Dean Smith - Confirmed

[Damo70]

Bruce bought players to suit the way he sets his teams up to play. They aren't suited to the way Smith wants the team to play. He needs the summer to sell and replace players.

[gpbarr]

Talent is just part of the equation - attitude and desire is just as important and these players have shown consistently they don’t possess the combo required.

Aside 2 or 3 I expect a huge overhaul in the summer - and I trust DS to get that right

[sickbeggar]

Last night on the way home from the match in a desperate search for some radio thoughts on the match we came across Talksport and the two Mikes or whatever it's called. By the time they eventually got around to taking some callers an absolute weapon (claiming to be a Villa supporter) came on and the first words out of his gob we're 'we're Aston Villa, we won the European Cup' for which he got thoroughly ridiculed and rightly so.

Unbelievable. We have too many of these supporters who just haven't moved on and realised it's no longer 1982. I'm of that vintage and i don't feel the need to keep banging on about it like it's somehow relevant at all in this day and age. It beggars belief people still bang on about it.

You can't compare now to then or expect it to mean anything to anyone outside of B6 under the age of 40.

The club you support is the one you watched last night. Deal with it and stop living on past glories. Nobody is interested.

I agree on this ,  Time a lot of our fan base realised we're no longer the club we once were & lowered their expectations

I'm not sure many of our fans expect us to be challenging for a CL place apart from the odd delusional one. What we are guilty of, and it's a common fault among football fans, is expecting a new coach to sprinkle magic dust on crap players and get a tune out of them. Well maybe Smith's style doesn't get the best out of all of them, but in some cases they're just not that good players, and in the case of the likes of Jedinak, whelan and hutton unless he's got some miracle anti-aging dust available i'm not sure what he can do.

[LukeJames]

Bruce bought players to suit the way he sets his teams up to play. They aren't suited to the way Smith wants the team to play. He needs the summer to sell and replace players.

Bruce put no such thought into signing players unfortunately.

[Risso]

Bruce bought players to suit the way he sets his teams up to play. They aren't suited to the way Smith wants the team to play. He needs the summer to sell and replace players.

Bruce put no such thought into signing players unfortunately.

Was just going to say the same. Bruce just bought players who were doing OK for their team at the time with no thought as to how to fit them into a squad or way of playing.

[Ad@m]

Bruce bought players to suit the way he sets his teams up to play. They aren't suited to the way Smith wants the team to play. He needs the summer to sell and replace players.

Bruce put no such thought into signing players unfortunately.

Was just going to say the same. Bruce just bought players who were doing OK for their team at the time with no thought as to how to fit them into a squad or way of playing.

Absolutely.

Scott Hogan and Ross McCormack are two (very expensive) examples of that.

[Ad@m]

Actually, thinking about it, RDM bought McCormack didn't he?

So ignore that. The Hogan point still stands though!!

[SoccerHQ]

Stoke are in a bigger mess than we are.

Now there's a talented lower league manager who's failed to impose his way of thinking on the squad. Maybe they'll be better next season but they need a big overhaul.

[Mister E]

Some of ... The individuals are good enough; many aren’t. The team isn't.

is my view

[Leicester_Villian]

From last nights starting line up it would be no surprise if the only starter next season is the keeper .... possibly Tommy to
SJM will have moved on .... the loans will all have gone and the rest aren't good enough or out of contract
I don't think we really understood what a poor squad Bruce had assembled ...no plan
Until Dean can get players in to play his style its pointless moaning at him - just be sensible there does the high tempo come with the current midfield he has to pick from?  Watching Jedi lsdt night I am not sure he would have won a 50 yards sprint against Micah Richards. It was summed up when Whelan came on and the temp increased .....and we know he is not suited to a high tempo game

[ROBBO]

I said before the game that Smith should warn players they would be dragged if not performing, it was obvious after thirty minutes that Jedinak and Kodja for different reasons were not performing as a sign to the rest of the squad he should have pulled both before half time.

[LukeJames]

Weres this idea that McGinn will be gone next season come from? I'm seeing it more and more. People talking as if its a foregone conclusion and its already happened.
Theres not a fucking chance that he will be gone, not a single chance that we will sell him.

[Toronto Villa]

Stoke are in a bigger mess than we are.

Now there's a talented lower league manager who's failed to impose his way of thinking on the squad. Maybe they'll be better next season but they need a big overhaul.

Which also makes the job Darren Moore has done at Albion really since he took over all the more impressive. They might very well go up this season and avoid the mess Stoke are going to find themselves in this summer and into next season.

[SoccerHQ]

Stoke are in a bigger mess than we are.

Now there's a talented lower league manager who's failed to impose his way of thinking on the squad. Maybe they'll be better next season but they need a big overhaul.

Which also makes the job Darren Moore has done at Albion really since he took over all the more impressive. They might very well go up this season and avoid the mess Stoke are going to find themselves in this summer and into next season.

Whenever I watch West Brom they don't impress me that much tbh. Think they've very much like us last season. lots of experienced heads at the back and in midfield and got players of real quality in final third like Gayle who decide games even when they're poor.

Think they'll be same as us, not good enough for top 2 and hopefully losing play off finalists.

[pauliewalnuts]

What worried me last night was the number of times we had the ball and looked like we genuinely didn't know what to do with it. Players really not knowing what to do, the defence passing it between themselves until inevitably one of them got put under pressure, the number of passes which were at best 50/50 balls, the failure to show anything looking like movement off the ball (especially from throw ins, which was just horrible to watch).

The worst thing about the first 80 minutes was not just that we were shit, it was that we looked like we didn't even know what we were supposed to be trying to do, let alone just failing to execute something.

That's what concerns me about DS. Maybe the players aren't up to exactly how he wants them to play, but they're the players he has, he has got to roll with the flow and get a tune out of them.

The final result last night massively hides the underlying problem that we look disorganised from back to front. That's frightening.