John

I think Wigan's hopes rest with the WBA game. If they lose that one the most they are likely to get before the last weekend is 3 points. I think they may get a point so that would leave them on 36 points before our game so 6 points from our next 3 games would leave Wigan unable to get above us. Anything less would see us needing to get a point or 3 from them on the last day and I would rather it did not go down to that. Should the worst happen and Albion do roll over for them then we would need 2 points from the next 3 games to still be in with a shout of ending the season above them. For me it has to start with a win on Monday.

Super Spurs!

"my United supporting mate was saying how Villa fans love to come to OT because it's a big day out". Tell him when you see him next we are not Wigan or Small Heath StephanAVFC and we have been going there long before the PL began even when they were in Division 2 in 74/5 and we were both promoted that season and ask him if he has looked back in the history books at those Cup Finals in 1957 and 1994 and whether he knows who ran them so close to that first title in so long in 92-93!

"Seems strange for an owner to not say anything to the guy who was in charge at the end of the season or to not even be the one to inform him he no longer has a job". Or was it that the decision had already been made that we would have a new management team in place for the following season and so he would have found it uncomfortable to have said well done on keeping us up when he knew he would shortly be letting him go Big_John_10?

I would be shocked if Wigan got anything from their games against Spurs or Arsenal other than a minus on their goal difference. I would expect them to beat Swansea and to get something (I hope no more than a point) at WBA who are on their deck chairs now and will not be bursting a gut to help us to stay up I think, so I see Wigan on 35 points before the last game. So we would need 5 points to know we are staying up before the last day. 6 points would cover us for them getting the odd unexpected point so wins at Norwich and Sunderland are what we really need but I think 4 may be more likely from those games and I see our game with Chelsea in much the same way as I see their games with those North London clubs so we may need to look to WBA to do them or leave it to us to secure our own safety on the last day. How sad it is that we have sunk so low as to be doing such calculations now at the foot of the league rather than at or near the top of it...

6 points from our remaining games should do it and this along with the game at Norwich appear the most likely route to those 6 points for me. That would also give us the option of getting something at Wigan on the last day if we need to and they are able to pull something unexpected out of the bag where something less from Monday may put staying up beyond us before then in that situation. We have to win this one as we did the last home game. The fact we did not beat Fulham makes it even more vital that we win this one. Anything less than a win might see Lambo repeating Ron Saunders "do you want to bet against us?" moment after defeat at home to Ipswich in 1981 but this time we are at the wrong end of the table.

Surely Odemwingie will spend the transfer window in QPR's car park? On a more serious note I think Herd can still have a bright future at VP.

"Would people rather keep Benteke and sign no one or sell Benteke and sign people?" I would rather do both! If we stay up some of the television money should be used to build the team in an attempt to prevent us suffering through another season like this one. Other teams will spend and we need to as well to try to secure a place in the PL as the risk we have taken this season was too great and we need to learn from this.

3 potential offside goals OK'd from the same linesman. Marginal they may have been but to have allowed all 3 beggers belief and the offside player was right next to the linesman in the build up to the crucial early first goal. Given that the result was never going to go our way and at least it did not end up being a Chelsea like score line that would have given Wigan a clear point by leaving them safe on goal difference. We go again next Monday and nothing less than a win will do then.

6 more points should do it and I would like to have those in the bag before the last day but I just do not trust WBA to get a win at home to Wigan knowing it would help us (show me I am wrong Baggies) and given there recent form as well so even should we say win against Sunderland and Norwich which is a best case prediction we would then need something at Wigan on the last day. That it has come to this is unacceptable and this is something less than the bright future we had been promised!

"Reading away (I think the score was 5-3, although the memory fades)". Not so, Fazilla 5-3 it was with goals from Lochhead, Tiler, McMahon, Anderson and an own goal from Butler. How about that 6-0 win at Oldham in the promotion season the following season Lochhead (3), Anderson and Bruce Rioch (2)? But that game against Bournemouth was the one for me back then 48,110 fans in Division 3, with us coming from a goal down on MOTD and with the sound of "Villa, Villa" ringing from every area of the ground loud and clear for all to hear.

He really has been so unlucky with injuries but he is young enough to bounce back and he really is a very bright prospect. He can have a big future for us and he has the potential to also play for England if he can come back strong, make up for lost time and stay out of the treatment room. I back Gary to have the will and ability to make this all happen he just needs and deserves some luck (other than the bad luck he has had up to now) on the injury front in the next and coming seasons.

We could do with Manchester City not losing at the weekend then Manchester United could not clinch the title with a win against us...

