Stoke City vs Aston Villa Post-Match Thread

[eamonn]

One thing I want to add, Walters is an odious little shit.

Big shit brickhouse you mean, the size of 'im. What did he do though?

[tomd2103]

I think Bruce is OK.

I think Keane is okay.  Not as a manager, he's evidently quite crap at that, but as a pundit, he's great, the nearest thing we have to Eamonn Dunphy, that can't be a bad thing.

Hes a brilliant pundit.

All that simmering anger and the way he seems to be holding back from calling the rest of them a bunch of c***s.

I'm not sure he is that great as a pundit.  Spends most of his time on air saying that certain players aren't "top players" and that teams "aren't top teams" and offers very little analysis.  He clearly still has a number of grudges to bear (Manchester United and Ireland being two of them) and although it can be amusing at times, it can hardly be classed as considered opinion.  Dixon and Southgate are better pundits (in my opinion of course), but Chiles should never be allowed near a football studio.   

[TheSandman]

I thought Keane came across very well as a pundit on ITV when they were discussing the Nani sending off against Real Madrid, being that he was the only one who actually understood the rules and was willing to vociferously disagree with the rest of the panel. Though maybe I'm only saying that as he agreed with me.

[tomd2103]

I thought Keane came across very well as a pundit on ITV when they were discussing the Nani sending off against Real Madrid, being that he was the only one who actually understood the rules and was willing to vociferously disagree with the rest of the panel. Though maybe I'm only saying that as he agreed with me.

I wonder if he'd have been so supportive of the decision if he'd been sent off for that challenge when he was playing?  He came out with a similar comments when Ireland were beaten in France by "Henry's handball" and he does seem to use such incidents to have a dig at those he clearly still has a grievance with.  It is amusing to watch the others on the panel squirm when he gets going though.   

[robbo1874]

Oh, and the game, thought we were excellent but the Stoke equaliser made for one of the typical roller-coaster performances we seem to specialise  in this season. I don't think I've celebrated a goal as much as I did Lowton's beauty in a long time. I'm still buzzing  because of it now. Sometimes there's no drug like seeing us put together a beautiful win.

I take comfort from the thought that had I stayed up and watched the match, he probably would've sliced it out for a throw-in to Stoke!

It was a cracking finish though - just seen the German commentary version of it. It's as much the chest down and the composure with players rushing at him, and also spotting the keeper off his line as seeing the ball looping through the air and into the goal for me. That was a pretty special finish.

I suppose with the score at 1-1 and only a few minutes left, he just thought: right, fuck it, I'm having a go...wonder if he'd have had a pop if it was still 1-0?

[Caiphus]

I take comfort from the thought that had I stayed up and watched the match, he probably would've sliced it out for a throw-in to Stoke!

It was a cracking finish though - just seen the German commentary version of it. It's as much the chest down and the composure with players rushing at him, and also spotting the keeper off his line as seeing the ball looping through the air and into the goal for me. That was a pretty special finish.

I suppose with the score at 1-1 and only a few minutes left, he just thought: right, fuck it, I'm having a go...wonder if he'd have had a pop if it was still 1-0?

The whole world went silent for me, I didn't process any celebrations or anything for a second or two... I thought the ball was bouncing out of the hoarding from just behind the goal before my brain processed that the net was oscillating from the inside.

It took me another five seconds to realise my mouth was dangling open and I was finger-banging a cushion.

[damon loves JT]

It was an unbelievably shit clearance from Adam. Like a slow full-toss. It virtually invited Lowton to have a ding at goal. I dread to think what Pulis said to him afterwards.

[Marlon From Bearwood]

Just heard Pulis on the radio, 'We've got to dust ourselves down and we go again'

Ha ha. Stoke now, are what we were in January.

[Tayls_7]

It was an unbelievably shit clearance from Adam. Like a slow full-toss. It virtually invited Lowton to have a ding at goal. I dread to think what Pulis said to him afterwards.

Not sure Adam was much to blame. The ball came out of one of the Spheres; Stratosphere, Ionosphere - take your pick. It was a rather pleasant and unexpected surprise for mankind what happened next! Hopefully this small step is a huge leap for the next generation Villa.

[damon loves JT]

If we can score three goals in each of our remaining fixtures we will win all of them.

[Matt Collins]

Two very quick observations from football first:

Our passing and movement is getting better and better all the time. I remember watching many a premier league side pass the ball in angles and keep the ball under pressure while we seemed only capable of the easy ball or one over the top. It's great to see how comfortable our full backs and central midfielders are.

Having said that, we're going to have to get out of the habit of completely panicking for amproprtion of every game. We completely fell to pieces for ten minutes yesterday. An unkind verdict would be that as soon as stoke put any remotely decent stuff together, we panicked and our defensive shape was all over the place. Tactically, getting more shape and discipline into our defending has got to be this summer's coaching priority number one. Hopefully we can stick with the 4231 / 433 shape to help bring about that cohesion. I don't think our 3 at the back period helped. If lambert had stopped playing that earlier we'd have more points now I think

[LeeB]

We pick ourselves up and go on to tea bag another side.

Ace.

[Ads]

Walters moaned and moaned all game. He alao had Bennett in a headlock at one point, yet managed to get a free kick!

[olaftab]

Well to go by the MOTD highlights, stoke were robbed by cheating Villa.

Gary said Villa were excellent.Lawro just sat looking clueless.

He does that vey well and steals licence payers money whist doing it.

[olaftab]

They've scored 3 in 7, 2 of those coming against Reading.
They've kept 1 clean sheet in the league since Christmas.
Get at 'em, get an early one, fan any anti-Pulis fire, get them feeling the tension. Being away from home will help us after the rather flat second-half against the 'The Mighty Reds YNWA', I feel. Even with our fragility at the back, we must surely score more than they ever can, given the comparative potency of each attack.
3-1 us, Benteke (2) and Weimann, Sturk well and truly dragged into it.

Your really need to get better at this. A bit more imagination with goal scorers would help!