Aston Villa 2009/10 thread

[buscador]

Last season Villa finished in 6th with 60 points. 27 behind the league winners.

This season Villa finished in 6th with 62 points. 28 behind the league winners.

Next season I can see Villa finishing 6th with 60-odd points – miles behind the league winners.

Sorry to drag this prediction back up from page 1, but it's proved to be unerringly accurate. Thank you, Biffo.

2010 Villa finished 6th with 64 points. 22 behind the league winners.

So, not miles behind, but unable to move above 6th. If we are to believe Martin O'Neill we are playing better football and improving - a view that surely no one (else) who has seen our home form (especially) this season can take seriously.

I haven't felt quite as miserable and uninspired about our future performance on the pitch since the dread days of O'Leary when I almost gave up watching my team altogether. I know it sounds churlish to be whingeing when we've got to Wembley twice but I can't get away from the notion that this season O"Neill has served up unimaginative, inflexible dross most of the time. And I am far from sure he can change the way he works or instructs the team. If Everton hadn't had such awful injury problems early in the season then we would have finished below them as well.

Where's the ambition?

I've seen a few reserve and youth games and they've been quite entertaining. There are clearly a few lads in those teams who might have a chance at first team level, but they're never going to get that opportunity under Mr I Play My Favourites Every Week Whether They're In Form Or Not O'Neill. The much-heralded new dawn of English football at Villa Park has faded far too quickly. James Milner will soon feel he has been sold a pup and head for the exit door marked Proper Coaching And Tactics here.

There's no doubt the brand-new defence worked a treat early in the season and despite the last day debacle Dunne has been the bargain of the season. But I'm sceptical that such questionable progress can be maintained under the present management and coaching structure. If your only tactic to change a game you're losing is to bring off a big striker with ten minutes to go and replace him with another big striker, then five minutes later do the same with smaller strikers then how do you expect to win the game? And don't even start me on the absurd ginger time-wasting substitution nonsense - we had a better record when he actually played whole games.

Oh dear, I've gone on a bit. Sorry.

 

[buscador]

Forgot to mention in my diatribe above how delighted I am that Gareth Barry will be playing in the Champions' League next season.

 

[Dr. Furface]

Oh dear, I've gone on a bit. Sorry.

But on the whole you're spot on about O'Neill. What's the point in building a squad if you're just going to play the same guys each week? The opposition know exactly what to expect and the regular first teamers just end up knackerd. John Terry was right about how we tire and in the semi Chelsea proved it - they just contained us until we burnt ourselves out and then picked us off at the end. And they knew damn well that they didn't need to worry about any change of game plan or inventive substitutions.

Converting Milner to central midfield worked out really well - both for the team and the player - but it wasn't any great innovation by MON because he knew he'd played there before occasionally for his previous clubs. All the credit goes to the player for his level of performance and consistency.

Finishing 6th again was good but like you say if Everton had had more luck we'd have finished below them and I think if Torres had been available more often then Liverpool woulda finished above us too. That would put us 8th and out of Europe - but we might as well not be in it anyway given our record in the last couple of seasons.

I could go on but I can't be bothered. Like most of us I was really chuffed when MON took over but now I'm totally fed up of his lack of tactical nous and even more so about his totally safe and unimaginative dealings in the transfer market - even if he has made some good signings.

 

[aylee]

I think the criticisms you've both made have some validity - some - but you're being unduly harsh.

We have also had more injury troubles this season than we've had for quite a few years, with Carew, Heskey, Downing, Reo-Coker and Davies all long-term or recurrent absentees. Others have played while less than fully fit. There are also a number of players, as stated above, who haven't pulled their weight.

In terms of signings, the trouble is that the money is not available to Martin - and won't be available to him this summer by the sound of it - to buy elite players of the likes of Wesley Sneijder, who we were allegedly in for before he went to Inter. Nor are they likely to want to come to Villa given that we're not in the Champions' League. That's why he purchases more workmanlike players for £5 million. The difficulty is that you need that extra quality to break through to the next level that we don't currently have. We need someone like Sneijder, who has really impressed me in the Champions' League this season, but the simple fact is it will cost £20 million plus to buy someone like that, even if willing to come to Villa, and Randy isn't willing or able to cough up the cash. So unless we get lucky with someone rising through the ranks - and good as some of the current crop are, there are no Rooneys among them - we're going to have to plod on with the type of players we have.

The other problem we've had this season is that teams have understood how to deal with Villa .... many times I've seen two men descending on Ashley Young as soon as he gets the ball, so that he doesn't get the time to pick his spot for a cross. A lot of the middling teams now view us as a team that they need to defend against rather than one they can attack and beat, whereon we hammer them on the counter-attack.

 

[buscador]

I love your glass half full optimism, aylee.

