brummie

That sounds really profound (genuinely, not taking the piss), but I've no idea what you're on about.

We're owned by the Lerner family trust, which is run by Randy Lerner, his sister and his mother. When daddy Lerner karked it, the three of them got 2bn dollars each, and Randy also got the Browns, valued at not much short of a billion dollars. Money isn't an issue. Its all very well going on about "buying players the way Villa are" but in the last year we've bought Marlon Harewood and Zat Knight. In the January window the only player we signed was Wayne Routledge. We've been heavily linked with Kevin Doyle. How would you have reacted to any of that at Newcastle? Too easy to say the grass is greener elsewhere. With a paper thin squad last year, we've bought 7 players since, but have shipped 6 out, so we're only 1 up on where we were. Also this talk of Man City, would you really want your club run like that? Players bought on the never never in a desperate attempt to keep up appearances? No ta.

As if.

Jesus, really? I thought he was one of the most laughably shit players at the Euros myself.

I'd love us to get Milner, and by and large I don't give a scooby how much we spend (it isn't my money), but really, 12 million of your English pounds? Fucking hell. If MON could get over his pathological fear of shopping outside the British Isles, I'm sure we could find a much, much better player than Milner for that amount in Europe.

Lad at work was going tonight, said it was only a Tenner.. what was the crowd mate ? 25,400 Not too bad considering 4-1 up from first leg, and live on telly. Still wish I hadn't bothered. Aye thats not bad. Another couple of season ticket holders in the office couldnt be arsed to go. I guess they saw what was coming I had to work till late so raced across town to get there in time for a quick drink in the ground. I was spitting feathers, got to the front of queue and remembered there's no booze on sale at UEFA games. Left with a full 15 minutes to go. The most low key match Ive been to in ages.

We've got Gash playing for us, too. Harewood and Knight for example.

Lad at work was going tonight, said it was only a Tenner.. what was the crowd mate ? 25,400 Not too bad considering 4-1 up from first leg, and live on telly. Still wish I hadn't bothered.

He was far from our shittest player tonight (I've just got back, what a waste of an evening that was). Harewood is simply not good enough. Knight was dodgy, Reo-Coker is incapable of passing a ball 5 yards to a team mate. Routledge and Salifou were the only two who looked vaguely decent.

Not necessarily, but you're taking it literally. The point I was trying to make was that Ashley might not be a RA style billionaire owner, but neither is he a Shinawatra or Gorfulgoldfishbowlsson one either. Maybe a responsible billionaire is the best type of billionaire owner to have?

re the huge turnover thing ..... you also have to take into account the cost of generating that turnover. The obvious example is the signing of expensive players that create a buzz, help put bums on seats and sell shirts, all major contributors to turnover. Hasn't Ashley discovered that the cost of generating that turnover was way too much and the club was sitting on a debt mountain, which he has now paid off? I reckon he'll play it similar to Lerner - make the money available when the manager needs it but improve the business efficiency of the club and get it to contribute as much as it can, without necessarily having to be self sufficient. I'd take that over Shinawatra (who will leave Man City in a perilous situation) or the Icelandic bloke at West Ham (who went mental last year and has now got bored with the whole affair) any day of the week. These are extremely rich men looking for a way to have a bit of big boys fun, even if it does cost them a lot of money. What they're obviously not going to do is irresponsibly blow a large chunk of their wealth in doing so. There will never, ever be another Abrahmovich. I think people are slowly starting to understand that.

Get any Birmingham supporter on here and they will tell you his workrate is indeed excellent. The only problem with that suggestion would be finding one who can write, let alone operate a computer.

Convicted murderer (well, death by dangerous driving twat) = Lee Hughes.

Nile Ranger? Is that a real person's name? How fucking cool is that. EDIT it sounds like an Egyptian ferry or something.

re the transfer request ... as i said before, I'd be surprised if he wasn't as good as gone for the club to issue that statement, but trust me, having had a summer of a player agitating in the press for a move WITHOUT submitting a transfer request, there's a lot to be said for Milner having the cojones to actually submit one. Far better that than getting his agent to whinge to the NotW.

Pennant is a much better bet than Aaron Lennon, for example, and probably than SWP too. I don't understand why people wank themselves into a frenzy over Lennon. All i see is a load of pace, absolutely zero end product, and some stupid eyebrow shaving.

In fairness, they actually got a result at our place last year We've got a problem with teams in red and white stripes. First them, then Stoke last week. I bet we get Atletico Frigging Madrid in the UEFA cup. To be fair to Keane, he's put a reasonable squad together, but surely their aim for this season would be mid table consolidation at best?

Did anyone see The Observer on Sunday, the bit where they get fans of each team to comment on their performance. The Sunderland fan said something along the lines of "I can honestly see us finishing in the top six, we're better than Villa and Man City were last season". The first ten lines of that sentence are the most wildly optimistic bit of football fandom I've seen in years.

After events of this summer, I absolutely fucking hate them. We had quite a lot of trouble after our home match with them last season. They're worse than Man United for having idiotic, know-nothing morons sitting in Liverpool shirts in the home end. There was a bit of aggro in the ground over that last year, I can imagine it being much worse this year.

There's a lot of sense in that. Happy to sit on the Chelsea bench all that time, and even now still doesn't really want to leave, and when he does it is back to where he was before. He's a waster. As is that cunt Bridge, for that matter.

No. It is the home of whining teenagers. Embarassing. Villa Ultras? Not that bad.

No. It is the home of whining teenagers. Embarassing. I've just been reading the forum, I don't think I'll go back. Even I don't bother reading it. Heroes and Villains is a decent read, but Villatalk is beyond awful.

No. It is the home of whining teenagers. Embarassing.

I can't imagine the club releasing the statement a week after the request unless he was practically out the door.

I wouldn't want to be a Man City fan these days for any money. All these players bought with 50p down then a gajillion a year for the next 5 years whilst Shinawatra gambles that he can stay out of jail AND get his money out of Thailand. It will end in tears. Big salty ones. SWP is a busted flush, anyway.