The College Dropout

Agree with this. The floor of Chelsea’s squad in ability is crazy high (except the GK and ST). Their 20-25 players would’ve probably started for us today

We were never going to win that tournament with Souness. Dyer and Jenas were killing Sporting with their pace and athleticism. Think they both got injured in the game and that was that.

Things like the Dan Burn slip just didn’t happen for vast majority of the season. That type of thing happened a few times in his first season at CB but he ironed that out in the main.

Funnily enough. I think 67 points is usually enough for 5th

Depends how much Villa have gambled financially.

One of the 3 centrebacks. 433. The back 5 is usually tactical. Today Howe simply didnt want to start Willock and Targett/Krafth.

I thought Forest would make it as they had great fixtures.

These proper botltled it. Lack of class and squad depth showed in the end. But also lost their nerve. If they had held their nerve against Leicestee they would be in the CL.

I’m not worried about Chelsea in the medium term. They are not well run enough. Don’t believe in the manager either. Something is seriously wrong when a £2bn squad is struggling to finish 4th when not in a competitive European competition. Conference has even been a blessing for them. It’s keep their second squad match sharp.

Would love to have a 30 year old Rondon as a bench option. We’ve had nowt upfront for weeks.

But it would’ve been overturned if the ref had delayed the whistle. Thats the issue. It being a foul is not the issue. Blowing the whistle is. At least to me anyway. Didn’t have the audio on high.

Bit of a blessing in disguise that

Nah if the ref had not blown his whistle before the goal went in - it would’ve stood. They are unlucky in that moment. Equally they would’ve been somewhat lucky that we shat the bed against Everton.

I hope so too. Eddie’s done wonderfully to get us in the CL. The squad is so thin. Villa are pretty much fully fit bar 1 I think tbf. They brought on Malen and Barkley as their final subs. Think Barkley starts for us and Malen might too - today I mean.

It helps man. We were so unsettled by his presence. Marked difference to an injured Isak and an elderly Wilson.

The one thing you want to avoid against a Moyes team and Pickford is letting them get that grit between their teeth. They can hunker down and see it out. Pretty much stopped watching for the last 20. We had nothing to give

Tbf to Man U and Spurs - this new European format makes it difficult to do well in Europe and the premier league. The level is too high.

Annoyed they’ve finished ahead of us again. They have a high floor of technical quality and a steep squad built on FFP fraud. But they are not a great side.

I agree. But that’s not Eddie’s style. Better versions of what Howe wants would work as well imo

We bottled a single game. It’s not the end of the world. If this was another club we would say they bottled that game without argument. Evidently - we are not a team of bottlers. Whenever we’ve had to get a result previously we have. But today? We bottled it. Man U and Ferguson were serial winners. But They bottled the league in 2012 the Aguerooooo year. They were 8 points ahead with 5 games to go or something like that. Drew at home to Everton after being 4-2 up. At 4-3 they lost their nerve - you could feel it in the atmosphere.

Disagree with this. We’ve not had the funds for him to be ruthless.

IMO we need more Eddie Howe hyper press players. We need to be able to lose one of the midfield big 3 and have another warrior step in.

A large part of the reason we lost was a lack of composure. The pressure got to the team and we were unable to play. We lost our nerve in that second half. That was probably the worst performance of the season. Up there with West Ham at home. &nbsp That second half was pure panic.

Was chief headloss when he should’ve been the one to get the ball down and play. Anyways this guy is a machine.

Lads did bottle it today. But we deserve 5th. Fantastic season.