Aston Villa vs Everton Post-Match Thread

[pauliewalnuts]

I'm finding I just don't really care any more, which is genuinely quite sad. I can pay, adding up travel, tickets and spending on the day, what would make up for me a week's wages to see a bunch of millionaire also-rans lose year after year with no hope of us actually achieving very much or I can pay £4 entry to my local team who, whilst not actually the best football, are far more enjoyable to watch than the Villa nowadays and being in the Evostick League they don't break the bank to spend an afternoon watching. It's quite nice to be part of a community football club that seems to be about more than being part of The Best League In The World (TM) on TV and less about the actual local communities and fans of The Best League In The World (TM).

I went into the bar at the ground at half-time today to see we were losing and shrugged. I went back in at the end to see we'd lost and didn't even bother with the shrugging.

What annoys - almost upsets - me most is how much I used to love Villa growing up, how excited I would be and how I'd spend all week thinking and talking about the next game. Now I really don't care, and it's sad to realise I've fallen out of love with Aston Villa. I don't even get angry at it any more, I'm just resigned to how poor they are and how little it will change.

I know what you mean.

I ditched my season ticket after the McLeish season, after having one for years. In the first Lambert year I picked and chose my matches and was actually quite positive at the end of it. Circumstances (financial) meant I couldn't have renewed if i wanted to for his second season, although I probably wouldn't have wanted to anyway, so I picked and chose matches - and I didn't choose many of them at all.

I haven't been at all this season, and genuinely don't think I am missing anything.

Basically, the club aren't trying, so why should I?

I know you can shout "what sort of supporter are you?" yada yada yada, but I went to my first match almost 40 years ago, have spent fuck knows how much money and time watching them, have the club running through my veins, as have my family for high on a hundred years, but I really just don't care any more.

The problem isn't that I have turned out that way, it is that I know loads of people in almost the same situation, who have just decided they've had enough over the last four ambition-free years.

The obvious dropping of any pretence of ambition, the acceptance of the truly mediocre, the levelling down of expectations to a situation where Everton have joined the clubs we can't think of competing with, the mental owner with his semi-literate press releases, the whole thing, bollocks to it.

This club is going absolutely nowhere, and the most depressing thing is watching people making excuses for what is going to be yet another year of utter shitness. Call me cynical, but I'd have thought things like shots on target are the minimum we can hope for as fans, but we don't seem to get very many of them. God knows how long this is going to go on.

[richard moore]

I couldn't really give a fuck either anymore and, as I said on the match thread, I no longer recognise the club I fell in love with and which has run through my dad's side of the family for three generations. Football has lost almost all of the magic it used to have and I barely watch it anymore. I haven't been for nigh on two years and have no intention of going any time soon. I can't really fathom out why so many people still go when just two clubs compete to buy the league. And that is all it is, there's nothing more to it these days despite the endless media hype, which just keeps wankers like Savage and Micky Quinn in jobs - they'd be too thick to do anything else.  I shall soon be lost to it altogether. I love H and V because it keeps me in touch with how the game used to be and people who can remember those good times.

[Meanwood Villa]

We are where Everton were late nineties to early noughties - a big club, happy just to stay up and stinking out the division. 

Personnel-wise, there are worse teams than us again this year.  And that might be enough. 

But I can't think of any other club in the top division that displays so little attacking intent.    This is not just a bad spell, or down to Benteke's injury.   Apart from February - May 2013, it has been like this for the majority of Lambert's time at the club. 

Four more years of this?  Christ.

Spot on.

[Meanwood Villa]

Why the fuck did we give him a new contract? If we're as skint as Randy likes us to be why didn't we just bear the unbearable and walk away. But four more shitting years? Really I don't think I can take it. Not suicide, just giving up on watching Villa. That sounds fucking great right now.

[kippaxvilla2]

I'm finding I just don't really care any more, which is genuinely quite sad. I can pay, adding up travel, tickets and spending on the day, what would make up for me a week's wages to see a bunch of millionaire also-rans lose year after year with no hope of us actually achieving very much or I can pay £4 entry to my local team who, whilst not actually the best football, are far more enjoyable to watch than the Villa nowadays and being in the Evostick League they don't break the bank to spend an afternoon watching. It's quite nice to be part of a community football club that seems to be about more than being part of The Best League In The World (TM) on TV and less about the actual local communities and fans of The Best League In The World (TM).

I went into the bar at the ground at half-time today to see we were losing and shrugged. I went back in at the end to see we'd lost and didn't even bother with the shrugging.

