Dean Smith - Confirmed

[Nunkin1965]

The other thing to say about perspective is that it’s changed

We were struggling at the bottom of the premiership then we went down and we wanted to get back and the perspective was if we can just get back to the premiership we can start to build slowly again

That perspective changed with the new owners
It’s a completely different scenario
Some of you guys think it’s still the same but it’s not a change that day

We are now the second richest premiership club
We are the biggest club in the Midlands
We still have one of the greatest players in the world in our team
Our perspective has changed

We need to start seeing ourselves as competing for a top six place
Set the bar higher not lower

Too bloody right John

Nobody is setting the bar lower.
But we're not playing FIFA people have to be patient.
The owners seem to be or Dean Smith wouldn't be in the job.

[Ads]

I think it strikes as self entitled to be honest. Very Wolves esq. levels of petulance. Stamping your feet and shouting "don't you know who I am?" achieves nothing.

There's more to the top half of this table than us. What has the team directly above us been doing in our lost decade? Winning the European Cup and title, by signing £60m players.

What about the one above? Developing the best centre forward in Europe, competing in the Champions League, getting rid of the best pound for pound manager in Europe and replacing him with a name as big as Mourinho. Moving into a £1bn stadium that holds 61,000.

What about the team above Spurs, what have they been doing in our lost decade? Spending half a billion and attracting one of the most successful managers in Europe, making preparations to build a new ground.

And West Ham? Getting a new ground for free that is 50% larger than ours. Being able to spend £40m on flops and finally, for this season at least, reinventing Everton of 2007 vintage.

And Chelsea? Winning titles, trophies, playing in Champions League football, spending hundreds of millions.

Leicester? Sliding doors and all that, but winning the title, spending and investing heavily. Showing an avenue to others like us of what can be achieved in time.

The Manchester clubs speak for themselves.

Yes we're loaded, yes we have Grealish, yes we are Aston fuckimg Villa. But glance in the mirror, see where we have been very recently and what clubs who can say "we're fucking Chelsea" or "we're fucking Everton" too and it makes the demands seem ridiculous. It has to be earned.

[Nunkin1965]

So none at all then, that's sort of what I thought.

Oh come on.
Its just round the corner though isn't it?
People are thinking it.
He's "Not a big name" so its not possible for him to be a success.
I don't see our owners having a problem at this moment in time though.

[Ian.]

I think it strikes as self entitled to be honest. Very Wolves esq. levels of petulance. Stamping your feet and shouting "don't you know who I am?" achieves nothing.

There's more to the top half of this table than us. What has the team directly above us been doing in our lost decade? Winning the European Cup and title, by signing £60m players.

What about the one above? Developing the best centre forward in Europe, competing in the Champions League  getting rid of the best pound for pound manager in Eurooe and replacing him with a name as big as Mourinho. Moving into a £1bn stadium that holds 61,000.

What about the team above Spurs, what have they been doing in our lost decade? Spending half a billion and attracting one of the most successful managers in Europe, making preparations to build a new ground.

And West Ham? Getting a new ground for free that is 50% larger than ours. Being able to spend £40m on flops and finally, for this season at least, reinventing Everton of 2007 vintage.

And Chelsea? Winning titles, trophies, playing in Champions League football, spending hundreds of millions.

Leicester? Sliding doors and all that, but winning the title, spending and investing heavily. Showing an avenue to others like us of what can be achieved in time.

The Manchester clubs speak for themselves.

Yes we're loaded, yes we have Grealish, yes we are Aston fuckimg Villa. But glance in the mirror, see where we have been very recently and what clubs who can say "we're fucking Chelsea" or "we're fucking Everton" too and it makes the demands seem ridiculous. It has to be earned.

Very well put.

[Exeter 77]

Our start the season raised expectations, possibly unrealistically, and now we have a sub-standard run the drop is more pronounced. A comparison to our exceptionally poor run at this stage last season which culminated in the surrender at Leicester shows the progress which has been made. I would rather be debating a fall away from European qualification than a drop into the relegation zone.

[Ian.]

I also think Jack is even better than we all think. He’s just an incredible player. The form he was in before Christmas he was just incredible. The chances he created and the times he broke away when we defended corners and turned them into attacks. We just looked like scoring but was often let down by our finishing. His form dipped in the new year and it’s no coincidence the players form around him has fallen off too.

[AV82EC]

Since we came back from the enforced Covid break in January we've W4 D3 L5, classic mid-table form. As others have pointed out, we're much more resilient as a team defensively but have utterly lost our attacking verve and progressive approach from earlier in the season.

Three contributing reasons for me:

1 - The Grealish factor - much as we don't like to admit it, he lifts this team from being a lower midtable team to potentially being a team that can challenge for the European spots. Also there was a detailed stats analysis done a few weeks back on us this season which only backed this up as nearly 70% of our attacking intent was in the attacking left third.

2 - Smith and his coaching team - as others have pointed out in view of the above what are they doing about it? Sticking with the 433 despite the lack of personnel for it to be effective, continually just rotating and perming 3 from 6 in the three central midfield positions, playing clearly out of form players.

3 - Players out of form - quite clearly McGinn, Luiz and Barkley are struggling badly at the moment though McGinn and Luiz are showing signs they are starting to get back to something like some level of effectiveness.

