Bright Future with M. Houllier

[Monty]

Monty, you look at Liverpool's midfield and it says everything about where they are as a club right now when you think "Christ, they miss Kuyt".

Not too dissimilar, you might say, to looking at us against Bolton and thinking "Christ, they miss NRC". Which of course is a better situation for us than for them, because we intend to improve on NRC - they've tried and failed to improve on Kuyt.

[Ads]

True, but I think we miss them for differing reasons. They’re midfield looks so uncreative that Dirk Kuyt starts to become an appealing option.

[Monty]

Very true. And considering I used NRC as a comparison because they're players with about the same ratio of graft/creativity, that's pretty damning.

[Ads]

Which is why I think we can and will finish above them. Especially if Tores still continues to struggle to get over the injury he had from last season.

[Monty]

I'm less worried about their quality, more about our profligacy. We've got a tough run ahead of us and we really should have more points on the board from the games we've had, and Liverpool's fixtures look better than ours.

[Ads]

True enough, but I think that by moving Ireland into a more advanced role should help us on the goal scoring and creativity front. The fixtures are tough, but I still think we can get a good few points out of them. Having Chelsea at home is a bonus.

[Monty]

In a weird way, the timing of Ged's arrival could help us. Maybe we need the 'new manager effect' in these sorts of difficult games like Wolves.

[Ads]

Yes, the bounce should help. To be honest, we can’t play any worse there this time around than we did last year. Certainly one for Nigel. If we come out of the next three league games with 5-7 points, then we’ll be alright for a top 6 finish in my view.

[Monty]

Agreed, I'd take that sort of total from the next few as well.

[KevinGage]

I think the nature of the last bloke's departure is always going to be dragged up, at least for this season. Unless we confound the critics and go on an unbelievable run.

Encouraging stuff from GH, but it's hard to affect even gradual change mid season and get results. Players might try to follow the new instructions to the letter, but the first time they're under the cosh or concede they'll revert to what they know.

Pessimistic hat on: I think we might bow out tonight.
There is only so much rotation we can do and if he wants to look at the likes of Sidwell, Davies and Beye this evening we could get turned over. Blackburn are a few notches above Rapid Vienna, lets face it.

But in the long run it might be better for us -in so far as GH getting to know exactly what he has on the books.

[cb]

I'm quite excited about the prospect of Ash switch ing out to the left and Ireland assuming a more attacking role. With one of Albrighton/Downing out left and Gabby up top, that certainly has goals in it, provided they play with the right attitude. I would hope Houllier can then solidify the midfield with some organisation until January and maybe a signing after this (my preference would be for someone like Flamini). Given this set of events (and I don't think it's too unachievable), then I think we could be in the mix for the last CL place again this season and would be reasonably happy with finishing sixth again...

[Ger Regan]

I am Houllier neutral, neither wildly for, or against, but think that the Gary Mac appointment is a shrewd one. MONs three successive sixth placed finishes was the best of any Villa post WW2 manager.

Hmmmm, I would argue that 1 1st place finish is much better than 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 6th places finishes, but there you go.

[Michel Sibble]

I don't think you can compare Ged's first conference with MON's... Ged seems to understand at a ground level what we're about as a club whilst MON just used the European Cup to big up himself with.

Ged may very well do to us what Arsene Wenger has done to the Arse. Arsenal had the drinking/gambling culture before Wenger stepped in and turned them into double champions. Villa has completed one-half of that with Randy et al, but the coaching/tactics were still in the 80s. Ged will bring us into the 21st.

[Bad English]

I would like him to leave tomorrow. Then I will not have to read that horrible word 'Ged' any more.

[peter w]

Is that what we're calling him now? Ged?

When people started to put LOL in response to my emails a few years ago i thought they were calling me Larry and I never really got it. As if it were a pet name. I wondered why so many people thought of me as a Larry. No, really.

Larry and Ged. Nice.