Cardiff City vs Aston Villa Post-Match Thread

[Deano's Mullet]

I think we'll be ok once he brings his own players in. he's doing pretty ok with the deadwood he inherited from last season plus the new signings he didnt buy. We've earnt a lot of points from his 13 or so games without playing well in a fair few of them which shows he has some talent from getting results out of this team which for several years has had a downer mentality. Had he been here in August we'd in those play off places at least. I agree we will do well to get promoted this season but i never once thought it would be a straight return and from the mess we were in end of last seasons its a lot healthier and happier place now. Fine tune that team and we'll be ok in this division. Once we do go back up - however long that takes - then the Premier League would be a whole different matter altogether.

[mr underhill]

we are light years away from PL standard. I would much rather another season in the Chumps getting the balance of the squad right . How successive managers have failed to do this is beyond egregious

[brontebilly]

Sanchez should be bought back as should veretout both are far better than Westwood and Gardner

Sanchez was horrendous let's be honest, Veretout thought he was too good for the second division

Time to move on, time for Westwood to move on too

[paul_e]

We are getting like the Americans and reducing sport to numbers.  Only the result is numbers.  How many times players do or don't touch the ball is not the problem.  The problem is that the elephant in the room when Bruce wrote out the team sheet was the fact that Warnock would tell his players to kick lumps out of us.  Neither Westwood nor Gardner has the physical strength or courage to deal with a Warnock managed Cardiff side.  Tshibola's off field antics have upset Bruce so the team sheet is used to discipline him.  Lyden is young and inexperienced so Bruce by nature and habit ignores him.  Lyden is hard and brave and is no way worse than Westwood or Gardner.  RHM is young and inexperienced so is forced behind multi, multi, multi under performing Gabby in pitch time to prove himself.  We put out unbalanced, misfiring teams time and again because we place too much faith in known failures than unproven potential winners getting their chance.
Like Mr Woodhall, my mood is sombre.  I can see what I have said above being the yardstick of transfer business and we will get Premiership bottom six thirty something year old bench warmers when we need young, athletic players with good engines trying to make names for themselves in the game.

I suppose you could argue that we went with unproven winners under Lambert and it didn't get us anywhere. I don't think anyone really knows the calibre of player Bruce will bring in and while we can speculate that he'll bring in thirty year old bench warmers, there's a chance he might not. Given his track record of getting teams up, he'll obviously know the type of player that he wants.

I do agree about RHM though.

I don't think you can argue that for Lambert at all.  He went for players who he'd scouted as having the potential to improve but I don't think any of them were particularly highly regarded or with a particularly outstanding record (Okore being the oddity in this).  Players like Green and RHM are different, they're youngsters at the club who, like Grealish, have been 'best in class' at pretty much every level they've played for us.

Aside from that trusting youngsters to change our fortunes in the premier league is very different to bringing them in to replace shite like Gabby now.  The key thing we need in the team is pace and power, we're lightweight and everything happens too slowly.  That's why people want to see more of Tish, he's a big lad with a bit of pace.

As for the '30 year old bench warmers' last summer he signed Ryan Taylor and Shaun Maloney who both fit that bill perfectly.  That's not me saying he'll do it now, I'm just highlighting why some people think that's the route he'll follow.

[brontebilly]

I've said it before and I'll say it again.This is the worst squad of players I can recall at Villa. Quite how SB can address this in a mid season window eludes me.

We are very fortunate to be in a relatively safe position in the league.

We are playing at a woeful level though let's be honest, Joe Bennett who bombed for us was one of Cardiffs best yesterday for example. Steve Sidwell dominates for Brighton and we know how crap he is.

Bruce should be able to get us playing to some kind of standard. It was hard to know yesterday what kind of football we were trying to play even in the second half. When we kept it down the wings we looked decent but why is Hutton given a free reign to bomb forward but Amavi never does? It was hard to know which of Bacuna or Tshibola was the holding/attacking midfielder and neither attempted to break into the box to attack a cross. Just seems like the players are not well drilled on what Bruce expects of them on the pitch.

[paul_e]

I've said it before and I'll say it again.This is the worst squad of players I can recall at Villa. Quite how SB can address this in a mid season window eludes me.

We are very fortunate to be in a relatively safe position in the league.

We are playing at a woeful level though let's be honest, Joe Bennett who bombed for us was one of Cardiffs best yesterday for example. Steve Sidwell dominates for Brighton and we know how crap he is.

Bruce should be able to get us playing to some kind of standard. It was hard to know yesterday what kind of football we were trying to play even in the second half. When we kept it down the wings we looked decent but why is Hutton given a free reign to bomb forward but Amavi never does? It was hard to know which of Bacuna or Tshibola was the holding/attacking midfielder and neither attempted to break into the box to attack a cross. Just seems like the players are not well drilled on what Bruce expects of them on the pitch.

Exactly right, I want to see some evidence of what we do in training because the only thing that's improved since he arrived is the concentration at the end of games.  That's a big thing to improve and it's he's got us from struggling at the wrong end to eyeing up the play offs but there needs to be some work on our play style as well.

[Monty]

On the Amavi/Hutton thing, my guess will be that Hutton's getting forward more because he's allowed to. Oppos know that Amavi is more of a threat and concentrate on denying him space - and you can't run forward into no space. Bruce should probably be working on ways of getting space for Amavi, but that is pretty hard when you've got no midfielders.

[Clampy]

I don't think Hutton has been as bad this season as in previous ones. I've always thought Bacuna has done a reasonable job at right back when he's played there.

[themossman]

We don't have a terrible squad we are just weak in key areas, i.e. central midfield and sticks.

We are one player short of a very decent defence for this league and a better keeper would probably have us in the playoff places at this point even after our terrible start and our shockers against Norwich, Cardiff, Leeds.

[LeeB]

On the Amavi/Hutton thing, my guess will be that Hutton's getting forward more because he's allowed to. Oppos know that Amavi is more of a threat and concentrate on denying him space - and you can't run forward into no space. Bruce should probably be working on ways of getting space for Amavi, but that is pretty hard when you've got no midfielders.

My take on the situation too. The whole thing collapses on our lack of effective midfielders, and we're failing to get the best out of considerable talent in other areas because of it.

[aj2k77]

No protection for the defense, no support for the attack. Just a big gaping whole of nothingness. We play most games with 9 men.

[old man villa fan]

On the Amavi/Hutton thing, my guess will be that Hutton's getting forward more because he's allowed to. Oppos know that Amavi is more of a threat and concentrate on denying him space - and you can't run forward into no space. Bruce should probably be working on ways of getting space for Amavi, but that is pretty hard when you've got no midfielders.

If you are going to use fullbacks to get forward, the last thing you want is two wide midfield players in a 4-4-2 sitting just in front of the defence. As you say, they need space.

[Richard E]

I've just seen the Cardiff goal. Words fail me.

[exigo]

I've just seen the Cardiff goal. Words fail me.

Same. Special mention for Ross somehow shepherding it in, and then turning to complain, when he could have taken the grand total of two steps forward and twatted it into their half.

[Bad English]

I too have just seen the goal for the first time. What a bunch of flaccid quimstakes!