Birmingham City v Aston Villa Post-Match Thread

[Can Gana Be Bettered!?!?]

Another observation from today is that Downing is still to grow a pair.  One bottle job for a 60/40 tackle in his favour was proof of this.

He's never going to grow a pair. I heard Liverpool and Sunderland were interested. Get rid.

[kippaxvilla2]

I am not wrong am I - he did start with a left winger up front and a striker on the left wing? 

[hawkeye]

When was the last time Downing had a good game for us? part of the problem is not playing him on the Left wing, because he is pretty ineffective every where else

[Jimbo]

I think being happy with a point against this absolute rabble shows how far we've dropped. I'm not unhappy with the point, just aware that we should have got three, and badly needed three in our fight for survival. 

I hate this kind of comment.  A point away from home this year is a good point regardless of the opposition.  Blues have a good home record and were rubbing their hands at the prospect of pushing us further into the shit today.  We've had a shocking of late run but managed to dig in and secure a very valuable point.  The noses ain't beaten us now in the league for about 5 years.

I'm happy with the point given the circumstances - just another 18 to go(!) and we can then start to rebuild the squad.  I fancy us against the Arabs next week as well.

Great, ok, a point is good. Let's hope that, come May, it was good enough.

[luke25]

Gabby is shit.

No he isn't.

He is out on the wing. Maybe thats a bit harsh but FFS stick him up top if your gonna play him.

Correct. He should be up front.

36 goals from 121 games in the last 3.5 seasons including a few penalties. He's not shit, but he's not good enough if we are going to do what Spurs have done at some point. Very happy with him as part of the squad, but we need better up front as first choice.

When has Gabby ever took a penalty? Apart from the shoot out at Sunderland

[Somniloquism]

Great, ok, a point is good. Let's hope that, come May, it was good enough.

Well if we are relegated by a couple of points then just singling out this match would be wrong. Fulham away would be a more deserving match as that was in the bag until a needless foul in the 94th minute. I don't disagree that we couldn't have done with a win but when playing away a point is not a bad result (especially with our away record this season) and when it is in a potential relegation 6 pointer the main thing is not to lose.

[Clark W Griswold]

Gabby is shit.

No he isn't.

He is out on the wing. Maybe thats a bit harsh but FFS stick him up top if your gonna play him.

Correct. He should be up front.

36 goals from 121 games in the last 3.5 seasons including a few penalties. He's not shit, but he's not good enough if we are going to do what Spurs have done at some point. Very happy with him as part of the squad, but we need better up front as first choice.

When has Gabby ever took a penalty? Apart from the shoot out at Sunderland

I'm not 100% sure on that to be honest but i thought i recalled him taking a couple last season, there were quite a few that did for us. Anyway, even if he hasn't i don't think it changes the point i'm making abiut needing someone more prolific to get in the Champions League, do you?

[luke25]

Gabby is shit.

No he isn't.

He is out on the wing. Maybe thats a bit harsh but FFS stick him up top if your gonna play him.

Correct. He should be up front.

36 goals from 121 games in the last 3.5 seasons including a few penalties. He's not shit, but he's not good enough if we are going to do what Spurs have done at some point. Very happy with him as part of the squad, but we need better up front as first choice.

When has Gabby ever took a penalty? Apart from the shoot out at Sunderland

I'm not 100% sure on that to be honest but i thought i recalled him taking a couple last season, there were quite a few that did for us. Anyway, even if he hasn't i don't think it changes the point i'm making abiut needing someone more prolific to get in the Champions League, do you?

I doubt anybody would argue against that point

[Jimbo]

Great, ok, a point is good. Let's hope that, come May, it was good enough.

Well if we are relegated by a couple of points then just singling out this match would be wrong. Fulham away would be a more deserving match as that was in the bag until a needless foul in the 94th minute. I don't disagree that we couldn't have done with a win but when playing away a point is not a bad result (especially with our away record this season) and when it is in a potential relegation 6 pointer the main thing is not to lose.

Fulham was before we plunged ourselves in the shit. There's more urgency now. Like I said, we didn't lose and I'm not unhappy with a point. But sooner or later we're going to have to start winning. And our excuses for not doing so are running out with every game. Blues may be a derby game, but they are a very poor team and they're above us in the league with a game in hand and superior goal difference of 10 (ten). These are the teams we have to beat because we screwed up against the likes of Fulham.

[Dan England]

Good result. Pretty good performance and were unlucky not to win. In boxing terms we should have won on points. Carew was poor however I disagree with the NRC and Clark critics, I thought they  both had reasonable games. Gabby is massively lacking in confidence and desperately needs a goal. We've stopped the pattern of not picking up points when we concede the first goal and have had two good points out of Chelsea and Blues. Sneaky feeling we'll get something out of Man City on Saturday.

[Somniloquism]

Fulham was before we plunged ourselves in the shit. There's more urgency now. Like I said, we didn't lose and I'm not unhappy with a point. But sooner or later we're going to have to start winning. And our excuses for not doing so are running out with every game. Blues may be a derby game, but they are a very poor team and they're above us in the league with a game in hand and superior goal difference of 10 (ten). These are the teams we have to beat.

So only matches in the second half of the season count if we are relegated. And there was me thinking there were 38 games counted towards in the league. Blues are shit, I agree. We have actually scored more goals then them so far this season so the fact they have such a better GD shows they are rather good defensively. We did more then Chelski did against them when they went 1 down, we scored a goal.

As I said earlier, I would have preferred a win but after that it was important not to lose. We managed to do the second bit in the end so it is still a good point and shouldn't be easily dismissed.

[damon loves JT]

I am just so bloody relieved we didn't lose. Sadly, this is about as good as it gets for me at the moment.

[Chris Smith]

Saying that Blues is a game that we have to win is ignoring the fact that they rarely lose at home, twice in just over a year I think it is.

We do need to start winning some games but just because we don't like them we can't start pretending that the Sty is an easy place to go.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

Any local derby is generally a tough game and today was no different. On another day we would have put two or three past them. At least we're starting to make chances again.

[Jimbo]

Fulham was before we plunged ourselves in the shit. There's more urgency now. Like I said, we didn't lose and I'm not unhappy with a point. But sooner or later we're going to have to start winning. And our excuses for not doing so are running out with every game. Blues may be a derby game, but they are a very poor team and they're above us in the league with a game in hand and superior goal difference of 10 (ten). These are the teams we have to beat.

So only matches in the second half of the season count if we are relegated. And there was me thinking there were 38 games counted towards in the league.

That would be very silly wouldn't it? What I'm saying is, the more games you lose or draw in the early part of the season, the more games you must win in the latter part in order to avoid the inevitable. But we don't consider those early games as must-win games because we think we'll have opportunities to pick up points later on. Today was an opportunity, and they are running out fast. I'm not dismissing the result, I'm delighted we didn't lose, but a solitary point here might not be enough. We have to get into that mindset, because as we go onwards scraping draws really will not be enough. We need to start winning somewhere and a must-win-at-all-costs mentality is going to have to emerge sooner or later.