Eddie Howe

[Stottie]

We've now conceded 23 goals at home, joint third most in the league. 11 in the last four matches. We've also scored 8 in those 4 matches, third most in the league, but lost three of games due to conceding 11.

 

We'll get nowhere shipping so many goals. Other aspects of the team aren't great either, but are secondary to us conceding so many.

[Ben]

Howe seemed really pissed off yesterday, I reckon he'll make big changes this summer

[astraguy]

I feel sorry for him, he needs a better squad to pick from like the 'top 6'. Sure i read this Is our busiest season since the late 50.we really need villa not to bottle the top 5 otherwise it's never gonna stop with them

[Dr Venkman]

11 hours ago, Erikse said:

Is it not then out of utmost importance to not play key players in games where they don't need to?

[TheBrownBottle]

19 minutes ago, astraguy said:

I feel sorry for him, he needs a better squad to pick from like the 'top 6'. Sure i read this Is our busiest season since the late 50.we really need villa not to bottle the top 5 otherwise it's never gonna stop with them

Villa qualifying does nowt to the usual suspects, but it gives Villa a massive boost.  Villa qualifying does us no favours whatsoever. 

[astraguy]

5 minutes ago, TheBrownBottle said:

Villa qualifying does nowt to the usual suspects, but it gives Villa a massive boost.  Villa qualifying does us no favours whatsoever. 

If it's stops one of the big spenders getting in I'm all for it, especially Liverpool or Chelsea 

[HayDen Traces]

I'm all for any clubs displacing the big 6. Except Sunderland.

[TheBrownBottle]

12 minutes ago, astraguy said:

If it's stops one of the big spenders getting in I'm all for it, especially Liverpool or Chelsea 

Doesn’t make a dent mate

[nufc4eva]

He maybe needs to get us to 40/45 points and then play some of the younger players like Neave, Shahar, Park etc to try and blood them in this season. Park can't be worse than Elanga and Murphy and Neave can't be worse than Wissa/Woltemade.

 

That way if we write off the league we are actually giving some players experience rather than persist with utter shit performances

[andyc35i]

5 hours ago, OverThere said:

Big summer coming up. We need a keeper, a CF,  another CH, a better RW and I think a holding midfielder (one who likes possession). IMO there are several that need to go including Elanga and Wissa -- horrible buys.

 

 

 

We also need a full back that can ideally do well on both sides. We’re looking at 7 players in and god knows how many out - it’s not going to happen.
 

I suspect that as we won’t be in Europe, it will be minor investment in the hope of finishing top 7 based on the players we have now 

[OverThere]

5 minutes ago, andyc35i said:

We also need a full back that can ideally do well on both sides. We’re looking at 7 players in and god knows how many out - it’s not going to happen.
 

I suspect that as we won’t be in Europe, it will be minor investment in the hope of finishing top 7 based on the players we have now 

Well to finish top 7 we would need a striker above all else

 

[OoOGazOoO]

9 hours ago, Froggy said:

 

It's not as rosy as it looks. I would say there's an argument that each performance has been worse than the previous one since we beat City. 

 

We were average to poor against Fulham, West Ham and Everton and were nicking points thanks to Sesko producing magic off the bench. 

Fair mate, clearly you watch them a lot more than I do, I have seen bits and the results and thought they were turning a corner.

[The Prophet]

I didn't watch this, so not going to get into the tactics or digging players out, but you can pin point the games we'll struggle in at the moment. 

 

We've shown so much more control away from home over the last few weeks, but our home games remain end-to-end affairs where we open ourselves up to the fine margins (i.e goal keeping errors) falling again st us.

 

Can guarantee we'll be much improved v Man United, but our answer of struggling against the mid-table teams seems to be to allow the game to become overly stretched and open, which has been just as ineffective.

[Froggy]

2 minutes ago, OoOGazOoO said:

Fair mate, clearly you watch them a lot more than I do, I have seen bits and the results and thought they were turning a corner.

 

Well we have to be fair. But that corner wasn't hard to turn.

 

I'm hoping for a much better performance today though. 

[Wallace]

Even if Villa don’t make top 5, they can still qualify for the Champions League if they win the Europa League.

 

[TRon]

2 hours ago, astraguy said:

I feel sorry for him, he needs a better squad to pick from like the 'top 6'. Sure i read this Is our busiest season since the late 50.we really need villa not to bottle the top 5 otherwise it's never gonna stop with them

 

I don't think anyone sensible expects him to compete with the cartel clubs tbh. Our problem at the moment is breaking into the top 8. 

