Poll - Sherwood - got rid

[Ads]

If you have an exceptionally good crosser of the ball and an exceptionally good header of the ball, then you should be playing to that strength, as it will get you a good 15-20 goals a season.

Get Gestede service within the 18 yard box and he will like as not score as many as Benteke. He’s less likely to do all the good work Benteke was able to with his back to goal or in the channels, 30-35 yards out, so I am not sure why we biff balls into Gestede and expect him to do the same.

I do think, a you say, that Ayew is an ideal foil with his pace and trickery to buzz in around Gestede for the second balls, or equally to drift wide and create. With him picking up some confidence, it would be nice to see him start, together with Traore, to provide some pace and mobility either side of Gestede, as they’re the sort of players who get oppositions defences sat ten yards deeper and facing their own goal.

One of the major problems we have had so far is that we haven’t see our best XI on the pitch or something close to it.

[Clampy]

We should have bought a right back and a decent centre forward, that much is pretty clear. The forward should have been the number 1 priority this summer, not replacing Benteke with pretty much an 1 season unknown and championship striker.

Are you saying that we should have blown most of the money we had on a replacement for Benteke? Personally, I think he did the right thing overhauling the squad. He did want Adebayor so another striker was in his thoughts.

[Toronto Villa]

We desperately need to win this weekend. Any win will do, but ideally one that gives hope that many of daft things we've seen in the past month are being addressed on the training pitch as Sherwood has promised. There's nothing in Stoke to take a cautious approach. We need to start the game quickly and take it to them. Go a goal down and Villa Park will become icy cold.

[aj2k77]

We should have bought a right back and a decent centre forward, that much is pretty clear. The forward should have been the number 1 priority this summer, not replacing Benteke with pretty much an 1 season unknown and championship striker.

Are you saying that we should have blown most of the money we had on a replacement for Benteke? Personally, I think he did the right thing overhauling the squad. He did want Adebayor so another striker was in his thoughts.

Not most of the money no but I wouldn't have spent £23m on Gestede, Traore and Ayew. I would have had 2 players. I can't see how we are going to fit Gestede, Ayew, Gabby, Sinclair, Traore, Grealish and Gil in the squad without compromising the midfield, too many attacking players and not enough quality.

That's just my opinion, we have a lot of options but I'm not sure how many of them are quality options.

[Clampy]

We should have bought a right back and a decent centre forward, that much is pretty clear. The forward should have been the number 1 priority this summer, not replacing Benteke with pretty much an 1 season unknown and championship striker.

Are you saying that we should have blown most of the money we had on a replacement for Benteke? Personally, I think he did the right thing overhauling the squad. He did want Adebayor so another striker was in his thoughts.

Not most of the money no but I wouldn't have spent £23m on Gestede, Traore and Ayew. I would have had 2 players. I can't see how we are going to fit Gestede, Ayew, Gabby, Sinclair, Traore, Grealish and Gil in the squad without compromising the midfield, too many attacking players and not enough quality.

That's just my opinion, we have a lot of options but I'm not sure how many of them are quality options.

So you wouldn't have brought three players but two? It's hardly a massive difference really. I see what you're saying about the midfield though, we do need to find a way of finding the right forward line without weakning the midfield.

[passitsideways]

Meh, if we'd spent 15+ million on a single striker (say, Destro, or Diego Rolan or one of the others we got linked with) and he got off to a slow start, people would be complaining about how we should've spread the risk out on two varied players. You can make an argument for either option; it's more about hoping that we picked the right two players.

[passport1]

It could be a defining game for Tactics this weekend. A convincing win and he will get some leeway but a serious mauling       doesn't bare thinking about.

[aj2k77]

We should have bought a right back and a decent centre forward, that much is pretty clear. The forward should have been the number 1 priority this summer, not replacing Benteke with pretty much an 1 season unknown and championship striker.

Are you saying that we should have blown most of the money we had on a replacement for Benteke? Personally, I think he did the right thing overhauling the squad. He did want Adebayor so another striker was in his thoughts.

Not most of the money no but I wouldn't have spent £23m on Gestede, Traore and Ayew. I would have had 2 players. I can't see how we are going to fit Gestede, Ayew, Gabby, Sinclair, Traore, Grealish and Gil in the squad without compromising the midfield, too many attacking players and not enough quality.

