Aston Villa manager Paul Lambert denies rift with Darren Bent

[Irish villain]

Darren Bent. Its an odd one. Our record signing who arrived at least a season too late but to great fan expectation as a bolt out of the blue in a depressing season. Bought by a desperate manager who couldn't get the best out of a side who had been top six three years in a row. The man who bought him was gone within five months (if you include the period that GH was sick) and replaced by an anti-football manager who presided over the break-up of the side that had been top six for three years and hadn't a clue how to best utilise Bent. Now we have a positive manager who seems to be building something special but you get the impression from him that his attitude to Bent is 'take it or leave it son'.

As for the fans? I get the impression that Bent isn't and will never be the kind of cult hero Yorke, Dublin, JPA, John Carew or Gabby were. He's not an Ashley Young, James Milner or Gareth Barry either. He's just this star striker who we should be 'thankful to have'. We all know he is a goalscorer but that he has been at villa through a period when we have created fuck all.

My gut tells me it will just never click. He'll have been here two (sorry!) years come January yet it always feels like he has just arrived! I don't know, I think he will be off for a decent fee (£12m?) and everybody, including the fans, will move on.

It would be nice to be proven wrong and see him fill his boots this season, but sometimes what your gut tells you is too strong.

[Ad@m]

My gut tells me it will just never click. He'll have been here three years come January yet it always feels like he has just arrived!

3 years?  Are you sure it's not 2 - and he's been injured for at least half a season since he's been here.  It's not that surprising it still feels like he's a new signing.

I've said it before, if we can play to his strengths there are very few players in the Premier League better than him at scoring goals so it's madness to ignore that.

But, if we don't have the players or manager to play to his strengths then he's a very expensive passenger, and one this team isn't good enough to carry.

[Irish villain]

My gut tells me it will just never click. He'll have been here three years come January yet it always feels like he has just arrived!

3 years?  Are you sure it's not 2 - and he's been injured for at least half a season since he's been here.  It's not that surprising it still feels like he's a new signing.

I've said it before, if we can play to his strengths there are very few players in the Premier League better than him at scoring goals so it's madness to ignore that.

But, if we don't have the players or manager to play to his strengths then he's a very expensive passenger, and one this team isn't good enough to carry.

You're right, two years! I will edit my post.

[Percy McCarthy]

Sub today, here we go again.

[danlanza]

Another round of " Bent demands talks with Lambert" in the daily rags tomorrow then.

[Nastylee]

I think Lambert's made his point by leaving him out again but the fact of the matter is that we cannot score and Bent still offers us that. Until we can score consistently then we can forget about midtable safety. I don't care about all this 'he does fuck all' bollocks. The game's about scoring and he does that and has a record to prove it. Heskey made a career from being a team player but scored bugger all and we could not wait to get shut of him so time to decide what it is that you want because to hear some of you talk, you'd think we were Real Madrid and could buy this mythical, hard working, goal scorer and he'd want to come to a team destined for another crap season.

[Dante Lavelli]

I don't care about all this 'he does fuck all' bollocks. The game's about scoring and he does that and has a record to prove it.

It’s not that he does or doesn’t score as an individual, it’s how many the team score.
Someone of this parish looked at Bent’s career before Villa (at Spurs?) and the stats suggest the team scores more when he is not playing.

[Nastylee]

But the team is not scoring, he's been our leading scorer in both seasons he's been here despite playing around half a season for us in both of them. I'm guessing he's there or there abouts now despite being left out and in his absence no one has taken the opportunity nor looks like doing so.

[Dave]

I don't care about all this 'he does fuck all' bollocks. The game's about scoring and he does that and has a record to prove it.

It’s not that he does or doesn’t score as an individual, it’s how many the team score.
Someone of this parish looked at Bent’s career before Villa (at Spurs?) and the stats suggest the team scores more when he is not playing.

How many does the team look like scoring when he's not playing?

Edit - incidentally, I call bullshit on that stat (I think it's Monty that is the person who is fondest in bringing it up). I'd be amazed if Ipswich, Charlton or Sunderland scored more while Bent was at their club when he wasn't playing than when he was.

I can easily believe that it's true when he was at Spurs, but I'd put that down a bit more to Berbatov and Keane playing if Bent wasn't. And I think it says a lot more about how good Keane and Berbatov are/were as opposed to how bad Bent is/was.

[Dante Lavelli]

I don't care about all this 'he does fuck all' bollocks. The game's about scoring and he does that and has a record to prove it.

It’s not that he does or doesn’t score as an individual, it’s how many the team score.
Someone of this parish looked at Bent’s career before Villa (at Spurs?) and the stats suggest the team scores more when he is not playing.

How many does the team look like scoring when he's not playing?

I’d guess we’re creating an average of two decent chances each match at the moment.

[SoccerHQ]

Darren Bent. Its an odd one. Our record signing who arrived at least a season too late but to great fan expectation as a bolt out of the blue in a depressing season. Bought by a desperate manager who couldn't get the best out of a side who had been top six three years in a row. The man who bought him was gone within five months (if you include the period that GH was sick) and replaced by an anti-football manager who presided over the break-up of the side that had been top six for three years and hadn't a clue how to best utilise Bent. Now we have a positive manager who seems to be building something special but you get the impression from him that his attitude to Bent is 'take it or leave it son'.

As for the fans? I get the impression that Bent isn't and will never be the kind of cult hero Yorke, Dublin, JPA, John Carew or Gabby were. He's not an Ashley Young, James Milner or Gareth Barry either. He's just this star striker who we should be 'thankful to have'. We all know he is a goalscorer but that he has been at villa through a period when we have created fuck all.

My gut tells me it will just never click. He'll have been here two (sorry!) years come January yet it always feels like he has just arrived! I don't know, I think he will be off for a decent fee (£12m?) and everybody, including the fans, will move on.

It would be nice to be proven wrong and see him fill his boots this season, but sometimes what your gut tells you is too strong.

Completely agree chap, this is my feeling on it. Bent was the missing piece in the MON years, I'm certain he would've got us top 4 in one of those years and prevented the depressing times we've had since.

He'll still score goals but it won't be as good as it could've been, for him and us.

[SoccerHQ]

I too was amazed he was left out today. Fair enough last week when we'd scored 4 at Man. City without him but I do think people was a case of Lambert ramming the point down everyone's throats at the expense of the team.

In a difficult away game against a technically excellent Spurs, we simply weren't going to create as many chances as last week. So for even the half chances or good ones like Benteke had you need your best finisher on the pitch and he wasn't.

[Sleeuwenhoek]

How many truly class/proven players do we have? We'll sell Bent in January, buy a couple of promising youngsters, then we'll have none.

[Richard Richard]

I genuinly don't think Bent was left out to prove a point. As I put in the match thread before kick off, I think the game plan was to set up as 4-5-1/4-3-3 with Gabby and Albrighton helping Lowton and Bennett try and null the threat of Bale and Lennon hence us needing a big man up front that could hold the ball up and Benteke just fitted the role better than Bent.

[JUAN PABLO]

we need experience heads in the team . Bent is one of our most experienced players and scores. Should be starting.