Who is to blame?

[PaulTheVillan]

Lerner.

[Monty]

Whose shot was it that Schwarzer parried to let Weimann score against Fulham?

Yes fair comment, although perhaps with the reputation he came with from the reserves he should have put it in the top corner. That would be being churlish in the extreme by me and in the same spirit of generosity I'll agree with 'parried' rather than 'dropped' !

Weimann scoring actually proves my point a little. He came on and scored which is what 'hot' prospects do.

Was it easier to score from where Weimann was or from where Gardner shot from?

[andrew08]

Bringing  Doug Ellis into the discussion makes it an interesting debate. It's conjecture, of course, but if Doug somehow had spent at Randy levels over the last five years I would be certain that we would be in a better place now.
He would never, without sacking the manager responsible first, have allowed players recently purchased on high wages to rot in the reserves. He wouldn't have allowed the purchase of old players with no resaleable value on long contracts. It just wouldn't have happened. Yes we wouldn't have had MON but for,what £180m I'm certain we would have had trophies.

[andrew08]

Whose shot was it that Schwarzer parried to let Weimann score against Fulham?

Yes fair comment, although perhaps with the reputation he came with from the reserves he should have put it in the top corner. That would be being churlish in the extreme by me and in the same spirit of generosity I'll agree with 'parried' rather than 'dropped' !

Weimann scoring actually proves my point a little. He came on and scored which is what 'hot' prospects do.

Was it easier to score from where Weimann was or from where Gardner shot from?

I could argue that Weimann played a one two off the keeper....it clearly was a great shot by Gardner.

[KevinGage]

Bringing  Doug Ellis into the discussion makes it an interesting debate. It's conjecture, of course, but if Doug somehow had spent at Randy levels over the last five years I would be certain that we would be in a better place now.
He would never, without sacking the manager responsible first, have allowed players recently purchased on high wages to rot in the reserves. He wouldn't have allowed the purchase of old players with no resaleable value on long contracts. It just wouldn't have happened. Yes we wouldn't have had MON but for,what £180m I'm certain we would have had trophies.

Paul Merson?  Dion Dublin?   David Ginola?


Certainly towards the end of his stint there is no way we'd have signed a relatively unknown and somewhat risky young player like Ash for the guts of 10 million either.

And had we got a big name player all set to sign, he'd have started playing silly beggers with the fee or the wages at the last minute.  No, I don't pine for Herbert at all, even if RL has recently made a balls of things.

 Crucially, the bulk of any financial losses sustained recently have hit RL directly in the pocket.  Herbert did often talk as if the money spent on players and wages was his.  But that's all it was, talk.  Hot air and bluster from an attention seeker.

[ktvillan]

When we've had Doug debates in the past, one of the things, if not the only thing,  that Doug's defenders threw out in his defence is usually something like "at least when he sold he made sure the future of the club would be in good hands".  I'm not sure that argument would be quite so readily touted or swallowed after the last two years.  When I catch myself thinking that even old Deadly wouldn't have been daft enough to hire McLeish, I quickly rememeber he was the man who replaced the European Cup winning manager with Graham Turner, and then Billy McBodge. 

[Risso]

When we've had Doug debates in the past, one of the things, if not the only thing,  that Doug's defenders threw out in his defence is usually something like "at least when he sold he made sure the future of the club would be in good hands".  I'm not sure that argument would be quite so readily touted or swallowed after the last two years.  When I catch myself thinking that even old Deadly wouldn't have been daft enough to hire McLeish, I quickly rememeber he was the man who replaced the European Cup winning manager with Graham Turner, and then Billy McBodge. 

I suppose you could say that Doug was unlucky at times.  Taylor mk 1 left us for the England job, and both Atkinson and Little just went off the boil.  Certianly you couldn't say that Little wasn't backed, as the seeds of his demise were sown with the captures of Curcic and Collymore, who at the time were two of the hottest properties in English football.

