OnlyOne

Neither is losing 4 home games out of the last 5. We've already lost the same amount from last season and that was when we were in a true transition (no pre season, 2 caretakers, massive injury crisis, adapting to positive football) Fans are too soft towards McLeish at the moment. No where near the venom Houllier got. Why is that? Yeah, Houllier was bad, but McLeish takes it to another level.

Just finished watching the Liverpool game. Erm....how come we were useless against them again? Carroll, Henderson, Downing (lol back to his shadow self) and Adam... All of those players aren't even upper midtable standard yet it costed Liverpool over 80 million. Horrible business. They won't finish in the top 4. No way.

They will also get use to winning more games. Unlike us.

Zatman, are you really defending a man who has 2 Premier League relegations? Defend this. If our squad is superior than SHA's (you said even 13th would be a remarkable achievement for them), then why is he doing just as bad with us with the same amount of games played too? Oh wait, you're blaming the players for not understanding his relegation tactics. Interesting indeed.

I'm watching Chelsea play at the moment and they look awful. But what's the betting that we won't get anything from that game despite the fact we have a reputation of giving Chelsea a good game at Stamford Bridge during the christmas holidays as well? We'll no doubt lose under this prick. He's just incapable of getting a result against the top 6 with us. Why is he still here?

The reason why SHA finished 9th under him was because of Joe Hart. He must have saved at least 10 points for them. He really is one of the best goalkeepers in the Premier League and that's why Man City made him number 1 when they got him back from loan.

What I mean is there's nothing to suggest he can win us over. What exactly has he done worthwhile to even bring it up? Just because the crowd applauded good football in the Arsenal game (we still lost btw) shouldn't bring his delusions that'll he win us over some day. It won't last long if we remain at the bottom half of the table for the entire season.

He's deluded if he thinks he can win us over. 4 home game defeats out of 5. 4 wins out of 17. **** you.

I don't understand the reactions in this thread. Yeah he has remained poor overall, but he was pretty good at Arsenal. He fits in the system with positive football where we bring the ball forward instead of hoofing it. He lost his head in the last few mins but imo that showed abit of passion because he was pissed off when Arsenal scored the second after we played so well.

This has got to be the shittest fixture in the entire league. Monday night Winter Britannia 2 Hoofball teams (we being the poor version)

The bigger question is not why wasn't Bent watching Villa, but why were Villa fans going shopping instead of supporting the team, if less people went shopping and turned upto the ground we might actually be in a better situation. I mean look at Stoke, yes horrible team/tactics but my god do there fans back the team. If we were half as passionate we might actually make some noise for a change. ? you think it is the crowds fault we are losing rather than the shit that is faulkner decided to employ the shit ginger clunge? and then the ginger clunge doing exactly what anyone with half a brain cell said he would which would be to produce poor unattractive ineffective hoofball which will have the club looking like shit? you think fans who all look inbred and want to fight as it is the only thing they can do as they dont work and there is **** all else for them to look forward to in their dull lives are passionate and that is why stoke have become a team our currently shittly managed team fears? oh my! :| It's embarassing really.

Making Kev Mac the manager would have been the easy option. This is what makes it more aggrovating. It's the fact Randy actually made the effort of bringing AM here and is putting his reputation/money on the line. This manager isn't a safe bet at all. The odds were stacked against him from day one.

I completely agree, but that doesn't mean that there are no logical reasons why the board went with McLeish. They wanted someone who would work on shoestring. They wanted someone with Premier League experience. Martinez fell in that bracket. They went after him. They failed. So they went for McLeish, who was also in that bracket. They got him. I don't think it was a good appointment, I don't think it'll turn out to be a good appointment. But I understand why the board did it. Personally I think they should have looked down a division, to a bright, young, upcoming manager. But they didn't. But we've seen AM working on a shoestring at SHA and he failed in the Premier League. Twice. Why did they think he was good enough to work on a shoestring here? He even outspent clubs like Wigan and Wolves, but still failed. Now it seems in the January window he wants emergencies to get us out of the relegation battle. That's not exactly working on a shoestring if he needs funds. At least with an unknown prospect he could work out in the top flight. The whole 'Premier League Experience' is a farce if that person has to proven be a failure there.