I just think all the evidence points to another season of exactly the same. I feel like we've all got into a go-back-in-time-atron and are in Leicester in the late 1990s only with claret and blue shirts. We might as well have Fat Sam in charge - at least he gets his teams to attack the opposition's perceived weakness.

Even my girlfriend, who knows nothing about football and cares even less, can tell me exactly who will be on the teamsheet. I'm sure it's only because he's a bit quirky and therefore a bit of a media favourite that O'Neill doesn't get slated as much as other managers might.

Anyway, mercifully I'm off on holiday tomorrow (ash clouds permitting) and will not look at a newspaper, the internet, sky sports poxy 24 hours a day rolling claptrap masquerading as news. I am not going to even think about football. Maybe after a break I will feel more optimistic.

 

[Stanley Edwards]

...I'm sure it's only because he's a bit quirky and therefore a bit of a media favourite that O'Neill doesn't get slated as much as other managers might.

...

We finished above Liverpool with all their talent and dosh. Just one win behind Man City with all their talent and dosh. Another top 6 season with all we don't have!

Is there anyone to blame? Really? Is there anyone to praise?

Randy isn't going to pump big money into Villa. With the squad we have (the squad O'Neill has built) we do actually stand a chance. Just 2 wins short of qualifying for Europe against all the cash that Spurs, Man City and Liverpool have! He's doing a fucking good job. I hope we don't lose him, because there are plenty of others who would like to take him.

 

[Notorious J.I.M]

I agree with Stanley.

 

[holteman]

We would struggle to replace him.

And we have a smaller budget than a lot of teams.

Which is why i will not tolerate another season of harewoods, salifou's, heskeys and shoreys.....

The money we have spunked on players we all knew were not up to standard is just not on.

MON needs to improve his transfer record, and look outside the uk. Maybe take advice on targets and get storey-smith a passport at last.

HE also needs to look at match tactics. come up with alternative plans. bringing on heskey after 70 minutes is not a tactic its just a signal to tell us we have 20 minutes left...

I am a MON fan, but I feel he is seriously struggling to progress us.

Good season.. best in many a year... we should be proud...

But i reserve judgement on MON till after the first few signings come in.

 

[Notorious J.I.M]

Randy Lerner has massively improved the whole set up of this club in all departments making money available for MON to improve the squad as he sees fit. If Randy still trusts in MON then I certainly do. I won't defend some of the signings he's made, we can all name the players who have failed to make the grade but is it any different to other top flight managers? Fergie has signed some shite players eg Djemba Djemba, Kleberson and Taibi. Wenger signed the likes of Jeffers, Cygan and Stepanovs. In the long run it's about improving year on year and you can't argue that we have under MON. Man City coming from nowhere and throwing money around has complicated things. Spurs have finished in fourth after a lot of trial and error. You could argue that by bringing back the best players that Ramos sold on and adding a couple of new ones Harry has just picked up where Jol left off a couple of years ago improving on consecutive 5th place finishes. The Tottenham squad has been pretty good for a while now but they've improved gradually by selling on players like Berbatov for a big profit. I think this might be the time for MON to do the same, make some money on Carew for instance and clear the decks of the deadwood in order to sign 5 or 6 better squad players. It might be that we're improving to stand still as others do the same but MON is now the fifth longest serving manager in the division after Fergie, Wenger, Moyes and Benitez who have all had their ups and downs. Keep the faith people!

 

[Notorious J.I.M]

A 20 Million bid from Man City for James Milner has been firmly rejected by the club, good thing too.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/m/man_city/8693557.stm

 

[TrippyLondoner]

They'll come back with a higher bid that villa wont be able to resist, smart move by villa either way.

 

[aylee]

They'll come back with a higher bid that villa wont be able to resist, smart move by villa either way.

Probably. But I have a feeling that he will be a real star for England at the World Cup .... perhaps in the same way that Hargreaves was England's surprise package the last time out. If so, that will add to his value and we could get as much as £30 million for him. Time to play hardball!

 

[TrippyLondoner]

Probably. But I have a feeling that he will be a real star for England at the World Cup .... perhaps in the same way that Hargreaves was England's surprise package the last time out. If so, that will add to his value and we could get as much as £30 million for him. Time to play hardball!

Exactly.

 

[Notorious J.I.M]

I have no doubt the club will play hard ball over the fee just as they did with Liverpool in the Barry saga. I'm fairly sure that an offer of 30 million would be hard for the club to turn down but we're some way off anyone meeting that valuation. I reckon you're right about the World Cup making him a star and if he does catch the attention of a foriegn club it could start a bidding war. I'd be fairly philosophical if he went for stupid money as we need strengthening in other areas and believe we'd addapt as we did to losing Barry.