Stoke City v Aston Villa Post-Match Thread

[hilts_coolerking]

Petrov never touched Pennant. Pennant knocked the ball past Petrov, runs past him and falls over. Quite obvious on the replay. But from the refs angle it looks like a foul.

I think that's right. It looked like a foul at first sight.  Besides, we can't moan too much about the ref - he could easily have given them a pen in the first half.  The point is if a free kick is given then we have to deal with it better.  Particularly in the last fucking minute of injury time.

[DaveD]

Houllier should be fuckin sacked right  now.  Pulis' mother died and he still managed to make it to the game to change the result in their favour yet our tosser of a so called manager was at a pissin awards ceremony in France.  Bullshit.  Hang your heads in shame Messrs MacDonald, Lerner, Faulkner and Houllier.

Houllier is doing the right thing, in fulfilling his contractual obligations. If anyone is to blame, it's the twats at AVFC who appointed a manager, seemingly with no idea as to when he can actually begin his job. You'd think this would have been discussed and agreed prior to anything being signed, never mind announced to the public. I've never heard of a club being involved in such a monumental failure to check even the most basic things. I can't imagine how the interview went. Maybe this is how they do things in the US.

+1. Ditto. Damn straight. Etc...

[achilles]

Houllier should be fuckin sacked right  now.  Pulis' mother died and he still managed to make it to the game to change the result in their favour yet our tosser of a so called manager was at a pissin awards ceremony in France.  Bullshit.  Hang your heads in shame Messrs MacDonald, Lerner, Faulkner and Houllier.

Houllier is doing the right thing, in fulfilling his contractual obligations. If anyone is to blame, it's the twats at AVFC who appointed a manager, seemingly with no idea as to when he can actually begin his job. You'd think this would have been discussed and agreed prior to anything being signed, never mind announced to the public. I've never heard of a club being involved in such a monumental failure to check even the most basic things. I can't imagine how the interview went. Maybe this is how they do things in the US.

I have to say, that with this Houllier delay, and the shirts delay, I do wonder what on earth is going on at the upper levels of the club.

Obviously not enough!

[KevinGage]

We have to give credit to Tony Pulis, he makes tactical changes when needed, 2 seasons in a row he has made sub which have influenced the game.

Can anyone remember what Houllier what like tactically?

Tactical genius?

No.

But he does something. We do nowt.

[rutski]

who shall i blame?

[Guy M]

Can't believe this twonk has another match in charge with us. Fuck off MacDonald.

Classy. Might be worth getting a large dose of your username methinks.

[Reality]

Pulis used his subs yes. MacDonald brought on Heskey. Says it fucking all.

[TonyD]

Played well at times but didn't make the changes to combat Stoke for the last 20 mins.

If you bring on EH then we deserve our fate - what a clearance for their winner!

[sfx412]

Naive totally naive another tired team of players concede a late late goal.

[eastie]

I agree with a lot you say paulie- randy is lucky to have escaped much criticism having seen some of the things that have happened since the summer began.

It seems frankly ridiculous that we gave houllier the job not knowing when he could take it.

[Reality]

Also. Our "manager" was over in France attending an award ceremony.

Tony Pulis' mother died today, and he came back for the second half when they were down 1-0.

[OzVilla]

We need a manager now, not next week, not next month but now.  We just can't keep folding like that every time we concede.

RAL if your reading this do everything you can to get GH here pronto as this cannot go one - we are leaderless and it's going to cost us.

If you can't get GH here any sooner, may I ask what the feck you are doing appointing a Manager that isn't allowed to manage us yet.  You had weeks to get someone in and then choose a bloke that can't leave his existing role yet.  WTF!!

As for the performance, a little bit more nous and commitment, a real over my dead body attitude and we'd have won that game.  Is it is, we have none of those qualities within the team at the moment so we lost.

The more i see of us the more I think the best we can hope for this season is win the mini league of West Midlands clubs and beat Blose - that's ambition isn't it - it's like we've turned in to them.

[Risso]

Naive totally naive another tired team of players concede a late late goal.

Why on earth would they be tired?

[NorthYvillan]

There is some amount of over-reaction going on here.

It was f**king annoying to lose in the last minute again at this wind-swept hole - and we should have changed things when we could to hold on to what we had. I believe KMac brought on Heskey to add some height at both ends when he should probably have brought on Cuellar to help defend.

After we weatherd their early attacks we took control of the game; we played the ball around well and NRC was a revelation - he actually passed the ball to his team-mates 99% of the time - although he dropped one for the equaliser. Ash should have got the second and almost certainly killed them off - but shit happens. Even after they equalised we had almost as many opportunities to score as they did.

The referee was a c**k in the 2nd half; he gave them nearly all the 50:50s and certainly penalised us for things that they got away with. And don't get me started on the free-kick that lead to the goal - not a free kick and just where the hell did they take it from? No agruing that we should have dealt with it better but it would have been so much easier to defend if had been taken where it should have been.

We've played a lot worse away and won, so despite the depression at losing, the "doom and gloom mongers" are way off target.

[Dan England]

Albrighton did nothing second half.  It was crying out for Ireland to replace him, but KM seemingly has the same lack of nous as O'Neill.

Agreed.  That would have been a good substitution.  If nothing else it would have improved Ireland's match fitness and saved Albrighton's legs a bit.

Agreed. Thought Gabby was pretty useless as well in the second half. Fucking sick to death of watching us trying to hold on in the second half of games. We were lucky against everton. Highly cheesed off again.