[jackyboy]

Eddie looked absolutely gutted yesterday and looked ready to walk away.  I hope that doesn't happen because he's not been dealt a good hand this season.  It all started with the Isak fiasco which I blame Mitchell for And no one else 

[TheBrownBottle]

For those who like all the records getting broken, there’s another one we could be on course to break this season - the most we’ve ever conceded in our history at home in a 19-game league season is 33 (under Bruce, of course).  We’ve conceded 23 in 14 so far - another couple of performances like the last two and we’ll see that that record go.  

[TheBrownBottle]

35 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

I didn't watch this, so not going to get into the tactics or digging players out, but you can pin point the games we'll struggle in at the moment. 

 

We've shown so much more control away from home over the last few weeks, but our home games remain end-to-end affairs where we open ourselves up to the fine margins (i.e goal keeping errors) falling again st us.

 

Can guarantee we'll be much improved v Man United, but our answer of struggling against the mid-table teams seems to be to allow the game to become overly stretched and open, which has been just as ineffective.

Agreed - it’s amazing what being in the shop windows can do for some of our players’ performances 

[TRon]

55 minutes ago, andyc35i said:

We also need a full back that can ideally do well on both sides. We’re looking at 7 players in and god knows how many out - it’s not going to happen.
 

I suspect that as we won’t be in Europe, it will be minor investment in the hope of finishing top 7 based on the players we have now 

 

 

We'll have to bring some players in just because some will be out of contract and moving on. We already spent big last summer so if we want to do the same again we'll maybe have to sell some of those we bought and take a loss in order to buy in players fit for purpose. 

[TRon]

Also I imagine we might end up selling Tonali or any other player who the big clubs are targeting. That will mean more funds to spend, but whether we will be able to improve on the back of that is another matter. 

[TheBrownBottle]

1 minute ago, TRon said:

 

 

We'll have to bring some players in just because some will be out of contract and moving on. We already spent big last summer so if we want to do the same again we'll maybe have to sell some of those we bought and take a loss in order to buy in players fit for purpose. 

Just to add - not being in Europe doesn’t just impact our income; it impacts the % of our income we’re able to spend.  Without Europe, a thumb-suck guess would put our income at around £370m, assuming a top-half finish - and a SCR ratio of 70% would mean that we would have a budget of about £260m for footballing purposes to stay within the rules (though this can be stretched to include 100% of income).  Our current wages + amortised transfers is well over £300m.  For all the talk about holding onto players, I don’t really see how we can, assuming a mid-table finish. 

[500bhp]

It feels like you only ever need to watch the first 5 minutes of our games to know the what the outcome will be. When we start at full throttle like Spurs away you know it'll be a good day. When we start like yesterday you know it'll be shit. Said to the lad next to me 5 minutes in, that we'll not win today. We were so passive from ko and when we do that we never seem able to step up the intensity. 

[TRon]

3 minutes ago, TheBrownBottle said:

Just to add - not being in Europe doesn’t just impact our income; it impacts the % of our income we’re able to spend.  Without Europe, a thumb-suck guess would put our income at around £370m, assuming a top-half finish - and a SCR ratio of 70% would mean that we would have a budget of about £260m for footballing purposes to stay within the rules (though this can be stretched to include 100% of income).  Our current wages + amortised transfers is well over £300m.  For all the talk about holding onto players, I don’t really see how we can, assuming a mid-table finish. 

 

 

We are almost being forced to operate like an Ashley club on steroids. I suppose the big difference is we can spend our budget on improving our recruitment staff and other operational personnel at the top level with the aim to drive up our income - which Ashley would never have done because it means investing significant money up front with no guarantees of a return. 

 

But it's a slow process and fans will just have to come to terms with it. We've been ahead of the curve for the last few seasons, now we are having a dip. I think next season will be a real barometer of where we are headed. 

[TheBrownBottle]

1 minute ago, TRon said:

 

 

We are almost being forced to operate like an Ashley club on steroids. I suppose the big difference is we can spend our budget on improving our recruitment staff and other operational personnel at the top level with the aim to drive up our income - which Ashley would never have done because it means investing significant money up front with no guarantees of a return. 

 

But it's a slow process and fans will just have to come to terms with it. We've been ahead of the curve for the last few seasons, now we are having a dip. I think next season will be a real barometer of where we are headed. 

100%.  I think folks need to get their head into that space or they’re liable to become aggrieved this summer.  There’ll be a few players itching to go in May, and for once we’re likely to make serious money on them.  Nothing wrong with it - everything looks stale at present in any case.  Assuming Howe is in charge, he’ll need to bring in quite a few players.  For all the talk of ‘transition seasons’, this isn’t one; we’ve just been a bit shite for most of it.  Next season will be a genuine ‘transition season’.