[Concrete John]

When we've had Doug debates in the past, one of the things, if not the only thing,  that Doug's defenders threw out in his defence is usually something like "at least when he sold he made sure the future of the club would be in good hands".  I'm not sure that argument would be quite so readily touted or swallowed after the last two years.  When I catch myself thinking that even old Deadly wouldn't have been daft enough to hire McLeish, I quickly rememeber he was the man who replaced the European Cup winning manager with Graham Turner, and then Billy McBodge.

And argument could be made that Randy is demonstrating this by making the necessary cut backs to ensure the longterm solvency of the club.

[andrew08]

I agree M'Zog

So then would we want:

a) Doug with Randys money
b) The real Doug ie how it was in the DOL days
c) Randy with Randys money ie what we've got
d)Man Citys owners.

[pauliewalnuts]

I agree M'Zog

So then would we want:

a) Doug with Randys money
b) The real Doug ie how it was in the DOL days
c) Randy with Randys money ie what we've got
d)Man Citys owners.

I'd take d every time.

I know it is a bit tasteless, just brazenly buying success like that, and it'd be more satisfying to build it etc etc, but I didn't make football the entirely cash driven beast it is today, to ridiculous levels.

So if it's going to be like that, I'd take the opportunity for us to be buying it, thanks very much. We can joke about them being drowning in horrible plastic nu-fans, and how they've got no class yada yada yada, but your average Man City fan goes home revelling in the fact they've just watched players of the likes of Silva and Aguero do their stuff, whereas your average Villa fan stops at a shop on the way home to see if they can buy such a product as "mind bleach" to erase the memory of Heskey falling over whilst McLeish tries to keep the score down.

I reckon I've got (touch wood) 35 years or so until I kark it. I'd quite us to win some stuff by then. Given the money City's (they've even bought the right to be known as just "City") owners have invested, I reckon 99 percent of us would swallow what we consider our principles inside ten minutes.

[Rip Van We Go Again]

Man City get stick for buying it, but nearly all the champions do. Liverpool, Manure, Blackburn.

I'd love some Man City investment.

[paul_e]

Buying the title I can forgive.  The tevez poster in manchster I can't./  That was unbelievably small time and pathetic.

[dave.woodhall]

He would never, without sacking the manager responsible first, have allowed players recently purchased on high wages to rot in the reserves. He wouldn't have allowed the purchase of old players with no resaleable value on long contracts. It just wouldn't have happened.

Ginola, Schmeivh

Bringing  Doug Ellis into the discussion makes it an interesting debate. It's conjecture, of course, but if Doug somehow had spent at Randy levels over the last five years I would be certain that we would be in a better place now.
He would never, without sacking the manager responsible first, have allowed players recently purchased on high wages to rot in the reserves. He wouldn't have allowed the purchase of old players with no resaleable value on long contracts. It just wouldn't have happened. Yes we wouldn't have had MON but for,what £180m I'm certain we would have had trophies.

Paul Merson?  Dion Dublin?   David Ginola?

 

Schmeichel, Alpay, Hadji, Kachloul, Balaban. 

[Monty]

I'd like a middle ground of sustainable investment to a level where we're not afraid of teams buying our young players. That's the crux of what Barca do - the reason they're able to field a team of youth team graduates is because they know nobody else is going to take them away from them.

I love Villa and football but, though they didn't create the situation, City represent one big flaw in the game. I feel proud of what we do at Villa sometimes - the Acorns deal for one - and I like the feeling that my club is on the morally good side. It might not bring trophies and superiority but frankly it makes me just as proud of my club. I don't want Villa to become part of the moral vacuum currently in place at the top of our league.

[Stu]

I reckon I've got (touch wood) 35 years or so until I kark it. I'd quite us to win some stuff by then.

Bit of context to this: my father saw us win the cup in 1957 when he was 14 years old. He turns 70 this July.

Feel any better?