brummie

And who can blame them.

I just do not understand why he's playing Jordan Henderson, who is 33 tomorrow against a bunch of postmen and plumbers. He's clearly not the future of England, so why bother at all? And why play TAA in midfield rather than any of the really good midfield options we'd have who we could play with the chance of them playing there long term? I think Southgate gets a lot of unfair flack, but fuck me, he does not help himself sometimes. Harry Maguire. Jesus Mary.

I always think there's no point really worrying about it, if you start with a difficult run of fixtures (obv your first fixture will be EXCEPTIONALLY difficult), it balances out as some point you'll get an easier run. Although I remember thinking "Bournemouth away first day, piece of piss", and it was, but we still got relegated. Oh I dunno.

Phillips is a good player but his whole situation reminds me of Fabian Delph, and look what happened to his career - ended up at Everton. *shudder*

Who is that guy? He's brilliant.

To be fair, if you appoint the manager, you have to back him, so if Gerrard really wanted him and the money was there, wage structure permitting, all Purslow could do was back him. It was the appointment of Gerrard in the first place that was the catalyst. I dunno, I might be wrong, for all this, perhaps he just wants a change.

NB Coutinho - started doing well before his last injury. It won't be that - we've a big recruitment team inc a recruitment director they think very highly of. Players sometimes don't work out, that's not what it'll be (and besides, that was on Gerrard).

He apparently pushed through the Gerrard appointment big style, whilst Sawiris and Edens were unconvinced. When Gerrard got sacked after Fulham away, Sawiris was, according to those around him in the corporate area, absolutely fuming and left during the second half. He then sacked Gerrard before he'd got on the team coach home, whereas you'd expect the CEO to do it. The last few months he's had a very low profile (normally he'd turn up to the opening of an envelope) and they've appointed new big-hitter names to run the various bits of the club, particularly some guy from the Philadelphia 76ers to run commercial, which doesn't really leave much for the CEO to do. Basically, though, Gerrard was hugely Purslow's appointment. It's the only mistake I think he's made so far. Unfortunately, it was the biggest one he could make, and what Emery has done with the same squad has really made that starkly clear, so yep, this smells of Gerrard basically.

Purslow has stepped down as CEO today, I think Monchi (which of course makes me thing of the mental TV show Monkey) or whoever goes into that role completes a structure that doesn't really need CEO. He's not massively popular as he comes across as smarmy, but to the guy's credit - been here 5 years, club on its knees when he arrived, he's played his part in a total turn around.

Amazing that Scott Carson - basically what you'd get if you deflated Chris Moyles a bit - stands to win his second CL medal tonight. Jimmy Rimmer also won two European Cup medals despite playing for a handful of minutes across 180 mins football.

I trust Emery. I saw him take McGinn from a shambling mess to a dynamic, all over the pitch midfielder inside ten games. I've seen him bring out the best in almost our entire squad. The talent is there, he'll sort it.

https://www.avfc.co.uk/news/2023/june/10/villa-announce-tielemans-agreement/ Signed.

Free transfer signings always command bigger wages.

Good signing. Kamara, McGinn, Tielemans, Ramsey, Luiz - total cost about £20m.

Remarkably, that bell end Danny Mills has been bigging up Carpethead's time at Villa.

Even with Kalvin 'Ten Minutes Here and There' Phillips in it.

It certainly does. *wink*

Made up for Danny Ings.

Rice getting his kid to wave "tara" to the West Ham fans.

David Moyes looks like my Grandma used to do in the mid 80s after too much sherry on christmas day.

Going to live stream me watching all the away legs just for you, big fella. #UTV and you know it.

Guarantees more Moyes next season and a 15th place finish, mind.

Savage genuinely ruining this.

When we win this next year, I am going to be giving it large on here, and no mistake. It's a perfectly good competition.

Savage, Jesus Christ.