What annoys - almost upsets - me most is how much I used to love Villa growing up, how excited I would be and how I'd spend all week thinking and talking about the next game. Now I really don't care, and it's sad to realise I've fallen out of love with Aston Villa. I don't even get angry at it any more, I'm just resigned to how poor they are and how little it will change.

I know what you mean.

I ditched my season ticket after the McLeish season, after having one for years. In the first Lambert year I picked and chose my matches and was actually quite positive at the end of it. Circumstances (financial) meant I couldn't have renewed if i wanted to for his second season, although I probably wouldn't have wanted to anyway, so I picked and chose matches - and I didn't choose many of them at all.

I haven't been at all this season, and genuinely don't think I am missing anything.

Basically, the club aren't trying, so why should I?

I know you can shout "what sort of supporter are you?" yada yada yada, but I went to my first match almost 40 years ago, have spent fuck knows how much money and time watching them, have the club running through my veins, as have my family for high on a hundred years, but I really just don't care any more.

The problem isn't that I have turned out that way, it is that I know loads of people in almost the same situation, who have just decided they've had enough over the last four ambition-free years.

The obvious dropping of any pretence of ambition, the acceptance of the truly mediocre, the levelling down of expectations to a situation where Everton have joined the clubs we can't think of competing with, the mental owner with his semi-literate press releases, the whole thing, bollocks to it.

This club is going absolutely nowhere, and the most depressing thing is watching people making excuses for what is going to be yet another year of utter shitness. Call me cynical, but I'd have thought things like shots on target are the minimum we can hope for as fans, but we don't seem to get very many of them. God knows how long this is going to go on.

Sums it up for the way I feel as well.  It is a funny thing, because when there was no football last weekend, I felt a bit bored.  Which means that with a modicom of ambition in the club, I could probably get excited about watching Villa again.  But probably not with this manager in charge.  I honestly think he would still be shit with £100m to spend.

[pauliewalnuts]

I'm finding I just don't really care any more, which is genuinely quite sad. I can pay, adding up travel, tickets and spending on the day, what would make up for me a week's wages to see a bunch of millionaire also-rans lose year after year with no hope of us actually achieving very much or I can pay £4 entry to my local team who, whilst not actually the best football, are far more enjoyable to watch than the Villa nowadays and being in the Evostick League they don't break the bank to spend an afternoon watching. It's quite nice to be part of a community football club that seems to be about more than being part of The Best League In The World (TM) on TV and less about the actual local communities and fans of The Best League In The World (TM).

I went into the bar at the ground at half-time today to see we were losing and shrugged. I went back in at the end to see we'd lost and didn't even bother with the shrugging.

What annoys - almost upsets - me most is how much I used to love Villa growing up, how excited I would be and how I'd spend all week thinking and talking about the next game. Now I really don't care, and it's sad to realise I've fallen out of love with Aston Villa. I don't even get angry at it any more, I'm just resigned to how poor they are and how little it will change.

I know what you mean.

I ditched my season ticket after the McLeish season, after having one for years. In the first Lambert year I picked and chose my matches and was actually quite positive at the end of it. Circumstances (financial) meant I couldn't have renewed if i wanted to for his second season, although I probably wouldn't have wanted to anyway, so I picked and chose matches - and I didn't choose many of them at all.

I haven't been at all this season, and genuinely don't think I am missing anything.

Basically, the club aren't trying, so why should I?

I know you can shout "what sort of supporter are you?" yada yada yada, but I went to my first match almost 40 years ago, have spent fuck knows how much money and time watching them, have the club running through my veins, as have my family for high on a hundred years, but I really just don't care any more.

The problem isn't that I have turned out that way, it is that I know loads of people in almost the same situation, who have just decided they've had enough over the last four ambition-free years.

The obvious dropping of any pretence of ambition, the acceptance of the truly mediocre, the levelling down of expectations to a situation where Everton have joined the clubs we can't think of competing with, the mental owner with his semi-literate press releases, the whole thing, bollocks to it.

This club is going absolutely nowhere, and the most depressing thing is watching people making excuses for what is going to be yet another year of utter shitness. Call me cynical, but I'd have thought things like shots on target are the minimum we can hope for as fans, but we don't seem to get very many of them. God knows how long this is going to go on.

Sums it up for the way I feel as well.  It is a funny thing, because when there was no football last weekend, I felt a bit bored.  Which means that with a modicom of ambition in the club, I could probably get excited about watching Villa again.  But probably not with this manager in charge.  I honestly think he would still be shit with £100m to spend.

I have to say, in his first year, by the end of the season, I was still behind him, I could see what he was trying to do, and I thought we did better than the table suggested, so I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

After last season, though, I thought we were fecking awful pretty much all year, we played sub McLeishian stuff, really terrible football, and didn't improve at all.

