Aston Villa v Everton Post-Match Thread

[Dave Clark Five]

it ain't going to get much better than this in the short term. Given that McLeish will be here for the mid to long term too we can only pray it gets better when he gets some of his own players in. And I'm not talking about Hutton type players either. Warnock and Collins are travesties also.

I thought James Collins played quite well.

[WALTERS WARRIORS]

I can honestly say this is not the managers fault. Except for signing Hutton who is a very limited footballer. This is down to a lack of quality players Mcleish has inherited. Warnock would not get into another prem team. Clarke is trying to find his feet. Petrov although has had a good season is not a 90mins player. Ireland is only just starting to play along with Heskey who a championship level player at most. Ye Mcleish could of put Nzogbia on after half time but we then had our best period of the game and did not want to stop the momentum ......

[villan1975]

We're not the last game on MOTD.Take that all you doom mongers,two of the big premier league
big spenders are.
As an aside I did'nt go to the game today even though I had the offer of a free lift with
a couple of Everton fans.Could'nt even muster up the effort to look for a stream.
Fair play to all of you who made the effort today as this fixture was the very definition of the word
dirge.Sounds like it lived up to its billing.

[Shrek]

We have a problem.

Bent scored a goal, but cannot hold the ball up at all. Catch 22 situation.

Gabby has to play but means N'Zogbia doesn't & we miss his creativity.

Ireland is absolute quality but needs the freedom of being the 3rd midfielder.

Warnock is shot of all confidence.

Our problem is Bent scored? Fucking hell, I really do wonder about a lot of Villa fans.

Yes Bent scored, but his lack of involvement in the game is in my opinion costing us, hence the catch 22.

He never wins a header and cannot hold the ball, he just passes it back making it hard for the team to push forward, so it's catch 22 as to whether we can afford the luxury.

Bent was quality last season but he replaced Gabby in doing so, so maybe we need to start picking just one of them, for the sake of the team.

I know it might Go against the grain, but I'd play the same front 6 but play N'Zogbia instead of Gabby. I think Bent could be more effective with 2 genuine wide men.

[ez]

Where was Enda?

[paul_e]

I can honestly say this is not the managers fault. Except for signing Hutton who is a very limited footballer. This is down to a lack of quality players Mcleish has inherited. Warnock would not get into another prem team. Clarke is trying to find his feet. Petrov although has had a good season is not a 90mins player. Ireland is only just starting to play along with Heskey who a championship level player at most. Ye Mcleish could of put Nzogbia on after half time but we then had our best period of the game and did not want to stop the momentum ......

I'm sorry but I just don't buy this.  Virtually every player in that team was a full international (of the 12 that played today only albrighton isn't capped at full international level).

I agree there are some of them who aren't great footballers but they've clearly done enough in their careers to date to have earned the right to play at this level.

Compare that to Swansea who have about 5 players in their squad who have earned international recognition.

There is no way we should be completely outplayed by a newly promoted side with championship level players and a handful of new signings.

He hasn't had a massive amount of time but we should've started to see some effect of what is being done on the training ground.  At times we've played reasonably well (nothing amazing but at least playing to the strengths of the squad) but this has been all too infrequent.

I think it's fairly clear that the squad has completely lost confidence now but I haven't seen any sign of him doing anything to address that either.

Finally with the money he has been allowed to spend so far he bought nzogbia (I actually think this purchase was more that people from the club saw fans all over the internet lauding him up as an adequate replacement for ash and suggested it might get the fans onside) who he has completely failed to integrate into the side and Hutton who is no better than Herd or Lichaj who were already here and on a fraction of the wages.  I'm just not sure I'd trust him to improve the quality in the squad if Randy handed him a blank cheque.

[kippaxvilla2]

Warnock wtf?!

[Dave Clark Five]

I can honestly say this is not the managers fault. Except for signing Hutton who is a very limited footballer. This is down to a lack of quality players Mcleish has inherited. Warnock would not get into another prem team. Clarke is trying to find his feet. Petrov although has had a good season is not a 90mins player. Ireland is only just starting to play along with Heskey who a championship level player at most. Ye Mcleish could of put Nzogbia on after half time but we then had our best period of the game and did not want to stop the momentum ......

Whatever the manager did would be slagged off by the moaners.

[BC54 VFC]

Where was Enda?

I don't know, but it's surely now the Enda the road for Warnock?

[not3bad]

Observations from today:

When Warnock nearly scored an own goal and hurt himself one guy was shouting "stretcher!  Stretcher!" That was quite funny.

A lady who has been sitting near me since I started coming to that part of the Lower Holte in 2005 was saying "No way am I renewing my season ticket to watch this rubbish".  Not good.

Stephen Ireland applauding the Holte when they chanted his name was a nice moment.

Haven't Everton got some exotic sounding substitutes?!

The curry in the Holte Suite at half time was nice.

[Greg N'Ash]

well a draw was what i expected and what we got. I suppose i could slag off the duffers in the defence who aren't good enough again, but whats the point? we're stuck with them unfortunately.

