highlight sides which lack pace and we badly lacked pace.
'Experience' doesn't necessarily have to mean being 30 plus either. I would say Hourihane is a player with both youth on his side and experience. The kind we need to begin building our squad around. I think we can lose Jedinak, Whelan etc. It's now time to promote more of the U23 side and show more faith in them. Inject our side with some youth, energy and pace.
Both Fulham and Wolves had clear way of playing and stuck with it. I remember Fulham taking huge risks passing the ball around at the back at Villa Park earlier in the season, but the manager obviously believed that was the way to play and they stuck with it. Our way of playing seemed to revolve around getting the ball to Grealish and Snodgrass and hoping they could produce something special. The latter had a pretty poor end to the season so that option became less effective.
I have to disagree about Hourihane. He has scored goals this season, but isn’t good enough to be a regular starter and Onomah should have been playing ahead of him in the final games of the season. We need someone in midfield with a bit more drive and dynamism, although I think Hourihane would be a decent option coming off the bench.
Completely agree about Hourihane, he has been a passenger and we really could not afford that against Fulham.
I thought the substitution that really stood out, as early as the first half, was Onomah for Hourihane. He would have given us a bit more pace and drive. Hourihane, of whom I am generally a fan, had a nightmare and contributed nothing.
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I attend corporates at the Catalan Dragons (at least they beat the reigning champions, Leeds Rhinos at the weekend) now and again and I am amazed at the number of sponsors' tables that remain empty* (and therefore the corresponding seats in the posh bit of the ground).
*This allows me to nick their bubbly, nibbles and gift bags. Plus there are less queues up the free bar.
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Any empty seats in the Fulham end won't affect the attendance as it's tickets sold and they sold their full allocation. We were the ones that may not have sold out due to those late staff returns, although that would only be a couple of dozen or so. The unsold seats will be segregation, corporate etc.
There were a few empty seats near me in block 542- May have been no shows, may have been nicked. Everybody standing in that section ( except for a teenage lad who at one point was sitting down playing a racing game on his phone in the second half) which does make it easier to go and stand alongside your mates and leave your own seat empty.
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Went out with my wife for a drink this afternoon. Sitting outside a couple passed comments about the good nature of our two dogs. All very nice it was too. They were joined by another couple and we left them to their company and conversation.
The couple that joined then couldn’t wait to tell them they joy about Saturdays result and even punched the air when telling how their son had phoned them to tell them Fulham were one nil up.
Obsessed? This is one of the main reasons I so wish we weren’t in this league.
It wouldn’t have been so bad but I’m guessing they were probably a couple in their sixties.
Small time f*****s
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I think the game highlighted shortcomings we couldn't afford to take with us into the Premiership. On balance, Fulham deserved it. On merit Fulham and Wolves are the two best sides in this division and the ones most equipped to make a good fist of survival next year. They both have fairly young squads, whilst they've bought sensibly where they've had to spend a bit more. Wolves big spending succeeded where ours failed.
While we were slow, leggy and a bit one dimensional, they had energy. That pitch is big and it's one that will highlight sides which lack pace and we badly lacked pace.
'Experience' doesn't necessarily have to mean being 30 plus either. I would say Hourihane is a player with both youth on his side and experience. The kind we need to begin building our squad around. I think we can lose Jedinak, Whelan etc. It's now time to promote more of the U23 side and show more faith in them. Inject our side with some youth, energy and pace.
Both Fulham and Wolves had clear way of playing and stuck with it. I remember Fulham taking huge risks passing the ball around at the back at Villa Park earlier in the season, but the manager obviously believed that was the way to play and they stuck with it. Our way of playing seemed to revolve around getting the ball to Grealish and Snodgrass and hoping they could produce something special. The latter had a pretty poor end to the season so that option became less effective.
I have to disagree about Hourihane. He has scored goals this season, but isn’t good enough to be a regular starter and Onomah should have been playing ahead of him in the final games of the season. We need someone in midfield with a bit more drive and dynamism, although I think Hourihane would be a decent option coming off the bench.
Completely agree about Hourihane, he has been a passenger and we really could not afford that against Fulham.
Was he on the pitch yesterday?