Smith is doing OK in my view with the tools at his disposal but until the transition to a top 6 team is made then questions are bound to be asked, it comes with the territory unfortunately. That squad quality desperately needs to be improved in the summer as we're finding out, and really only then can Smith have no excuses in terms of delivering some of the expectations, up to know he's ticked every box.

Great post, and very much agree with your points. The world and his dog can see that our wide players at the moment aren't coming up with the goods, so why continue with two of them in a 4-3-3 that is making Watkins look really isolated due to their all round poor play?

This is the puzzling bit for me Risso, it’s quite clear perming 2 from 3 in the attacking wide positions is not helping just as it isn’t in the 3 from 6 in the midfield positions. It suggests he maybe hasn’t quite got the confidence to change it to a diamond or a more meat and potatoes 442. However, there is a part of me that quite admires a guy who sticks to his principles like this, frustrating as it may appear to us laymen. And then I remember he’s learning just like us, some of our play earlier in the season and how improved the top 12-14 clubs in the PL are since we’ve been away.

[aj2k77]

It's all very defensive on here today isn't it.

No one is unhappy with the season, no one wants the manager sacked, no one is calling for a complete overhaul, no one things the division is crap and we should be strolling to the top 6 at least. There's errors being made and improvements to make that people are rightly pointing out. That's part of football. We'd have nothing to discuss if we just said good season, can't wait until next year.

There's still 11 games to go and if we continue playing poorly and slide a bit to 12th/13th then it will have an effect on how we are viewed and the progress we might be able to make next season. It's a good step up we've made but we can't rest on our laurels, pat ourselves on the back and say ''well done, we were great in September, November and December'' when we're 3 months down the line and have hardly put in a good 90 minutes since then.

[AV82EC]

I think it strikes as self entitled to be honest. Very Wolves esq. levels of petulance. Stamping your feet and shouting "don't you know who I am?" achieves nothing.

There's more to the top half of this table than us. What has the team directly above us been doing in our lost decade? Winning the European Cup and title, by signing £60m players.

What about the one above? Developing the best centre forward in Europe, competing in the Champions League, getting rid of the best pound for pound manager in Europe and replacing him with a name as big as Mourinho. Moving into a £1bn stadium that holds 61,000.

What about the team above Spurs, what have they been doing in our lost decade? Spending half a billion and attracting one of the most successful managers in Europe, making preparations to build a new ground.

And West Ham? Getting a new ground for free that is 50% larger than ours. Being able to spend £40m on flops and finally, for this season at least, reinventing Everton of 2007 vintage.

And Chelsea? Winning titles, trophies, playing in Champions League football, spending hundreds of millions.

Leicester? Sliding doors and all that, but winning the title, spending and investing heavily. Showing an avenue to others like us of what can be achieved in time.

The Manchester clubs speak for themselves.

Yes we're loaded, yes we have Grealish, yes we are Aston fuckimg Villa. But glance in the mirror, see where we have been very recently and what clubs who can say "we're fucking Chelsea" or "we're fucking Everton" too and it makes the demands seem ridiculous. It has to be earned.

Good post Ads, we sometimes forget in our little echo chamber that other clubs have ambitions, money and dreams as well.

[Ads]

On the summer to do list;

Give the best English centre half a £100,000 a week contract.

Give England's best player a £180,000 a week contract.

Give one of Europe's best goalkeeper's a £100,000 week contract.

Sign a new centre forward and wide player in the <£35m bracket.

Move on the 3rd choice types like Trez, Nakamba, Davis etc.

Sit back and enjoy watching us earn more of a right to qualify for Europe and hope the others prior mentioned aren't quite as slick in their recruitment as we've become.

[AV82EC]

Pedantic prat alert, did you mean >£35m Ads? I'd up that to >£50m.

Also there's no reason those contracts can't be offered now.

[Monty]

We are improving year on year, but it's clear that either Deano doesn't quite know how to mould the kind of precise-moving attacking unit the top of the modern game demands*, or some of the players have been made to look much, much better than they were by the best attacking player in the country. No shame in either necessarily, we'll keep on progressing I'm sure, but this run has been a bit of a wake-up call. Sheff U, Brighton, Newcastle, these are some tremendously shit teams we've failed to beat, and it's  pretty fucking worrying.

*Apologies for unforgivable slippage into Jonathan Wilson voice.

[Ads]

I think its a combination of confidence, Covid, Jack and a stubbornness.

COVID saved us. COVID nudged us slyly in the back. But come the summer, COVID will give us an advantage. £2bn in lost revenues in the league.

Now while what our earners earn doesn't necessarily translate to "property of Aston Villa", that they have become even richer this year and that we are so insanely loaded, means we will have a spending power few outside Burnage can match.

[Allan C]

So none at all then, that's sort of what I thought.

Oh come on.
Its just round the corner though isn't it?
People are thinking it.
He's "Not a big name" so its not possible for him to be a success.
I don't see our owners having a problem at this moment in time though.

Great post that

[RamboandBruno]

So none at all then, that's sort of what I thought.

Oh come on.
Its just round the corner though isn't it?
People are thinking it.
He's "Not a big name" so its not possible for him to be a success.
I don't see our owners having a problem at this moment in time though.

Great post that

Agree, good post, every time we hit a poor run of form in the last couple of years, it’s resurfaced, some people will never deep down be satisfied that we have the lad from Great Barr rather than the man from Milan or Buenos Aires.