To What End?

[Mister E]

Although relegation is a possibility, the contrivance of circumstances to bring it about seem pretty far fetched to me. It would require 8 sides all to consistently out perform us between now and the end of the season, which when you consider how many of those games are going to be against each other or against the teams at the top it is possible but not probable. Therefore, in my view, waiting to get the right players rather than making do for the sake of numbers is not a huge risk.

whilst I largely agree with you, Chris, my one concern is our home form. We play few of those below us in the League at VP in the next few weeks, and I currently have the collywobbles about that!

[Dave Clark Five]

But, once again, we are settling for not getting relegated as a comfortable position.

[aj2k77]

all this talk about Lerner not coming to games seems a bit strange to me, when only the other day the Liverpool owner saw his first game for ages and I bet the lot that own Man Ci££y don't go every week either and Abramovich just looks fucking bored shitless at Chelsea games.
I
I am hoping for a good investment in 3/4 quality players this summer

UTV
The Doc

It's more of an issue because he used to attend quite regularly, then his funding was scaled back, we become shit and now he comes about as often as Pele.

If he never attended in the first place I doubt it would be mentioned but it all ties in to lack of enthusiasm and his general interest towards us has waned.

Maybe he has found out that being a football fan isn't all battles for honours, scintillating football and   great atmospheres and it isn't for him. Who knows?

[mattjpa]

all this talk about Lerner not coming to games seems a bit strange to me, when only the other day the Liverpool owner saw his first game for ages and I bet the lot that own Man Ci££y don't go every week either and Abramovich just looks fucking bored shitless at Chelsea games.
I
I am hoping for a good investment in 3/4 quality players this summer

UTV
The Doc

It's more of an issue because he used to attend quite regularly, then his funding was scaled back, we become shit and now he comes about as often as Pele.

If he never attended in the first place I doubt it would be mentioned but it all ties in to lack of enthusiasm and his general interest towards us has waned.

Maybe he has found out that being a football fan isn't all battles for honours, scintillating football and   great atmospheres and it isn't for him. Who knows?

In his defence, I havent been much this season and I live in Lichfield, not America. I dont think the players we have are very good, The style of football is crap, we very rarely score and invariably always lose. Why would someone travel thousands of miles to watch us grind out a 0-0 with Sunderland etc? I just struggle to get myself up for it anymore.  Occasionally I regret it such as against Albion (well infact that is the only time) but certainly I dont think it is worth the 40odd quid at the moment. I can no longer blame Randolph T. Absentpants for not attending. Would be nice if he gave his seat away to one of the fans each game though.

[Jimbo]

I think it's because, in our disarray, we've needed visible leadership. If Man City, Chelsea or Liverpool had spent the last few seasons under threat of relegation, I'd expect their respective leaders to at least show their faces.

[not3bad]

But, once again, we are settling for not getting relegated as a comfortable position.

At the start of the season, I decided I'd settle for mid table and 6+ points better off than we were at the end of 12/13.  Not an inspiring performance by any stretch of the imagination (in fact medicocre) but progress.  It can feel a little "meh" when all you're aiming for is mid table obscurity but I don't want that for Villa every season.  At the moment we don't know if we'll reach that uninspiring mid table target, but we certainly had no hope of reaching such a goal this time last year.

[Dr Butler]

I think it's because, in our disarray, we've needed visible leadership. If Man City, Chelsea or Liverpool had spent the last few seasons under threat of relegation, I'd expect their respective leaders to at least show their faces.

you mean like Carson Yeung ? 

[pig]

This season I started to become really depressed that the plan included a "no glory" element which allowed the board and the owner to regard the simple survival in the Premiership as a legitimate and adequate ambition so long as the gates held up and the costs went down.

This is the key for me. It upsets me that "Premiership survival" is considered good. What's the point of turning up each year and aiming to be 10th. It's just as bad aiming for 4th. No one remembers who was 2nd or 5th or 11th or 16th we only remember those days that make us feel top of the world. Partly the problem with football, and I hope 6 teams bugger off to Europe and never come back. Then we can play football again with the chance, maybe just maybe, we might win it.

[Neil Hawkes]

A team with a budget such as ours needs their best players to be fit for virtually the whole season.
Our problem last season was the 'goals against' column. This was addessed and judged by most to be satisfactory, yet the solution found himself injured after a handful of matches and is out for probably the rest of this season.
We would not be mid table obscurity if all our best players were fit at the same time.
Our goal now, having got rid of the deadwood high earning dross of before, replacing them with (some would say) more deadwood, are at least on a much more sustainable wage, allowing us to spend the little remaining on a few more 'best' players standard of footballer.
The summer looked rosy, lets see what next summer brings.

[Chris Harte]

I'm fairly sure that of the top eight, the only one of those that we haven't played at home is Chelsea. That's a lot of games to go at home against teams below us. Our home form will make us or break us, but surely must improve towards the end of the season.

[Ads]

I am pretty confident we will win at least four more home games against the likes of West Ham, Hull, Norwich, Stoke, Fulham and Southampton, which would equal our record under O'Neill in 2009/10.

[danlanza]

Top 8 would be fantastic this season.
Saturday against West Ham is a big game and we need a win to push us on to catch Southampton and then Newcastle.
Tough ask but i think we can do it.
Like has been said by previous posters 3-4 QUALITY signings Mr Lambert and Lerner, QUALITY signings and we would be looking good for pushing on again next season.
We need some positive news from the club before next season starts. The World Cup should give us plenty of knowledge of players in the quality range we should be looking at if we are going to push forward.
Here is to a good shopping spree in the summer.
UTV

[eastie]

Top 8 would be fantastic this season.
Saturday against West Ham is a big game and we need a win to push us on to catch Southampton and then Newcastle.
Tough ask but i think we can do it.
Like has been said by previous posters 3-4 QUALITY signings Mr Lambert and Lerner, QUALITY signings and we would be looking good for pushing on again next season.
We need some positive news from the club before next season starts. The World Cup should give us plenty of knowledge of players in the quality range we should be looking at if we are going to push forward.
Here is to a good shopping spree in the summer.
UTV

I think top 10 would be a significant improvement this season , I don't think top 8 is likely , but top 10 would be nice .
The news that we made a pretty big bid for a player last month is also encouraging as some people believed there was no cash available to lambert.

It will be an important summer window and the addition of three quality players will bode well for a challenge on the top 8 next season.

[Richard E]

I am pretty confident we will win at least four more home games against the likes of West Ham, Hull, Norwich, Stoke, Fulham and Southampton, which would equal our record under O'Neill in 2009/10.

Put it this way, if we don't then there should be a steward's enquiry!

[Concrete John]

But, once again, we are settling for not getting relegated as a comfortable position.

It's not a comfortable position per se, but a comfortable position for this season.

Unless you throw oil tanker sized sums of money at it, you don't go from where we were to challenging the European places in the space of a season.  We're on a more organic curve, so aslong as it keeps pointing upwards I won't moan at a mid table stop off on the way.