"Might be a bit harsh on Lerner and Faulkner...Things had to change, and they have... My view is that the changes have saved the club from a fate worse than a few seasons struggling, and although Randy and Faulkner should never have let it happen in the first place (or did they not 'interfere'?), they have at least had the sense to make sure it didn't continue like it did at Leeds and Portsmouth, and is doing at QPR (who spent big on experience in January, and are now screwed)." I see where you are coming from Pez1974 but I think we have took the cost cutting too far too soon. A gradual spending reduction could have been managed but to have cut back so hard and then have spent so little in the last window was too great a risk to take. If we get out of it Lambo will have done more than could have reasonably been expected and we really do need to back him with some of the extra money we would make from staying up in the next window.

"No no chance. The FA Cup final is the biggest game in their history". I would like to think so as well PaulC but they are in Europe already and might see staying up more likely and a bigger goal given the money that would give them than winning the cup (as others have shown earlier during the cup competition). But I guess no player would want to miss out on the final although I would not want it to go to that last game for us.

It is hard to accept that he has been injured for an entire season given it was said he was near to playing more than once and that we had a need for some experience in the centre of our defence during the course of this season. I would guess he has been frozen out at Villa Park by his own or the club's choice in much the same way as has horse meat lasagne at some retail outlets..

"We need a minimum of 4 points from the Norwich and Sunderland games. That would put us ahead of Wigan and Stoke on the final day by my reckoning". For me lp-villa830 we need to get 40 points on the board before that last game lottery wherever those points may come from. So I think we may need 6 from those 2 games and it is a big ask as they are both 6-point games. By the way does anyone else wonder if Wigan might rest players from the FA Cup Final should they need points from the last game to stay up???

"Dale Stephens, Liam Trotter, James Chester?? Guessing they will be still on managers list". I agree mikeyp102 but I guess Chester may stay where he is if as seems likely to me Hull go up even should we still be there to play them.

I think we have to accept that Murphy is the sort of player we will likely to be looking at whatever division we may start next season in. The price is likely to be right as will be the wages and he will see us as a step up where others who we may not be prepared to pay the fee or wages for in any case would not. If he proves as decent as Lowton and Westwood have been for us then I would be happy with that. I would add that even if we have money for a couple of players on bigger wages that would cost more we also need to look at players like this to give us more and better options next season than we currently have.

Source: Player Match Ratings – Not safe yet!

That Sunderland result is a shocker. Thanks for that Newcastle if you play like that for the rest of the season it may well be you rather than them who take the drop.

I like that headline!

They will be looking to clinch the title in style and we really cannot afford another drubbing as we need our confidence in place for the run in. My heart says we will shock them and that Benteke and Weimann will score before Gabby hits the winner in Fergie time. We owe them more than one and I refuse to listen to what my head is telling me about the outcome of this game...