[WALTERS WARRIORS]

I can honestly say this is not the managers fault. Except for signing Hutton who is a very limited footballer. This is down to a lack of quality players Mcleish has inherited. Warnock would not get into another prem team. Clarke is trying to find his feet. Petrov although has had a good season is not a 90mins player. Ireland is only just starting to play along with Heskey who a championship level player at most. Ye Mcleish could of put Nzogbia on after half time but we then had our best period of the game and did not want to stop the momentum ......

I'm sorry but I just don't buy this.  Virtually every player in that team was a full international (of the 12 that played today only albrighton isn't capped at full international level).

I agree there are some of them who aren't great footballers but they've clearly done enough in their careers to date to have earned the right to play at this level.

Compare that to Swansea who have about 5 players in their squad who have earned international recognition.

There is no way we should be completely outplayed by a newly promoted side with championship level players and a handful of new signings.

He hasn't had a massive amount of time but we should've started to see some effect of what is being done on the training ground.  At times we've played reasonably well (nothing amazing but at least playing to the strengths of the squad) but this has been all too infrequent.

I think it's fairly clear that the squad has completely lost confidence now but I haven't seen any sign of him doing anything to address that either.

Finally with the money he has been allowed to spend so far he bought nzogbia (I actually think this purchase was more that people from the club saw fans all over the internet lauding him up as an adequate replacement for ash and suggested it might get the fans onside) who he has completely failed to integrate into the side and Hutton who is no better than Herd or Lichaj who were already here and on a fraction of the wages.  I'm just not sure I'd trust him to improve the quality in the squad if Randy handed him a blank cheque.

I think the bit you say " i admit they are not very good footballers" pretty well confirms my point.  Being an international at some period of your career does not always mean you are a good footballer eg Warnock - Hutton and many would even say Heskey. Swansea have a young enthusiastic group of players who have just been promoted and it was a so called "international" ( Warnock) who handed the game to them ??

[taylorsworkrate]

I can honestly say this is not the managers fault. Except for signing Hutton who is a very limited footballer. This is down to a lack of quality players Mcleish has inherited. Warnock would not get into another prem team. Clarke is trying to find his feet. Petrov although has had a good season is not a 90mins player. Ireland is only just starting to play along with Heskey who a championship level player at most. Ye Mcleish could of put Nzogbia on after half time but we then had our best period of the game and did not want to stop the momentum ......

I'm sorry but I just don't buy this.  Virtually every player in that team was a full international (of the 12 that played today only albrighton isn't capped at full international level).

I agree there are some of them who aren't great footballers but they've clearly done enough in their careers to date to have earned the right to play at this level.

Compare that to Swansea who have about 5 players in their squad who have earned international recognition.

There is no way we should be completely outplayed by a newly promoted side with championship level players and a handful of new signings.

He hasn't had a massive amount of time but we should've started to see some effect of what is being done on the training ground.  At times we've played reasonably well (nothing amazing but at least playing to the strengths of the squad) but this has been all too infrequent.

I think it's fairly clear that the squad has completely lost confidence now but I haven't seen any sign of him doing anything to address that either.

Finally with the money he has been allowed to spend so far he bought nzogbia (I actually think this purchase was more that people from the club saw fans all over the internet lauding him up as an adequate replacement for ash and suggested it might get the fans onside) who he has completely failed to integrate into the side and Hutton who is no better than Herd or Lichaj who were already here and on a fraction of the wages.  I'm just not sure I'd trust him to improve the quality in the squad if Randy handed him a blank cheque.

I think the bit you say " i admit they are not very good footballers" pretty well confirms my point.  Being an international at some period of your career does not always mean you are a good footballer eg Warnock - Hutton and many would even say Heskey. Swansea have a young enthusiastic group of players who have just been promoted and it was a so called "international" ( Warnock) who handed the game to them ??

As someone else mentioned though, there are 4 or 5 players who were a big part of the decent league postions under MON. Add to that Bent, Given and Ireland. (who has inexiplicably been left out for large parts of the season so far)

Admittedly we've lost some good players since then, but there is more than enough quality in the squad for the standard of the football to be considerably better (If not the league position).

[Greg N'Ash]

The problem as i see it and why some people can't understand why our defence is so bad when they were apparently a top6 defence 2 seasons ago, is under MON we not only had creative midfielders to take the pressure off the defence like young, Downing, and Milner, but we also had very hard working midfielders in Young, Milner and Petrov who also helped them out. As soon as Milner left and Petrov started breathing out his backside we started having problems with the defence. This summer has compunded it further with Young going.

So now while you could argue we still have creative midfielders to an extent, if not to the same quality they don't put the work in that milner and young got through, hence our defence gets exposed for the crap they are

Now given we can't replace the defence because we've got no money and we can't bring in hardworking and creative midfielders because we've got no money, i think AM is trying to find some compromise there, where we're less creative but don't expose the duffers too much. With the current options in midfield at his disposal i think he's gonna struggle but at least i think he's realised the problem.

[WALTERS WARRIORS]

Good point Greg. Milner , Young and Downing (particularly Milner and Young) were extremely hard workers and most opposition midfielders were chasing them on the counter attack eleviating any pressure on the same defence (except Hutton) these players are now worth between £60-70m take that out of any team in the prem and it would create massive changes ........