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Still feeling down and depressed 48 hours later .As soon as it was confirmed it would be Fulham in the final i feared this would be the outcome. Away from home against the top six we have lost to Cardiff ,Wolves,Derby and Fulham without even scoring Evey game Bruce approached the game with the intent not to lose not with the intent to win. To approach a one off match winner takes all with the same approach is the last straw for me .He is a decent bloke but i hope he is not our manager next season
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I think the game highlighted shortcomings we couldn't afford to take with us into the Premiership. On balance, Fulham deserved it. On merit Fulham and Wolves are the two best sides in this division and the ones most equipped to make a good fist of survival next year. They both have fairly young squads, whilst they've bought sensibly where they've had to spend a bit more. Wolves big spending succeeded where ours failed.
While we were slow, leggy and a bit one dimensional, they had energy. That pitch is big and it's one that will highlight sides which lack pace and we badly lacked pace.
'Experience' doesn't necessarily have to mean being 30 plus either. I would say Hourihane is a player with both youth on his side and experience. The kind we need to begin building our squad around. I think we can lose Jedinak, Whelan etc. It's now time to promote more of the U23 side and show more faith in them. Inject our side with some youth, energy and pace.
Both Fulham and Wolves had clear way of playing and stuck with it. I remember Fulham taking huge risks passing the ball around at the back at Villa Park earlier in the season, but the manager obviously believed that was the way to play and they stuck with it. Our way of playing seemed to revolve around getting the ball to Grealish and Snodgrass and hoping they could produce something special. The latter had a pretty poor end to the season so that option became less effective.
I have to disagree about Hourihane. He has scored goals this season, but isn’t good enough to be a regular starter and Onomah should have been playing ahead of him in the final games of the season. We need someone in midfield with a bit more drive and dynamism, although I think Hourihane would be a decent option coming off the bench.
Completely agree about Hourihane, he has been a passenger and we really could not afford that against Fulham.
I thought the substitution that really stood out, as early as the first half, was Onomah for Hourihane. He would have given us a bit more pace and drive. Hourihane, of whom I am generally a fan, had a nightmare and contributed nothing.
Kodjia should have come on for Adomah early on in the second half. Grealish was starting to pop up on the left quite often and we were getting some joy on that side. Adomah was having a poor game and either Kodjia or Grabban should have gone out there. I still am a bit puzzled why he left it so long to change things.
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Drinking in the Black Lion in Kilburn before the game with the London lions, all was fine and relaxed, though plenty of nerves. There was a big England flag outside with Villa Youth and the Football Lads Alliance badge which surprised me, as the group with the flag were not all white.
Chatted to Fulham fans on the tube - they were convinced they would not turn up. No Tarquinius, just normL fans who had never seen their team at Wembley. The only trouble I saw was on Wembley way where 2 Fulham twats were throwing first beer and then beer cans down at some Villa fans. Two went up to remonstrate and just as the Fulham fans were about to take a pasting the police intervened.
After the game back in Kilburn we shared a few drinks with Fulham fans as well as the hordes in the pub watching the Other Final. Again, all fine and dandy, with positive comments about our support. For the fans we met it was the best day of their life.
I got off the tube and got absolutely drowned walking home - torrential rain, thunder, lightning forks every 15 seconds. Summed up the bleeding day.
Oh, I hope we never play another London club at Wembley- Chelsea twice, Arsenal and now Fulham. 4defeats and not a goal scored.
I was in the black lion in Kilburn. That flag was the Democratic football alliance. It's not the racist bigots. They oppose them. The badge actually says "against all forms of extremism" Had my picture took in front of it with my pal who happens to be a black lad. Put the picture on our WhatsApp page and my brother (who Is a blue nose) got straight onto it and wanted to know why I was drinking with a load of bigots. I told him to look closely at the badge which he did and apologized to me straight away. Anyway onto the match ...... We were fucking crap. The End.
Am I looking at another Democratic Football Alliance’s twitter account then? The bunch of pricks who run this account are retweeting requests for a “ free Tommy Robinson “ chant, retweeting Farage posts and posting right wing shit. And they have a picture of their “ against all predjudice” flag too. You sure about this, The Edge? I was also standing outside the Black Lion
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There must a completely different DFLA to the one I keep seeing mentioned on Twitter etc, they seem to think Tommy Robinson is some sort of folk hero.
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There must a completely different DFLA to the one I keep seeing mentioned on Twitter etc, they seem to think Tommy Robinson is some sort of folk hero.
They also have a strange idea of extremism. For some reason they're opposed to the democratically-elected Labour Mayor of London. Any idea why that might be?
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Hmmm, that's a tough one.