romavillan

yeah our "form" is dire. truly dire. and merits championship footy. we have the worst home record in our history. really shocking stuff. if we'd played like the first hour last night for all the home games, we'd have easily picked up 3 or 4 more wins this season and not be in trouble at all. as it is we need to win one of three games, the derby with the baggies will be a lottery so we could win it. tottenham will smash us if they really need the points and norwich away is not the easiest 3 points in the league (that would be a trip to villa park) so it looks like we may well be going down. i hope that means we get a young manager in who will play all the kids and get them playing some nice football (which they are more than capable of). get a good young team together then when we get back up add some experience to it in the transfer market and we shoudl be better placed than all this deadwood dragging us down...

i'd like to see the line up before predicting anything but yup an early bolton goal will make life very very hard but we've fought back ina lot of games this year. we need 3 points so badly it's nuts. i really shoudl be workign but just keep thinking abotu how bad it would be if we get turned over tonight!

massively worried about tonight even though they have no midfield left to speak of.

if we can't get 4 points from bolton at home, and the baggies and norwich away. then we should give up. seriously, just pack it in. close VP, go home and think no more about it.

this watching villa lark is going to give me a heart attack

mcleish in from 7/1 to 3/1 to be the next prem manager to go.

yep 1.06 pts a game is far more damning then having a go at him for the colour of his hair! as is our current situation in the league. if he stays after a relegation it would be criminal, if he stays after getting our lowest points total in 20 years of being in the premiership then we better come out of the blocks flying next season or he'll have to go and getting a manager during the season is harder than trying to do it in june. i don't go for all the personal abuse and was all for giving him the time to turn it round. if anything it's got worse. if he is here in the summer then the rebuild is going to be very interesting! to be honest i'd rather it wasn't him in charge of it,

no-one has seen enough of the kids at first team level yet. herd and clarke have been played the most and it shows. baker looks good to me so far. gardner and bannan it's too early to say, gardner has hardly played in his best position. when he has he has looked ok, (chelsea win). too early to judge really, bannan shouldn't be wide, he's better through the middle too. he's had some good games and some bad games so far. no-one shoudl be writing any of the youngsters off just yet!

well, well, well, look who's favourite in the sack race... http://www.thesackrace.com/competitions/premier-league

i hope 4-5-1 with weiman up top

Ha ha ha ha! You must smoke some silly stuff in Manc land. It's unlikely but you forget Blackburn won there this season! Hopefully Given and Dunney can help out their old club. No doubt Given will be sent off in the first minute for deliberate handball in his own box, this is at the shithole after all. haha. dunne's still out but i coudl see given getting a straight red for handball in his own box! our only chance would be playing all the kids together and just say "pressure's off, go and enjoy yourselves"

depedns how early, could be 34-0

must win for mcleish today, easy away fixture that we always do well in. if he can't get 3 points at old trafford then i say get rid...

i count two in a row so far! if we get shot of mcleish, and while i don't like most of the spite poured in his direction, if he manages us to our lowest ever prem total or worse, we go down too, then he i think we should get shot. if we do it, we should do it as soon as the season is finished and have someone in before the players come back after the euros. the new manager woudl need to be backed heavily and be someone who has shown they can work with talented kids. Zdenek Zeman would be perfect, he's working miracles at pescara with young players, he brought through nesta and totti too in the late 90s. not going to happen though! even though it would be his last shot at the big time. i think this season would have to be deemed a failure even by mcleish himself if we don't beat 42 points. as such we shoudl consider his position if that is the case. today our kids showed great heart and no shortage of skill. we need to build a team around them and i'm not sure it should be mcleish who gets the chance after this season (unless something very miraculous happens between now and the end of the season):

if we win today we could get 42 or 43 points, still a cack total for the season though. lose today and it all starts to look shitty again pretty quick. prob be a draw, and we'll finish the season around 39-40 points. shocking return really. only saving grae will be if we're mathematically safe with 3 games to go and we play all the kids together that have had such great results in the ressies.

yeah, ideal world give him half an hour in the second half when we're in the lead and see what he can do to create something for us. beat gerrard all ends up and was unfortunate to get booked for a dive when he came on the other day. dunno if we'll have the luxury of a lead though, i think this game could be tougher than the pool game...

6 points from stoke and bolton and we're in the clear for sure. 4 will probably do it though.

yeah i saw that a few times in teh second half, it was obvious they were too deep. he was saying the right things, that they shoudl push up and be more "compact" (if i lip read well enough). we brought the equaliser on ourselves in teh end by not doing what mcleish was asking. i thought he made positive substitutions with what he available on the bench. maybe caruthers came on a bit late for me. i think the players were desperate not to lose this and as such got sucked deeper and deeper as liverpool kept comign forward. we played ok today, but needed some more self belief in the second half from the players so we could have taken the sting out of the game a bit and knocked it around. it kept coming back to easily and we got battered. we can take some positives from it though, more game time for the kids in a very difficult place to go and get a point. the stoke and bolton games are key now. 6 points from those two and we're out of the woods for sure.

BTW, i watched doni a lot for roma, he's a good shot stopper but prone to crazy decision making if in doubt. doesn't command the box well and can make a complete tit of himself from time to time. shoot on sight and lots of crosses early would be good! that might be asking a bit much on our recent form though!

could be yeah... -----------given------------- hutton---collins---baker--lichaj ------herd------warnock------- gabby----ireland------bannan -----------lump----------------- if he wants to stick to the shape we've been playing...

11/16 academy products? that bench could be our future, hopefully a few can get a run out and perform. gerrard v herd is a big ask for the lad though ay

weimann passed late fitness test so prob not a good idea to start him. still i would prefer gabby up top on his own and push ireland up more with 5 in the middle than heskey!

found it Subs: Guzan, Johnson, Carruthers, Gardner, Weimann, Stevens, Williams. alby injured then for sure. carruthers for a run out on the wing? coudl be good second half if we're still in it...

that line up could be loads of different shapes really, depending on where gabby and heskey play. bench?

4-4-2 then interesting! so is lichaj on the left. herd holding on his own is ok i spose, be interesting to see if heskey is on his own up front and gabby wide, or vice versa and we play 5 across the middle?