That's just my opinion, we have a lot of options but I'm not sure how many of them are quality options.

So you wouldn't have brought three players but two? It's hardly a massive difference really. I see what you're saying about the midfield though, we do need to find a way of finding the right forward line without weakning the midfield.

If you have nearly £50m to spend, then starting the season with a strike force of a Championship striker and a young lad who's only really scored goals in 1 season is possibly not the best use of the money. Goals win you games. Of course they both could hit the ground running and we have a great season, but it's not looking likely. We have to wait and see, more jam tomorrow.

Especially when we seem to be packing the midfield full of ball playing midfields who look to be able to pick a pass I don't get why our main forward is so immobile.

[spangley1812]

It could be a defining game for Tactics this weekend. A convincing win and he will get some leeway but a serious mauling       doesn't bare thinking about.

This................and his team selection, use of substitutes

[Clampy]

We should have bought a right back and a decent centre forward, that much is pretty clear. The forward should have been the number 1 priority this summer, not replacing Benteke with pretty much an 1 season unknown and championship striker.

Are you saying that we should have blown most of the money we had on a replacement for Benteke? Personally, I think he did the right thing overhauling the squad. He did want Adebayor so another striker was in his thoughts.

Not most of the money no but I wouldn't have spent £23m on Gestede, Traore and Ayew. I would have had 2 players. I can't see how we are going to fit Gestede, Ayew, Gabby, Sinclair, Traore, Grealish and Gil in the squad without compromising the midfield, too many attacking players and not enough quality.

That's just my opinion, we have a lot of options but I'm not sure how many of them are quality options.

So you wouldn't have brought three players but two? It's hardly a massive difference really. I see what you're saying about the midfield though, we do need to find a way of finding the right forward line without weakning the midfield.

If you have nearly £50m to spend, then starting the season with a strike force of a Championship striker and a young lad who's only really scored goals in 1 season is possibly not the best use of the money. Goals win you games. Of course they both could hit the ground running and we have a great season, but it's not looking likely. We have to wait and see, more jam tomorrow.

Especially when we seem to be packing the midfield full of ball playing midfields who look to be able to pick a pass I don't get why our main forward is so immobile.

It's not as if we're not scoring goals though. Sinclair has five, Gestede has four and Gil and Grealish have helped themselves to one each. Goals are not the problem really, it's keeping them out.

[aj2k77]

We have 8 league goals in 7 games, with the easiest start we've had in many moons. I don't care how many Sinclair scores against Notts County, if Sherwood gets the sack it will be because of league form. We still don't score enough and having immobile strikers don't help us stretch the game enough. Fully agree about the defence being shit, is it the players are no good? Is it the midfield not offering them enough protection still? I have no idea but add to it the amount of thicko errors we make it's not good reading.

[not3bad]

Lose this weekend and the start to the season will officially have been disastrous.  This is a massive one and I don't think Stoke will be in the mood to accommodate us the way Villa do other out of form teams.

[pauliewalnuts]

Just win this one, please, Tim.

Losing it is going to make this opening run much worse than just another loss at the end of the list.

[Clampy]

We have 8 league goals in 7 games, with the easiest start we've had in many moons. I don't care how many Sinclair scores against Notts County, if Sherwood gets the sack it will be because of league form. We still don't score enough and having immobile strikers don't help us stretch the game enough. Fully agree about the defence being shit, is it the players are no good? Is it the midfield not offering them enough protection still? I have no idea but add to it the amount of thicko errors we make it's not good reading.

You're missing the point slightly. We scored two in each of the games against Sunderland, Leicester and Liverpool. Normally that would get us a win and a couple of draws but the goals we conceded cost us. Defending is just as important as scoring as the Albion found out last night. Yeah, of course a few more goals would be good but we're not going to score 3 goals every game and we shouldn't need to score three to win.

[ez]

We have 8 league goals in 7 games, with the easiest start we've had in many moons. I don't care how many Sinclair scores against Notts County, if Sherwood gets the sack it will be because of league form. We still don't score enough and having immobile strikers don't help us stretch the game enough. Fully agree about the defence being shit, is it the players are no good? Is it the midfield not offering them enough protection still? I have no idea but add to it the amount of thicko errors we make it's not good reading.

You could be right about the midfield not offering the defence enough protection. Too often the other team is able to work the ball right up to our penalty area.