The perception of Villa

[saunders_heroes]

So when you talk to fans of other clubs, they praise our champagne football and ambitious transfer market swoops? Who are these madmen, and who do they support?

Who mentioned champagne football? Nobody but you. We're certainly not a boring club who play boring football though.

[saunders_heroes]

None of the Liverpool fans I work with wanted O'Neill as their new manager when Benitez quit.  That wouldn't have been the case two years ago.  O'Neill's reputation is definitely on the slide.

They ended up with Hodgson - a man who led Fulham to the bottom half of the Premier League.

[Risso]

None of the Liverpool fans I work with wanted O'Neill as their new manager when Benitez quit.  That wouldn't have been the case two years ago.  O'Neill's reputation is definitely on the slide.

They ended up with Hodgson - a man who led Fulham to the bottom half of the Premier League.

Considering where they were when he took over, he did brilliantly for them.

[villan1975]

It is of great importance in the sky era how we are percieved whether we like it or not,we as a club are selling a product.The product we sell for the most part is of good quality and we seem to get a more than fair share of tv air time.We do have problems at home breaking teams down but we are not the only ones by any stretch of the imagination,even the "sky four" have had to put up with well organised teams visitin old trafford,the emirates etc and hoping for a 0-0.

[KevinGage]

That's the thing - as Irish villain said - we do see ourselves bigger than what we are. We scoff at those pundits that say we think we have a divine right to win anything and everything. We attack those pundits who say that 6th is a great achievement for us. We pour scorn at Newcastle for pundits going on about them being a big club when all they do is fill a ground to capacity every week despite winning nothing for 50 odd years.

But in reality we are big in our own minds. We're there or thereabouts when we have a good season but have only won something like 10 trophies in a hundred years or so and no matter how many excuses we can come up with we can only sell out the ground when the opposition are big.

Maybe its not us that's right and everyone else that is wrong. Maybe we are doing well to be where we are. maybe we're not a big club despite thinking that we are - yes we have the potential to be but so do many.

We are, like most clubs, possibly just big in our own minds.

The counter to that is:

- There has barely been a decade since formation when we haven't won a major trophy.

- We're still the fourth most successful side in English football history

-For most of the individual domestic honours won in the English game, we're up near the top of the list in each

- We've supplied more England internationals than any other club

-We're one of only four English sides to pot the EC

That sounds plenty big enough to me, and if Tottenham, Citeh or any other side outside of the very elite had that kind of record their spin dept would never let the media forget it. Whilst our own fans are so keen to do us down others will be more than happy to do the same.

[Greg N'Ash]

My Liverpool supporting mate was fairly underwhelmed by Hodgson but will reserve judgement and see how he gets on. He was deeply afraid of getting MON.

[TimTheVillain]

I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.

Give us hope, pray give us hope............enlighten.

Honestly, I think some on here are beyond hope.

If hope = watching the team play to support them, I have hope.

If hope = taking time on here to share opinions and thoughts with fellow Villa fans, I have hope.

If hope = truly believing that AVFC will be playing sexy football nest season, winning 4 nils and attracting the plaudits from the neutrals, I do not have hope.

[KevinGage]

Older fans of other clubs I talk to (40/50+) seem to rate us.

Younger ones (20's/30's) less so.

I'd agree with that. Talking to an older Arsenal fan a few weeks ago and he said that he thought the league needed Villa to be challenging and that he was brought up to think of us as a massive club, kept saying "the Villa" which I liked.

We need to win something or get into the CL for younger fans to start to see us any differently.

Had a similar encounter with a Citeh fan a few years back when we were after Distin. Think it was back in 2005 under Pigface. Citeh fan said he was bound to move to us if we were keen as we were a 'massive club.' How times change, eh?

You're right on the last part too. We need to be current, or relevant to borrow Dave Woodhall's description.

[Irish villain]

History means an awful lot to me but I despair to think how little it means to most people. That's why we are not seen as big or fashionable because so much of our success was so long ago.

We desperately need an FA cup win or a great run in the Europa League to attract attention from further afield. It's clear now we don't have the money to compete with the cubs who want to buy success and status so we have to try to do it the hard way.

[Chris Smith]

I think we're far from being perceived as a boring club with a boring team. Just because a few fans on here constantly try and talk us down doesn't mean it's true. It's getting a bit boring to be honest.

Give us hope, pray give us hope............enlighten.

Honestly, I think some on here are beyond hope.

If hope = watching the team play to support them, I have hope.

If hope = taking time on here to share opinions and thoughts with fellow Villa fans, I have hope.

If hope = truly believing that AVFC will be playing sexy football nest season, winning 4 nils and attracting the plaudits from the neutrals, I do not have hope.

The phrase sexy football makes me want to buy a shotgun and run amok through Moseley. Mourinho is the best manager in the world and has never knowingly had a team play sexy football. It's all about results, if you can score a few gaols along the way then that's great but English football is so physical and so competitive that few games live up to your romantic aspirations.

You also seem to have trouble with language. How can hope be the same as "truly believing"? I hope that we win the league by 20 points, I expect to see us once again involved in the battle for Champions League qualification.

[KevinGage]

Even ten years ago, you had a situation where players were probably aware of our success in Europe and the League at the turn of the 80's; and our record FA Cup haul (up until 1991) from the time they were growing up, so -providing we were't well and truly in the shit- we were still a vaguely attractive option for many.


But for players breaking through now -nevermind fans of other clubs- we really haven't achieved a great deal for a while. That's when it becomes harder.

Take Dunne as an example. In all the time he's been with us I don't think I've ever heard him  refer to us as a big club or similar, whereas he generally can't shut up about how huge Citeh are and how they should be sweeping all before them.

He hasn't been particularly derogatory about us either. And I tend to go the route of much preferring performances on the pitch outdoing waffle in print. But he does seem to see us as a 'homely' club, rather than a major player. Maybe that's the wider perception amongst his peers now, and that you're only a 'big' club if you're top 4 or have money to throw around like Citeh.

[TimTheVillain]

I think you're right.

We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.

We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.

If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).

If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.

[TimTheVillain]

I think you're right.

We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.

We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.

If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).

If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.

[TimTheVillain]

I think you're right.

We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.

We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.

If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).

If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.

[Chris Smith]

I think you're right.

We are seen as a 'homely' club with an eccentric Manager and a quiet, wealthy owner who wants 'tradition' as the cllub's mantra more importantky than 'winners'.

We just aren't seen as a team of winners, a club to be feared with a fortess of a home ground.

If we accept where we are we can move forward ( brightly).

If we continue to look at our club through rose tinted glasses, you could change our club motto to 'Proud to be mediocre' and it would be more appropriate.

I think that's a load of crap, if you don't mind me saying, you're confusing us with Ipswich.

I think it's all in your own head. On another thread you were saying how you agreed with Savage who, amongst other things, said "Martin has proved he can deliver success and I wouldn’t bet against Villa having another good season" now you're saying that you think that really we're not bothered.