Two of the hard earned points that we gained last weekend at Stoke were dropped yesterday at Villa Park and we may yet pay a very heavy price for that. We lacked a little of the fire, passion and resilience that we had showed when winning last weekend and the subdued performance we produced at times yesterday along with our inability to keep a clean sheet has left us still uncomfortably some distance from safety. This was a game we really needed to win. We could have stretched clear of the relegation places with a win and left ourselves perhaps just one more win away from safety. But a point was not quite good enough and it leaves us among the pack of teams who will battle against relegation up until the last game of the season with our seemingly winnable games now quickly running out. A win against Sunderland now looks increasingly vital and we may well need the same at Norwich given we face tough games against the soon to be crowned champions and Chelsea before the last game of the season at FA Cup finalists Wigan. I for one would not want to rely on renowned relegation fighters Wigan taking their eye of the ball in the league with a cup final around the corner and I really want our future secured before that last weekend. Our welcome win at Stoke was not enough to guarantee our safety in itself and we desperately needed to follow it up with a win against Fulham. Four points from six would have been acceptable before the win at Stoke but having achieved that win we needed to follow it up with another. At times the game was reminiscent of an end of season match between two mid-table teams who have nothing to play for but that applied to only one of the teams who took the field yesterday. Fulham who last tasted victory at Villa Park 40 years ago had Berbatov pulling the strings seemingly effortlessly up front and a solid defence that coped pretty well with what we threw at them. They had also gone 5 games unbeaten before losing at Newcastle so this was never going to be an easy win but it is disappointing that we have now dropped 23 points from winning positions and did so against a team who had until yesterday took only 4 points from losing positions this season. I had expected that after a rather tame first half that we had the best of particularly in the last quarter of an hour or so we would then go on to up the tempo in the second half. But it was the visitors who did so and although we did take the lead on 55 minutes and so only needed to keep a clean sheet to secure the win we so badly needed I think we all knew how unlikely that would be given our forwards know that 2 goals is a minimum requirement for a win given our accident prone defence. This was once again emphasised when they equalized 11 minutes after we went ahead. Clearly there was still time for a winner but the game drifted away from us all too tamely after we had been the more dominant side between our goal and their one and they might look back on it as one they could have won given the chances they had in much the same way as we will do so. We badly lacked the pace and the goals that Gabby has recently given us yesterday. But we also shot ourselves in the foot when for some inexplicable reason we took off N’Zogbia who had up until then been our biggest threat and who would have been the most likely of our players to provide the crosses for Bent who came on later. The first two substitutions it seems were planned before Fulham had equalized. When they did so I think we really needed to think again because we lost width, shape and impetus up front with these two substitutions and the changes did nothing to make things better and in fact had the opposite effect. I can see bringing on Sylla would have improved our midfield but one change for me would have been enough at that stage and it was not N’Zogbia that I would have seen make way for Sylla. Our manager has rightly said that the point we got from this game may be huge for us but conversely the two that we dropped may prove the same. My player ratings from a game that has seen us still looking over our shoulders and trusting that other teams do not pick up unexpected points between now and the end of the season are: Brad Guzan – 6 – An unusually quiet day at the office for Brad. Matthew Lowton – 7 – Sound enough at the back and good going forward. Ron Vlaar – 6 – Played his part in what was a good performance by our defence. Nathan Baker – 7 – Rock solid, loved the well timed crunching tackles and he will only get better with additional games. Joe Bennett - 6 – Decent today and got in a good block to a Berbatov shot which went out for the corner that gave them their equalizer. Jordan Bowrey – 6 – This was arguably his best game for us. He put himself about out wide and is another who will improve with further first team outings. Fabian Delph – 6 – What was otherwise a very sound display was marred by two moments. The first of these gave them a point on 66 minutes when he flicked a corner on into the net past both Baker and Guzan who were behind him and the second came 7 minutes later when he was presented with the chance to make amends but blasted the ball wildly showing a lack of composure when he really needed to be on target. Ashley Westwood – 7 – Another solid overall performance, kept possession well and had a shot deflected wide by Hangeland on 49 minutes. Charles N’Zogbia - 7 – MOTM – I really cannot understand why he was the first player to be pulled off given he had just scored and was therefore on a high. He forced a good one handed reaction save from Schwarzer on 31 minutes when he was found by Benteke and almost turned the ball in at the near post and had a decent effort from distance turned over the bar by the keeper a minute before half time. He then curled a sweet shot past the keeper and just inside the far post on 55 minutes after Weimann fed by Lowton had pulled the ball over and Hangeland’s attempted clearance had ran to him inside the box. Andreas Weimann – 6 – Andreas was some way short of his best yesterday but we are still more dangerous with him on the field than we are with him off it. He almost made something of nothing with his persistence on the half hour but Schwarzer managed to pip him to a loose ball within the area. He then pulled his shot wide from the edge of the box on 45 minutes after Benteke’s header on fell into his path. On 46 minutes he was played in by N’Zogbia and Schwarzer touched his effort away and just behind the incoming Bowrey at the far post for what would have been a tap in. Christian Benteke – 6 – Faced with the impenetrable Hangeland and the bulk of Senderos he failed to make his usual impact and to add the goal we have come to rely on from him each week. Lost possession a few times particularly in the first half and he did not boss opposition defenders this time. Hit a shot wide of the post on 25 minutes from a Lowton cross that had fell to him after just eluding Baker’s head. Had a late half chance on 90 minutes after Holman found him inside the area but his powerful shot was off target hitting the side netting. Substitutes: Yacouba Sylla– 6 – Replaced N’Zogbia on 68 minutes. Brett Holman – 4 - Replaced Bowrey on 69 minutes. He again very noticeably lacked the pace, commitment and hard running he had showed us earlier this season. He did however demonstrate the lack of options we had on our bench. Darren Bent – Replaced Weimann on 76 minutes. Lacked the time and the service to gather a rating or to make a decisive impact. Stay up the Villa and Stay Strong Captain! John Lewis

Remy to us would require a big change in our transfer and wage structure so I think Dale Stephens would be the more likely type of signing for us along with players from abroad who we can sign and make money on when we sell them on. But why would we need another striker if we stay up and have Benteke and Weimann available??