Do you have ANY faith left in McLeish ?

[Tokyo Sexwhale]

You can drop down that statto.com table to get the position exactly 1 year ago.  At that point, Small Heath were above us, and things were a lot tighter:

http://www.statto.com/football/stats/england/premier-league/2010-2011/table/2011-04-03

Rationally, we shouldn't go down - for that to happen it would need three of the five teams currently below us to overtake us (and assuming we don't also overtake West Brom).

Wolves would have to make up 11 points AND a 26 goal difference - the equivalent of 4 more wins than us.
QPR, Blackburn and Wigan have to make up 5 points + significantly worse goal differences  - the equivalent of 2 more wins than us.

All of the above have only 7 games left.

Bolton have to make up 4 points AND a goal difference of 15.  We also play them at Villa Park later this month.

So I'd assume Wolves can't catch us - if we win just once, they have to win 5/7.  If we win twice, they have to win 6/7.

QPR's run-in is tough, but no tougher than ours.  They have winnable home games against Swansea and Stoke, and have shown they can raise their game.  But I'd say it would be hard for them to win 4/7 games.  So we'd need to win 2 to stay ahead of them.

Blackburn have an easier run-in - so there's an outside chance that they could win 4/7 - though one match is against Wigan.

Wigan's next 3 are horrendous - Chelsea (a), Man U (h), Arsenal (a) - and I hope that kills them off - but their end of season is a lot easier, but I think it's just about possible with a foul wind behind them they could get 4 wins from Fulham (a), Newcastle (h), Blackburn (a), Wolves (h).  Even then, we'd only need 2 wins and a draw.

That leaves Bolton - they have the easiest run-in of the lot - and I suspect they'll overhaul us.

So in summary - I think we need 2 wins and not take a 6 or 7 goal hammering to stay up.

So a 94th minute Heskey winner at Norwich to keep us up on goal difference is my prediction.

[Hopadop]

None.

Expecting the team to have a go is not the same as expecting them to win. Just as you're staggering home wondering why you bother, he tops it off with that sort of utter bollocks.

[London Villan]

Where does our wage bill compare to everyone else in the league? That is a fair barometer as to where we should finish. I'd be very surprised if we were in the bottom half of that table... It the same justification for Mancini to get the sack too.

[claret and blue blood]

how can anyone vote to give him more time after what we have endured this season?

[Ian.]

Risso's league stat left me feeling numb. Tokyo, yours have given me belief!

[ozzjim]

Our wage bill is the biggest mystery in the league for me.

Way I see it, we have 6-7 players on 60-70k a week. Take 70, so essentially 3.5 million a season. Then 6-7 players on 40-50, say 7 at 50, so 2.5 million a season. Then 5-6 at 25k ish. All in all that should be no more, even with the big wages we still have, than about 50-55 million, plus another say 4-5 million for the coaching staff and back room team. All in it should be no more than 60 million. I fear it is still more though, which would suggest that the wages some of the O'Neill signings were on were completely bonkers and even more stupid than we ever thought.

[ROBBO]

The worry is that at the moment i cannot see us beating Bolton.

[Phil from the upper holte]

I think we should protest :-)

[robbo1874]

I've gone for no this time, as I think it's pretty clear he's not good enough to be a long term manager. Think we should assess at the end of the season and call it then. If we do go down there's no point sacking him, we may as well keep him to get us back up again. If we stay up ( which I think we will) - he might be worth one more season to try and turn it around. Beyond that, it's hard to say really. Anyone know how long his contract is?

[Irish villain]

I cannot think of one positive thing he has done to take us forward. It is negativity piled on top of negativity, I just want him gone.  In fact if I win the Euro millions lotto I will offer to pay him off if Randy cant afford to.

Much appreciated. Make sure and buy that ticket!!

[mrfuse]

I cannot think of one positive thing he has done to take us forward. It is negativity piled on top of negativity, I just want him gone.  In fact if I win the Euro millions lotto I will offer to pay him off if Randy cant afford to.

Much appreciated. Make sure and buy that ticket!!

Great idea Im buying one too with that thought in mind.

Im all for giving anyone a chance but what has McLeish ever done to make anyone think that he can make Villa play decent football?

I don't trust him with money or with our youngsters!

I think back to a bewildered Hleb arriving at Blues from Barcelona as the ball sailed over his head for the umpteenth time just looking at McLeish as if hes playing a different sport.
I haven't even mentioned winning games I just want our team to at least attempt to try and play good football but I don't think McLeish has ever been connected with good football has he?

[PeterWithesShin]

The one thing I don't get is the amount of posts saying they wouldn't trust AM with any money in the summer. His signing so far are

Given: Who most of us would have signed.
N'Zogbia: Ditto. I don't remember too many not wanting him in the N'Zogbia transfer thread back in the summer.
Hutton: Was shocking to begin with but started to improve (not hard I know) but with Luke going and Lichaj getting injured just before deadline day we needed a RB. So what more did we expect that was fairly cheap that we could get at the last minute?
Jenas: The big mistake was agreeing to pay his wages if he got injured. Can we blame AM for that though?
Stevens: Young, cheap never heard of. The kind of signing we've been complaining for ages about that we don't make often enough.
Keane: The only thing we've complained about that is the fact we could only keep him for 2 months. 
Holman: A foreign bosman who looks decent. Again, something we've complained about Villa not doing enough.

There are a shed load of reasons AM deserves to be slated for, I just don't think his transfers is one of them.

[Tokyo Sexwhale]

Nope - agreed that his transfer policy is the least he can be criticised for.  It's what he does with them when he gets them.

[Monty]

Nope - agreed that his transfer policy is the least he can be criticised for.  It's what he does with them when he gets them.

Agreed. MrFuse above mentioned Hleb - classic example. Good player, no question, but really misused.

[PeterWithesShin]

Nope - agreed that his transfer policy is the least he can be criticised for.  It's what he does with them when he gets them.

Yep, that is a whole different matter.