tinker

We will see who has the most to offer when we play each other in a few weeks, Gabby, Young, Warnock, Milner and Heskey and for Spurs Defoe, Crouch, Huddlestone, Jenas and Lennon. These players have a lot to prove, no more so than Young, who needs to get to the level he was at last season in order to push his case.

Lennon has been on form for a few months, Milner was clearly, IMO, one of Englands better players against Brazil, Capello seems to agree after his comments. Milner has two feet and can play in the middle, left or right, he can also fill in at LB and RB. To say Lennon gets his crosses in is probably misleading. When i have seen him he is most effective when he beats his man and runs to the by line, this will work against lesser defenders, when you come against top quality and you can't beat the man for pace then Lennon shows his weakness. A Young has the ability to be better than both of them, he is just off form, if he can get some form (which he appears to be) then he will force the issue. Suppose its all about opinion, but there is very little between Villa and Spurs IMO, first team and squad.

Bridge is of form and SWP should never be near the England squad, hes a one trick pony. The squad has turned into Sven's MKII, add Beckham to it to complete the 'film star' line up. We will be lucky to get to the 1/4 finals, IMO.

Spurs have a stronger first team? never. What players from your first team would get into ours? IMO 1 or perhaps 2. Defence . Villa > Spurs. The rest? Young > Modric, Milner > Lennon. Petrov> Jenas, Huddlesetone. Palacious > NRC, Sidwell. Attack Defoe => Gabby. Carew > Crouch We have had a moderate start to our season, Spurs have had their best start for years, how many points ahead? Its early days and it will be close but being as objective as I can :: Villa look to have a better chance, IMO. Congrats on the new stadium, looks nice, a bit like Derbys, The Re Cock and the Riverside + the Emirates...... Its a shame we have to keep our classic traditional stadium (the home of the modern game), complete with one of the finest Jacobean mansions in the world. I believed only Magpies were attracted to shiny things, maybe Cockrells are as well?

I would stick with NRC/Sidwell and Carlos at the back. On the basis that I would not change a winning team, however IMO MON will change it and Petrov and Collins will be back. I enjoyed watching NRC and Sidwell play against Bolton and they did well, but this does not make either of them a better passer of the ball than Petrov, and thats not to say Petrov is a playmaker, he is not, but he is better at it than either Sidwell or NRC IMO. What NRC gives us that Petrov does not, IMO, is an effective captain, very vocal and enthusiastic and this may be the deciding factor in who would play for me. I would however bet that MON picks Sidwell /Petrov and brings Collins back if fit, wonder if he will then move Carlos out to the right and drop L Young?

Collins should be left out, no point in rushing him back and him picking up another injury (remember Laursen?). It also helps build another central defensive partnership, which is useful to cover for injuries and suspensions. The Sidwell /Petrov thing is a little harder to judge, I would like Petrov back in the team, but would also like to keep NRC as captain, which wont happen if Petrov is back in the team.

IMO he must keep this team together, but you never do know with him, do we? This is the most frustrating thing for me with MON, he changes winning teams.

NRC as captain, master stroke from MON. His drive and motivation on the pitch is a vital factor in Villa's strong performance IMO, hope he plays the next game. Carew, West Ham performance was the opposite of this one, wanted the ball and worked very hard. All 8/10's.

Changed us beyond comparison to what we were, now for the next phase, and it will happen.

IMO we played with 10 men from the start and went down to 9 when Beye went off. People need to watch our games very closely, IMO one of our fans hero's has turned into a liability who can't play 90 minutes........Carew what the f**K is going on? Is he injured, not fit or has he got a mental block, I would rather Heskey have played the 90 TBH. The ref was very bad, on both teams but especially for us. Next! UTV

Young to score 2. 4-2 TO THE VILLA!

Collins was clearly obstructed for Evertons goal, the ref was shocking. On Everton fans, even though its annoying for the away team, their waying and screaming does influence the ref, so why would they stop? Wish we would start it to pressurize the refs at Villa park TBH. At the start of the season i would have accepted this result, bit disappointed now though as Everton are in their invertible slow start mode, reckon they will be there with us at the end of the season though, top 8. Carlos getting sent off was all his own fault, he dived across their player and may, just may have got the slightest of touches on the ball (thats from replays).

Petrov did always had the ability, but him turning it around was not predicted by many and it took him a bit longer than 6 months. As for the attacking central midfielders, we have Sidwell in that role now, how many games have they played together? Im not sure, plus with Downing to come in we will be changing our system and it just might be that MON has plans to play to Heskeys strengths when this happens. My point is that even if Heskey, Knight and a few others were brought in Haste (and in error), MON has noted the mistake and rectified it and if the purchase of Heskey, Knight........ are given as reasons for MON to go , then it is a poor argument IMO. MON has faults and one of them IMO is his stubbornness, but he does seem to get it right more than most. The transfer windows are very frustrating and MON has a history with Celtic that reflects this, their fans only real gripe of him. If some Villa fans cannot back him now, who could they back and under what circumstances? I for one would rather be in our position than Arsenals ATM (CL aside). We are nearly there and after 3 years and from 16th position thats good going IMO. UTV

We would have to drop Petrov to fit NRC in and that ain't gonna happen. Sidwell offers us a different type of outlet to either Petrov or NRC. Heskey, for all his faults, has only been at Villa for half a season, he still has time to turn his Villa career around, just like Petrov did. NRC will get his chance, probably against Sunderland, he needs to sit tight and keep his head down. How many matches have we won with Petrov staying on till the end, quite a few. We could have brought NRC on and lost or drawn these matches.