I honestly think the bloke is an absolute chancer. He is totally unconvincing tactically, he doesn't seem to be able to get us doing even the basics well. He's been a disaster.

All that I could live with, but the fact he has just been given a four year contract is just gob smacking incompetence from Lerner.

I used to think Lerner was a well intentioned idiot. Now I just think he's an idiot.

[kippaxvilla2]

That's the irony, if this was McLeish putting us through this now, he would be unsafe walking the streets.  Lambert still doesn't get half the abuse McLeish did and I wonder why.  I can only assume it is down to people now becoming totally apathetic with the whole shambles.  I don't really know what to say about the owner anymore.

[pauliewalnuts]

That's the irony, if this was McLeish putting us through this now, he would be unsafe walking the streets.  Lambert still doesn't get half the abuse McLeish did and I wonder why.  I can only assume it is down to people now becoming totally apathetic with the whole shambles.  I don't really know what to say about the owner anymore.

The main reason is that Lambert came *after* McLeish, people are resigned to it. We've had four years of utter shit, and it doesn't seem to be getting better. Look at the attendances, they're awful. Honestly, good luck flogging tickets for that shite - at the current rate, we can expect about 1.3 attempts on target per game.

Proud history etc etc

[saunders_heroes]

I wanted him sacked ever since the 0-8 humiliation at Chelsea. I'll never forgive him for that day or the many humiliations he's put us through since. That's not to say he's the man responsible for our decline over the last 5 years, that would be Randy Lerner. I've said this many times on here but these last 4 - 5 seasons is the worst time I've ever known as a Villa fan. Relegation in '87 wasn't as disheartening as the mess we see now.

[Kingthing]

Just in, great day out ruined by 90 minutes of football.

[SoccerHQ]

I wanted him sacked ever since the 0-8 humiliation at Chelsea. I'll never forgive him for that day or the many humiliations he's put us through since. That's not to say he's the man responsible for our decline over the last 5 years, that would be Randy Lerner. I've said this many times on here but these last 4 - 5 seasons is the worst time I've ever known as a Villa fan. Relegation in '87 wasn't as disheartening as the mess we see now.

99% of managers would've been sacked after Bradford, he was the 1% that survived. I wanted him gone then but in fairness he won me over by how we finished that season playing decent football AND SCORING GOALS.

Since then aside from a handful of games we've played turgid uncreative rubbish for over a year now. We could play this style under Tony Pulis and probably get more home wins and finish higher up the league so Lambert isn't even achieving the maximum from this.

One thing I would say though, the state we're in, changing a manager would be cosmetic imo.

For proper new hope, fresh ideas and fresh impetus and momentum, we need fresh investement and a new owner. That's the crux of it in my mind, we're just plodding along otherwise as you see season in season out now.

[kippaxvilla2]

In 1987 it was absolutely terrible but at least you could see a way back and we all knew we would have some great memories from the games in the 2nd Division.  I literally don't look forward to any games in this league any more.  And if we went down, I think it would be a lot, lot harder to come back.

[JUAN PABLO]

The drink is wearing off and I've just read the thread and realised that manager got a new four year contract
I am exhausted and depressed of Paul lambert . Hes draining the life out of me . I need to do something else Saturday afternoons maybe until he has gone . I might be back 2018

[ROBBO]

There is a bigger issue here for the club and that is membership, reading all the posts just brings home how nailed on Villa supporters who would walk over hot coals to get to a game are turning their backs on the club and once they find there is life after Villa it's almost impossible to get them back.
Then there is the long term issue of trying to get children to follow a club that disappoints week after week
when there are clubs who can give them immediate satisfaction and allows them to be winners in the playground.
Lerner has again shown how dumb he is in football matters by giving a manager who broken so many records for losing games,home games "etc" a new four year contract.
I cannot see any change at Villa until he has gone, out of all the failures at Villa over the last five years his ownership of the club has been by far the biggest.

[VillaAlways]

There is a bigger issue here for the club and that is membership, reading all the posts just brings home how nailed on Villa supporters who would walk over hot coals to get to a game are turning their backs on the club and once they find there is life after Villa it's almost impossible to get them back.
Then there is the long term issue of trying to get children to follow a club that disappoints week after week
when there are clubs who can give them immediate satisfaction and allows them to be winners in the playground.
Lerner has again shown how dumb he is in football matters by giving a manager who broken so many records for losing games,home games "etc" a new four year contract.
I cannot see any change at Villa until he has gone, out of all the failures at Villa over the last five years his ownership of the club has been by far the biggest.

Depressing but absolutely spot on .