Pre-Season Friendlies 2012

[olaftab]

Pre season games are only useful if other than fitness they help you to find error states. Therefore a loss is a good  thing and we rather find out short comings now than at West Ham or v Everton.

[1_Pablo_Angel]

I find it mad how people can watch Bannan and not see the ability there. Touch, passing, close control, awareness. A cracking left foot. Maybe I just notice the good things and ignore the bad because after seeing him look brilliant for the youth and reserves I'm desperate for him to carry that on at the top level.

....nah. He's definitely the Scottish Iniesta 

[spangley1812]

I find it mad how people can watch Bannan and not see the ability there. Touch, passing, close control, awareness. A cracking left foot. Maybe I just notice the good things and ignore the bad because after seeing him look brilliant for the youth and reserves I'm desperate for him to carry that on at the top level.

....nah. He's definitely the Scottish Iniesta 

I saw him yesterday and he did play well.......I am not his biggest fan but for him and several other players @ VP this is a make or break season (and some of them may not get that long) He has talent and he has to be given a chance to show this and by making him captain and by playing him in the middle it looks like Lambert will give him that chance as with only 1 game left of the pre-season that the team that started the second half with Given in goal would start v West Ham ...............Good Luck to him and its up to him to show if he is good enough to play/flourish in the PL

[Toronto Villa]

Now that we've had our first proper moan/doom and gloom post I'm expecting a Greg Nash sighting at any time.

[Dante Lavelli]

I like the fact that Lambert has had the balls to play Bannan quite deep.  I think that is where he skill set is best suited.  Picking the ball up from the defence and then keeping possession.  Playing face on to the play will also mean his size is less exposed.  By positioning himself between the attackers and the defence he does not need to be making physical tackles as much as just being there will force the ball out wide and to less dangerous areas.

Whether he is good enough  - I’m not sure anyone is expecting Sid good - will only become apparent after he is given a decent chance.  I’m delighted that we have a manager brave enough to take the risk.

[Monty]

Agree with everything you say there Dante. I also love that he's been made captain for a couple of games - he's lacked someone to really believe in him. That combined with the stylistic and tactical issues makes it look like everything's going in his favour. Of course, that also means he has no excuses now if he doesn't come good. Hopefully he won't need any.

[tomd2103]

I like the fact that Lambert has had the balls to play Bannan quite deep.  I think that is where he skill set is best suited.  Picking the ball up from the defence and then keeping possession.  Playing face on to the play will also mean his size is less exposed.  By positioning himself between the attackers and the defence he does not need to be making physical tackles as much as just being there will force the ball out wide and to less dangerous areas.

Whether he is good enough  - I’m not sure anyone is expecting Sid good - will only become apparent after he is given a decent chance.  I’m delighted that we have a manager brave enough to take the risk.

I can see where you are coming from Dante, but having seen the game yesterday, I would personally prefer to see him a bit further up the field.  I still think we we could do with a real leader and a bit of physical presence in there who can get the ball to Bannan in positions where he can really hurt teams.  We did look a little too lightweight in midfield at times. 

On the whole, I didn't think yesterday was too bad.  I don't want to be harsh on the lad, but Warnock was poor again yesterday and highlighted that we really need a new LB.  The rest were OK though and Forest only really began getting on top when they began bringing on fresh players.   

[curiousorange]

Technically, we were pretty good yesterday. Physically, we faded second half. As long as we can play like the first half and keep it going for the whole of the second, I think we can be optimistic.

[tomd2103]

Technically, we were pretty good yesterday. Physically, we faded second half. As long as we can play like the first half and keep it going for the whole of the second, I think we can be optimistic.

Agree Curious, though I felt we did overplay in the final third at times. 

[curiousorange]

Somebody behind me said 'Welcome to Aston Villa, Charles N'Zogbia' and he  was right - it was the best shift he'd yet put in. However, he needs to learn he can't walk the ball into the net. Three or four times he could have smacked it and it would have flown in past Camp.

My own opinion is that we can do with a snappy, combative player whose only job is to break up play. If we're going to go for the nice little passes, we need a Plan B for when the passes aren't accurate. One of the reasons for our tiredness was because we spent too long chasing for the ball back, our front players included. Give somebody the job of regaining it in midfield or watch as the shortcomings of the defence are exposed as they constantly were under McLeish.

[tomd2103]

Somebody behind me said 'Welcome to Aston Villa, Charles N'Zogbia' and he  was right - it was the best shift he'd yet put in. However, he needs to learn he can't walk the ball into the net. Three or four times he could have smacked it and it would have flown in past Camp.

My own opinion is that we can do with a snappy, combative player whose only job is to break up play. If we're going to go for the nice little passes, we need a Plan B for when the passes aren't accurate. One of the reasons for our tiredness was because we spent too long chasing for the ball back, our front players included. Give somebody the job of regaining it in midfield or watch as the shortcomings of the defence are exposed as they constantly were under McLeish.

Again, agree on both points Curious.  I thought N'Zogbia showed glimpses of real quality yesterday, yet there was still the moments of frustration.  I thought we were on for a very early goal of the season candidate when he went on that run in the first half, but again instead of shooting he took too many touches.  Let's hope he can build on that performance yesterday, as he does possess undoubted quality.

I also agree that we are missing that ball winner in midfield.  Personally, I think we could do with someone just sitting in front of the defence who as you say, can win the ball back when we lose it.  I think the saga with Makoun has gone too far now, so maybe we could sell him and use the proceeds to bring in that type of player.

[villan from luton]

We wont get too much for Makoun. Reckon he could have been an asset with Lambert in charge.

[luke25]

We wont get too much for Makoun. Reckon he could have been an asset with Lambert in charge.

I still think he's a really good player and hope we can sort his permit out.

[OCD]

Technically, we were pretty good yesterday. Physically, we faded second half. As long as we can play like the first half and keep it going for the whole of the second, I think we can be optimistic.

Was that the first time in this pre-season that our players have played the whole game? I imagine the first half is a better gauge of where we're at. We've got another couple of weeks to get fitness levels up to the point that we can play like that for a whole game.

[peter w]

After the shite we saw last season saunders to not see the green shoots this will always leave you open to ridicule. You know what you could be right, but its easy to pick the holes rather than want to find the positives. You have to ask yourself why you want to see negativity when the majority are looking for positives.