Paul Faulkner interview.

[not3bad]

So this is Lerner's ''Bright Future'' - worrying about getting sucked into a relegation scrap season after season.

I can't believe how far our once great Football club have fallen.

[dave.woodhall]

So this is Lerner's ''Bright Future'' - worrying about getting sucked into a relegation scrap season after season.

I can't believe how far our once great Football club have fallen.

Not bad, but it lacks a certain something. 

[villa `cross the mersey]

So this is Lerner's ''Bright Future'' - worrying about getting sucked into a relegation scrap season after season.

I can't believe how far our once great Football club have fallen.

Not bad, but it lacks a certain something. 

How about:

"Once great,now shit" ...only kidding folks!

[Monty]

They're to be applauded for not losing their shit and instantly sacking someone for no reason, but that doesn't necessarily mean they have the right guy currently in place.

[BoskoDjembaSalifou]

How can Faulkner honestly say there's been progress? If anything, we're going backwards!

[regular_john]

How are we going backwards?

Assuming we finish in our current position of midtable, which I think we will do, we'll have improved two seasons in a row from McLeish's 16th placed finish. Unlike when McLeish was here, we'll have achieved this with a young squad on very low wages, which gives us a great platform to add quality rather than quantity going forward.

IF we finish lower than 15th this season, which I don't believe for a moment we will, then yes - we will have gone backwards. If we finish above 15th, which I think we will, we'll have made progress.

[BoskoDjembaSalifou]

How are we going backwards?

Assuming we finish in our current position of midtable, which I think we will do, we'll have improved two seasons in a row from McLeish's 16th placed finish. Unlike when McLeish was here, we'll have achieved this with a young squad on very low wages, which gives us a great platform to add quality rather than quantity going forward.

IF we finish lower than 15th this season, which I don't believe for a moment we will, then yes - we will have gone backwards. If we finish above 15th, which I think we will, we'll have made progress.

Backwards from the last few months of the season. We really haven't played well in many games this season and that concerns me.

I'm sick of just hoping there's three worse teams than us every year.

[Steve kirk]

By that notion then, after the first 6 games we should be top 8, we are not, similarly after the last 6 games doesn't mean will continue in that form..

 


Well I am in your camp Chris, 5 points from the bottom 3, 5 points from the fuckin bottom, unless decent purchases are made in midfield and at left back we will almost certainly be involved in the relegation shake up just as the last 2 seasons.
No, you are quite right it doesn't.  But I said if we do continue the form.  More importantly our poor form has been a trend since early December and is probably therefore a reasonable barometer of where the team currently stands quality and performance wise.

sorry for being so controversial.

[oldhill_avfc]

If anyone needed reminding that mid-table at Christmas isn't safe ...

From http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writers/georgina_turner/12/23/West.Ham.Christmas/index.html#ixzz2qUfpYOpz

"Reading pulled off a similar trick by losing 12 of its last 18 matches in 2007-08, slipping from a comfortable 12th place on Boxing Day to 18th by May. Middlesbrough's tumble in 1992-93 was even more slapstick: 12th place became 21st (the league was made up of 22 teams at first) thanks to 15 defeats in 18 -- it lost touch with safety weeks before the season's end. Crystal Palace, one of the original yoyo clubs, lost eight consecutive matches after New Years in the 1997-98 season, finishing bottom having celebrated Christmas in 13th. Ipswich Town was slightly luckier in 1993-94, freefalling from a festive 10th to survive relegation by the point it secured at Ewood Park on the last day.

[Dribbler]

If our form carries on how it has done so far this season we will finish... 11th.

No that doesn't follow, as that would require every other team in the league maintaining exactly the same form. League position isn't just determined by our own form, but that of the other 19 teams in the league also.

Any questions?

[brian green]

What has happened since O'Neill flounced out has been an orchestrated push by Faulkner to reduce massively our expectations of the club.   I excuse Randy Lerner on the grounds of his naivety but I do not excuse Faulkner.   He has followed a premeditated plan for the purging of the fans of any expectation of glory.   Mazrim's description of him as corporate middle management is exactly right.   He reads the papers and picks up on words like "silverware" and believes that we, the fans want a trophy cupboard at Villa Park with cups and shields in it.   Her treats us like a parent who gives a child a bag of crisps when it wants a book to read.

Imagine what lies down this road.   Picture me leaving on a Saturday morning to drive 200 miles (sometimes 400) to see a Villa game.   My wife of many years asks if I really should be doing it at my age and why don't I stay home, have steak and chips for lunch and watch the racing on telly.   Faulkner believes that I will reply "sorry dear, these are exciting times at Villa Park, we have balanced the books."

We need glory.   We need famous victories.   We need breathtaking flashes of skill.   We need net bursting goals.   We need singing and chanting and jumping up and down and hugging and kissing each other.   That is what we need to disperse the pain and agony of years now of ridicule and piss taking by the media and by rival fans.   Silverware has nothing to do with it but Faulkner with zero grasp of what football is all about is more interested in spinning the spin sufficiently plausibly not to be sacked and to climb his chosen career ladder .

I also think that the malaise at Villa can be laid squarely at his door because I am sure he has promised Lambert that his job is safe even if we are relegated.   I would not be at all surprised if it is a promise in writing.   It is the same massive vote of no confidence in Lambert that Lambert gave the players with his opinion of them that they were not up to winning the cup and staying in the premiership.   Lambert can buy championship players on championship wages because it makes no difference to him.   He has bought into the no glory ethos and everything he does and says tells you as much.

I watched Bent tear holes in one of the worst Norwich sides I have ever seen last night and I could not believe that we had come to having a 24 million player out on loan and signing a Wigan reject.   What has happened to us?   I asked myself over and over.   Then I realized that the second part of the Lambert master stroke is to sign a Norwich player who cannot get picked for that utterly abysmal Norwich team, turned of the tv and went to bed in as black a mood as I can remember for many years.

[bertlambshank]

Spot on Brian.

[Dave Clark Five]

I watched Bent tear holes in one of the worst Norwich sides I have ever seen last night and I could not believe that we had come to having a 24 million player out on loan and signing a Wigan reject. 

Bent showed us what he was capable of and then, later, what he could be arsed to do.
Whatever his value, we will never get anything back.
The new player starts with a clean slate for me.
Maybe Bent would have been better with a decent midfield etc but he didn't look like he was concerned to me.

[bertlambshank]

Bent stays for extra training,not a lot people know that.

[Villafirst]

Spot on Brian.

Yes, agree, sums up most fans frustrations. Yet there's still people on here supporting this abysmal regime.