The midfield options are pretty lousy but that's what happens when you don't choose wisely in the transfer window. Jenas, a player who is known for being an average and injury prone player, hasn't had a spell at the Premier League for a good while now, but still took an interest by AM. He hardly made an impact and is now injured for the rest of the season where we have to pay his wages. We can't even call back Makoun either who admittedly wouldn't be good against Stoke but he's better than Delph at least. But I don't fully blame AM for the midfield situation. It's more of the board's fault for swapping Milner for Ireland without a manager who has made hardly any contribution, sold Young/Downing without seeing the full money and they allowed NRC to walk away without any replacements who brings steel to the midfield area. Also the Bannan incident was another one where he can't be blamed.

Plenty of good upcoming managers would take the job at the Premier League regardless of the budget. To manage at Villa, a club with a Premier League status is a massive bonus and privilege.

I don't see why not. Collins can be a top defender but just hasn't shown it this season. He probably knows it as well as we do. But if he has a solid game, that'll give him confidence which we are clearly struggling with. Players who played well against Arsenal should be first on the team sheet, that being Dunne, Cuellar, Petrov, Ireland, and Albrighton. I'd also drop N'Zogbia, but Gabby on the wing and play Bent up top, and make sure we don't hoof up to him. If we do that, hopefully those players with confidence after Arsenal will pull the whole performance together. N'Zogbia played well against Arsenal (as well as Liverpool and Bolton) so why do you think he should be dropped? I think Ireland is injured. I'm not sure about Herd, but if he can make it he should be Left Back with Petrov and Clark in the centre, and Bent & Gabby up front. A formation like this worked well against Bolton away and it could work against Stoke. Better than 4-5-1 where the striker is isolated throughout.

FFS, not Collins again.

There's still no one who can come up wtih a logical reason why hiring AM was the best for this club. For that reason Randy Lerner has to go. I don't trust his future appointments seeing as he has a history of bad appointments at the Browns as well and he should at least understand that Sport seeing as he grew up where his dad played a major part of it. He is absolutely useless at decision making. An embarassment.

Yeah I saw AM telling everyone to move back. What the **** was he thinking? He reverted back to his old ways where he was desperate of keeping the 1-1 instead of going for the 2-1 and what do you know it ends 1-2 instead.

I can't believe he has only picked up 4 wins out of 17. MON has already picked up 2 wins out of 3. I **** miss that guy now. We're **** under this useless manager. Some fans may over excited for now that we put in our first performance despite gifting away goals from set pieces near the end of the clock, but when we're going lower and lower in the table it won't matter. At least SHA had their Carling Cup as a consolation gift. They didn't even have to pay to get rid of him either. I think we could be stuck with him in the Championship. The board won't be able to afford to get rid of him by that point and they'll say he's the best possible man to bring us back up anyway. Would fans actually stand for that?

He was pretty good tonight. But two issues: 1. Nearly, nearly, nearly. He is never on time though. 2. Injure prone. I still think we should sell him. He takes too much of the wage bill and has contributed very little.

We still lost though due to the same stupid mistakes. Nothing really to be positive about at FT. I don't recall many people were happy with what happened at the end.

He has improved alot lately. Hope it continues.

The people who kept banging on about 10th. Look at the table again tonight. Nasty isn't it? And the next 2 games will be Stoke/Chelsea away. We're in a relegation battle and we have AM to keep us out of it. Be afraid.

I think we'll have 19 points in 19 games played. That's 1 point per average. Exactly the same stats AM suffered under SHA. Not good enough! All those draws he picked up is coming back to haunt him. He hasn't learnt a **** thing from SHA. Stupid clearing in the woods playing for draws. He did it again with Arsenal tonight. He seem satifised about the 1-1 scoreline. Didn't change a thing from the subs. Wenger however want to win it and made a double sub change where there was still alot of mins to play for and what do you know one of them makes an impact. Then suddenly AM brings on Fonz but by then it's too **** late. I'm sick of this useless prick.