Championship Play-off Final : Pre-Match Thread

[Steve67]

Not scared. Respectful.

I agree.  Totally professional in our game, no cockiness or laid back play like at Albion where we kept giving the ball away.  Desperate to go back up.

[The_ads]

Steer
Taylor
Tuanzebe
Mings
El Mohamady
Whelan
McGinn
El Ghazi
Adomah
Grealish
Abraham

That’ll be the team.  We can’t afford to play Andre based on his performance against West Brom and I think both he and Hourihane, along with Kodjia are good impact players for us.

Just win Villa please. Not sure I can handle walking out of there feeling like I did last year

[Sister of Top Cat]

As some of you may know, Top Cat and I had to give up our season tickets last year due to TC's lack of mobility because of her MS. This hasn't stopped her getting into the spirit of things though


image upload

[Sexual Ealing]

As some of you may know, Top Cat and I had to give up our season tickets last year due to TC's lack of mobility because of her MS. This hasn't stopped her getting into the spirit of things though


image upload

Beautiful!

[Top Cat]

Thank you. I'm quite impressed myself! Had them done when we last went to Wembley in 2010 but had a different design (not that I'm superstitious  )

[PeterWithesShin]

Worth making sure you know this if you're planning on carrying anything to the game.

http://www.wembleystadium.com/news/2018/sep/07/wembley-restricted-bag-policy

[Damo70]

Villa are 5/4 favourites to win in the ninety minutes. Derby are 5/2 and the draw is 12/5. Villa are 8/13 to go up and Derby are 7/5.

[SoccerHQ]

The boro semi had an element of randomness. Two negative teams of similar quality largely cancelling each other out.

It’s hard to say we outplayed them because we got the first goal and successfully choked the life out of them over two legs. If they’d got the first goal it could have been very different.

It did help we scored first but I thought we were very comfortable up there and could've scored another on the break, didn't Grealish go on a mazy run and hit the post?

0-0 at VP we could've held off their limited attacks. I certainly felt far more comfortable in that than the randomness of going to a penalty shoot out anyway.

[Ads]

Snoddy hit the post.

[petebullivant]

sorry wrong place

[themossman]

Yeah. My main memory is of it being a weirdly stress-free affair, as comfortable as watching villa ever is. Complete opposite of the WB games this time around, in fact.

Will be interesting to see the difference having battled through such a tough semi on penalties makes. My thought/hope is it’s a positive as we won’t go in with any sense of entitlement. As mentioned above, looking back, those boro games just convinced Bruce he could grind his way through the entire playoffs which seems ridiculous now.

[pauliewalnuts]

Is anyone else already shitting bricks over this match?

I find myself, every now and then, thinking to how fucking GUTTING it was last season against Fulham and my stomach goes into full on churn mode thinking about that happening again.

[fbriai]

I'm trying not to think about it at the moment. When it comes to mind, I just try and think of something else.

[andyh]

I am with you Paulie.

For me though its the wider implications of not going up that bother me so much.
I could accept another year or two down in the championship if we had the team and squad to give us the same as we have had for the last 2 years.
We have to admit, it’s been fun.

However, we know the club NEEDS to be back in the PL and more than that, the thought of losing Grealish is galling.

He will have to go, and we all understand why and it would be with our blessing after what he has given in the last 2 seasons especially, but to lose one of the best players we have seen for many, many years is a real pisser.

I desperately want to go up not only for the good of the club, but to keep the best players from this current team.

[LeeB]

Nowhere near as nervous as last year, in fact I'm positively becalmed.

It's a faith in process, and the fact there is one in the way play.