Zola did not want to sell him, that was the delay with Collins, Dunne was delayed because of Lescott. You can't seriously think MON leaves signing a player late because he chooses to? What benefit would it have? What would Mr Lerner say if he was? Is signing great players, late in a transfer period, a big enough fault in a manager to mean you would want him to leave? Despite his relative success.

Arsenal do not win sweet FA with their beautiful game. We have a team of hungry British players, trying to wrestle their title back from the foreign invaders. Please stay and finish the job Mr O'Neil. PS IMO this season could be the best chance we have to break this cartel up, we have no Europe and all of the usual top 4 seem beatable. 120-1.mmmmmmmm if I put a £10 on or even £100 that would give me...........! UTV

What a game, Gabby was unplayable at times, he really is going to be special if he continues to improve his game at this rate, they all grew as the game went on and TBH, they all deserved at least 8 in my book. Collins and Dunne.......what can you say? A Young battled and battled and put a few quality balls in (the one that found Milner who passed for Carew to miss was an exceptional cross + the pass from Milner, if only Carew had tapped it in it would have been one hell of a goal). Anyway had a read of a few match reports, the one I liked the most was from a Chelsea blog and included the line "Even as a recently spoilt Chelsea fan you have to wonder why none of Agbonlahor, Young or the brilliant Milner are pulling on our shirt this season. I’d swap any of them for Kalou." Chelsea Blog's Villa v Chelsea match report UTV

Financial Services are like the oil that keeps the economy turning and company's like JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs making profits is a positive story that the economy is moving in the right direction again. Neither of these companies recieved bailout money from the government of either the US or UK and by all accounts were well run allowing them to weather the economic crisis and come out the other side in good shape. A positive news story on the economy for a change. I'd much rather be hearing these stories than headlines about these companies needing government bailout money. I understand your point of view, but can't understand the principles of making vast amounts of money, but producing no goods, no raw materials, just money making money. IMO the system is fundamentally flawed. Only time will tell who is right, but I have a nasty feeling about an economy built on the principles of using money to make money, and no hard goods produced.

How can you make this type of money and produce nothing? The world has gone mad and we do not seem to able to put the brakes on, another economic crash is in the wings. Might sell my house and buy gold.

Met Astro once (ub40) he was having a piss outside my local (the Bradford arms, Castle Brom) My brother said to him "Oh, so it ain't true what they say about black men"

Indian women tend to do quite well in the Miss world competitions, they are beautiful. Ukranian girls are also very nice, but tend to be a little on the expensive side. :shock:

Well played, IMO we are still not in form yet we keep pulling these results out of the bag. Young was of the pace, IMO he is being hit hard early in the game and its taking its toll on his overall play, he will get his form back and when he does we will be flying. Collins was very good IMO, Dunne was good but don't half commit himself in the tackle, can see how he gets booked. Gabby, hes gonna be a real top quality striker for us see what he was trying to do against the SHA now, except this time he finished it perfectly. MOTM for me was though was Brad, top quality calm, composed. UTV

The performance was not great but with better finishing we should have won 4-1, Milner, Gabby and Carew messed up very good chances and Carsley messed a decent chance up. IMO we are still gaining form, which is a very good sign. The defence looked more secure than I have seen it in a great deal of time. The goals against tally for this season should be the best for quite a few seasons if Sunday has any think to show us.

My MOTM, Collins won header after header. MON took a risk in starting with 3 new players at the back, but it worked out and all of the back 4 played well. Dunne will become a great player for us a leader. Ash was quiet and Milner had a bad game for him, lots of missed passes. TBH I Don't think we are firing on all cylinders yet, but to win matches like this one when we are not in form bodes well for this season.

I have recently been to Dorset and saw 3 Villa shirts and no Spurs shirts, North Wales 2 Villa shirts and no Spurs shirts (plenty of Liverpool and Man U though). Not sure why people are building assumptions on Spurs or any other club for that matter on estimated and outdated figures or no figures at all, just hearsay. Star Player? For every Merson there is a Ginola. As for Carbone, IMO he only ever performed in odd games and is no more a flair player than either Young, Milner or Delph. IMO Our profile has been raised more than most other Premier League teams (bar one!) in the last 3 seasons and for that I would like to thanks the whole team at Villa, keep up the good work. UTV