Anyone starting to get worried?

[paul_e]

I didn't choose. I had no choice. I'd love a straw to clutch. A win tomorrow and we're all smiling again but as Paulie mentioned earlier, every bloody week we look for 'that' performance to say we've finally turned the corner. Until now it's still not arrived.

Of course it's a choice. We made more signings than anyone in the summer and have one of the youngest squads in the league. An unexpected break is better for us than almost any other team because it was a chance to reflect on what wasn't working. Loads of you have decided there was nothing from the game the other day to give us hope but I don't agree. Luiz played the role that has been missing and is rightly being called our player of the match for it, Targett and Mings looked like they had a better understanding and Davis showed he can be a target man for us.


All that said if you all want to start planning for the championship you can go ahead, I'll just go back to ignoring this thread for a while.

[tomd2103]

We have to win a game just to get out of the bottom three, as it stands.  That win seems really difficult to come by.  I also agree with Paulie, really good post.  We do not have the players to sustain a run of wins, the January transfer window was a disaster, other than an untested Samatta (sorry, but I don't really see that much in him either, needs to play with a partner I reckon).   To not address the centre of the park should be an embarrassment for Dean and Suso. We are sleepwalking to relegation.  I don't want it, I want fight, consistency and bottle from the players, and from Dean for that matter.  Sadly, we don't seem to have a great deal of that either.  Hope for the best but expecting the worst I'm afraid. Fuck, I'd love to be wrong.

Have to agree sadly, I just don't see us getting out of this one and fear we will be down with a few games to spare. 

Whichever way you shuffle the formation and the personnel, you are left with a lack of quality in a few areas.  There have been some decent enough signings, but think they took too many risks and it is the transfers which will be the main reason if we do drop.

[Steve67]

I didn't choose. I had no choice. I'd love a straw to clutch. A win tomorrow and we're all smiling again but as Paulie mentioned earlier, every bloody week we look for 'that' performance to say we've finally turned the corner. Until now it's still not arrived.

Of course it's a choice. We made more signings than anyone in the summer and have one of the youngest squads in the league. An unexpected break is better for us than almost any other team because it was a chance to reflect on what wasn't working. Loads of you have decided there was nothing from the game the other day to give us hope but I don't agree. Luiz played the role that has been missing and is rightly being called our player of the match for it, Targett and Mings looked like they had a better understanding and Davis showed he can be a target man for us.


All that said if you all want to start planning for the championship you can go ahead, I'll just go back to ignoring this thread for a while.

Time will tell Paul.  We were slightly better organised at the back but still have the gaping holes in front of them and continue to make stupid mistakes.  Stop that from happening and we may have a chance. I just don't see it though.

[Ad@m]

We actually had a reasonable start, but that just shows how bad we've been ever since.

Since we beat Brighton at VP with Targett's last minute winner, we've played 20 league games with a record of W4, D2, L14.  That is desperately poor.

We've kept saying it would change when we had an easier run of fixtures but nothing did. I simply can't see it changing now.

On that basis we have nothing to lose. I'd rather see us get relegated having a go, than get relegated trying to draw our final 9 games 0-0.

[Villan82]

I just want us to stay up, even if it means nine 0-0s. Couldn't care less how we do it so long as we stay up.

[hilts_coolerking]

I just want us to stay up, even if it means nine 0-0s. Couldn't care less how we do it so long as we stay up.

We're not going to keep 9 clean sheets in a row.

[PaulWinch again]

That West Ham result was excellent, that’ll knock the stuffing out of them.

[pauliewalnuts]

All that said if you all want to start planning for the championship you can go ahead, I'll just go back to ignoring this thread for a while.

Surprising to find people worried about relegation in a thread called "Anyone starting to get worried?"

[paul_e]

All that said if you all want to start planning for the championship you can go ahead, I'll just go back to ignoring this thread for a while.

Surprising to find people worried about relegation in a thread called "Anyone starting to get worried?"

Worried about about relegation and accepting relegation as inevitable when we're a point from safety with a quarter of the season to play isn't the same thing at all.

I only posted again because I came back on the thread to modify my post with something to this effect but replying seemed easier.

[curiousorange]

The thing is, it is still possible to stay up but no-one has yet made a convincing case as to why our form will suddenly improve to a level it hasn't been at all season while hoping that other clubs won't.  Same coach, same players, same tactics.  It's like our result against Sheff Utd.  Taken in isolation it was a point against a good team who played poorly.  But everything that happens between now and the end of the season has to be seen in the context of what our rivals do.

In and of itself a point wasn't that bad, if a missed opportunity. If Leicester and Arsenal had held their leads we probably would have been more sanguine. But Watford and Brighton's reluctance to surrender their opening games have made our efforts look pretty small time, as well as leaving us in the shit. It's not just the increase in the gap, but the way we seemed so satisfied that we'd done a decent job.

[Ad@m]

I just want us to stay up, even if it means nine 0-0s. Couldn't care less how we do it so long as we stay up.

We're not going to keep 9 clean sheets in a row.

And 9 points wouldn't be enough even if we did!

[tomd2103]

I just want us to stay up, even if it means nine 0-0s. Couldn't care less how we do it so long as we stay up.

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I'm desperate for us to stay up, as hopefully lessons would be learned, and the few quality players we need would be brought in to hopefully ensure a better season.

Going down and being stripped of the spine of our side would be an almighty boot in the knackers.

[kippaxvilla2]

One thing this season that reminds me of the relegation one was that back then, every week, I'd find myself thinking "maybe this is the week that we turn it around and start to show a bit of quality" but it never happened.

In that season it was a little different in that the entire club had pretty much accepted relegation by January (in which we did nothing to try to stop it).

However, I've found myself thinking the same thing this season, week after week there is either no improvement at all, or we look better and worth a win and throw it away needlessly (which is even more frustrating).

We are just so flat, paceless and predictable every week. Even when we don't lose, we never really look like we know what it takes to win matches at this level, and that for me is the fault of the manager. As someone else mentioned, his game management has been directly responsible for losing points which would have seen us far more likely to stay up now.

He sounds really plausible when you hear him speak, and it is very hard not to like someone with the sort of background he has got, but sometimes i find myself thinking back to the play off win and the feeling then, and I look at where we are now, and it is just so, so disappointing to think we have allowed things to spiral so awfully out of control.

Agree with every word.  It’s just typical Villa again if we go down.  We’ve finally got some owners that mean business, we were given the platform to kick on massively and instead appear to have allowed someone completely out of this depth to trawl the minor leagues of Europe and land us with a very average squad of players at this level. 

I just hope they stay with us if the worst happens.

[curiousorange]

Average players can be made to look better with decent coaches. Take a look at Adama or even Ayew. But an average coach won't get anything more out of them.

[Ian.]

I think we’re down. Not sure why as the players are good enough to stay up, we just seem to lack that extra edge for grinding out the wins. Maybe it’s a lack of belief.

If they can show that passion and willingness to win which we showed in the cup against Leicester, starting from tomorrow, then maybe I’ll believe otherwise.