leffe186

I love the idea that Lerner was only there to make money, given how much he's ploughed into Villa over the last few years without, ultimately, much reward. In MON we trust...

Just generally confident and spreading confidence, good distribution and communication. That's what I wanted to see.

I'm going to bloody bleat. Forgot how irritating Europe could be - referees who ignore cynical, persistent fouling, then make other decisions that leave you seriously questioning their motives. *sigh* Nine shots on target to their one (seven on target to zero), and seven fouls to their 21 (that the ref actually blew up for). Ah well. Least we looked OK, and Lloris and Caulker were excellent.

Fair play. Actually, we're already missing Kaboul and Parker, but we've got good cover in those positions. The only position we currently have no proper cover for is arguably left back, and of course, Benny's injured.

I think we'd be OK, tbf.

Well, it's funny now, wasn't so funny before Sunday...

Really liked Weimann when I saw him with your kids a couple of years back. Everyone was raving about Bannan and some kid you swiped from Watford, but Weimann had some real intelligence.

Don't think I'll even bother reading it tbh. We all knew this was going to happen if we put a foot wrong at the beginning, and we've certainly done that. Not that I'm convinced AVB is the answer, but he was never going to get a fair crack from many in the media.

McLeish Hodgson. Er, Kinnear?

That sense of perspective arose despite us shouting repeatedly, and to the rooftops (albeit not the redtops, they weren't listening), about the way we were being treated. I think it is almost impossible for a younger fan today to grasp some of the inhuman policies that were visited upon football fans. Just imagine if the disaster had happened at a Stamford Bridge with fans hemmed in by electric fences, as had been proposed by that utter c*** Bates. That particular perspective was adopted knowingly and willingly by those with the power to make a change.

Wouldn't want to be one full stop tbh.

Damning with faint praise there.

I think we actually made a profit on player sales - you're counting Bassong and Dos Santos (undisclosed) as zero? Doesn't really matter, the point stands. Neither of us have really invested much, while Liverpool (plus Chelsea etc) have again spunked loads. I suspect that one or two clubs have spent next year's TV money this year.

We did. Where is that list?

If that's true about the deals breaking down, it's more likely to be a function of where we are as a club. We pay less wages than the big boys (and some of the small boys) but are trying to get players of a higher level in. As a result, you'd expect wages to be a bigger issue in negotiations. Supposedly we are heavily weighted towards bonuses rather than basic, which will not be to everyone's liking. Apart from the obvious point that a large amount of reportage on this is bullshit.

desperate. Your group is ace. Wine in Bordeaux, beer in Bruges and Madeira in, er, Madeira. We have Athens, Rome, and the European City of Culture. Liverpool have a tough draw. Group H is fucking horrible.

Fuck me, our group is harder than yours. So much for our seeding

Are Panathinaikos any good this year?

They've been pissing us about for two years! We would if we could.

Don't think you'll need it.

I have done

So you could draw Moscow, Kharkiv and Dnipro? Nice.

When is Ellis Short going to get bored of giving them thirty mill a year?

I have a suspicion that a tiny part of you all would die if you actually won a trophy.