The Europeometer™ (2024/25)

[Checko]

23 hours ago, Coffee_Johnny said:

Are you psychic? Almost spot on, except it’s a garret with a single cracked single glazing pane (looks bright out…) and overflowing B&H blue. 

I bet you have an absolutely cracking wistful stare.

[Decky]

Its really annoying that Man Utd are still in the mix with how shit they have been, just grinding out one goal wins. Bournemouth at home this weekend too. Hopefully results will start matching performances with them soon. 

[Froggy]

1 minute ago, Decky said:

Its really annoying that Man Utd are still in the mix with how shit they have been, just grinding out one goal wins. Bournemouth at home this weekend too. Hopefully results will start matching performances with them soon. 

 

Same. Should have won 6-1 last night. Highest xG of any team this season except Chelsea vs. Spurs when it was 11 against 9.

[Decky]

3 minutes ago, Froggy said:

 

Same. Should have won 6-1 last night. Highest xG of any team this season except Chelsea vs. Spurs when it was 11 against 9.

 

Chelsea are a shambles to be fair, there's games where yous probably looked good, the likes of Chelsea and Everton but I'm yet to come across a Man Utd fan who doesn't think performances in general this season have been really poor. Man Utd have definitely rode their luck to get a few of those one goal wins. Yous could have sneaked a draw against us and the performance was the worst I've ever seen from a Man Utd side. 

 

 

Edited December 7, 2023 by Decky

[Froggy]

Just now, Decky said:

 

Chelsea are a shambles to be fair, there's games where yous probably looked good, the likes of Chelsea and Everton but I'm yet to come across a Man Utd fan who doesn't think performances in general this season have been really poor. Man Utd have definitely rode their luck to get a few of those one goal wins. Yous could have sneaked a draw against us and the performance was a shambles. 

 

Last night was the first time we looked good to be fair. We were shit against Everton, just clinical. We looked really good last night though. Been saying all season that dropping Rashford will make all the difference. Our front four will pick itself now unless someone picks up a knock.

 

But aye. To be above Newcastle despite being in reverse gear is a miracle. If the performances like last night can continue we will go on a good run same as last season. Just a shame we have Bayern and Liverpool next week.

[The College Dropout]

2 hours ago, TRon said:

 

They are pretty similar to us, they have a really effective and attractive style of football, but I would think if there is a weakness it would be squad depth. An injury in key areas like up front might potentially derail them.

They’ve got great depth.  
 

On the bench they had:

Diaby 

Cash

Moreno

Duran

Ramsey

Lenglet

Zaniolo

Dendoncker

 

Nearly all of these would get good minutes for us.  

[The College Dropout]

1 hour ago, Decky said:

Its really annoying that Man Utd are still in the mix with how shit they have been, just grinding out one goal wins. Bournemouth at home this weekend too. Hopefully results will start matching performances with them soon. 

Thats why I haven’t discounted them. 

[Upthemags]

17 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

They’ve got great depth.  
 

On the bench they had:

Diaby 

Cash

Moreno

Duran

Ramsey

Lenglet

Zaniolo

Dendoncker

 

Nearly all of these would get good minutes for us.  

Outside of Diaby I don't find that bench all that impressive. What we do know is there are 3 or4 guys in their starting xi who are playing out of their skin this season, and if one goes down it stands to reason they'll see a drop in quality

[Mazzy]

19 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

They’ve got great depth.  
 

On the bench they had:

Diaby 

Cash

Moreno

Duran

Ramsey

Lenglet

Zaniolo

Dendoncker

 

Nearly all of these would get good minutes for us.  

 

I'd say 3 of those would get into our squad when we have everyone fit.

 

Diaby, Ramsey and Moreno.

 

Don't need Cash as we have Tripps and Tino and I only put Moreno in there because he's marginally better than what we have in the sqaud at LB.

 

The rest are no better than anything we have.

[The College Dropout]

14 minutes ago, Mazzy said:

 

I'd say 3 of those would get into our squad when we have everyone fit.

 

Diaby, Ramsey and Moreno.

 

Don't need Cash as we have Tripps and Tino and I only put Moreno in there because he's marginally better than what we have in the sqaud at LB.

 

The rest are no better than anything we have.

All of them would make our bench at the moment, would you disagree?

 

Those 3 probably start for us if everyone is fully fit. 

18 minutes ago, Upthemags said:

Outside of Diaby I don't find that bench all that impressive. What we do know is there are 3 or4 guys in their starting xi who are playing out of their skin this season, and if one goes down it stands to reason they'll see a drop in quality

Diaby, Ramsey & Moreno would probably start for us if they were fully fit and we had a fully fit squad.

 

Duran is the 3rd striker some think is necessary.

 

 

For me - it's the depth of the squad that is so serving them so well. They have Watkins, Kamara, Luiz  and the GK as the spine. But the rest - even at CB - they've got solid options. Even Duran is a good back-up but you wouldn't want to rely on him for 10+ games.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 7, 2023 by The College Dropout

[Erikse]

1 hour ago, Upthemags said:

Outside of Diaby I don't find that bench all that impressive. What we do know is there are 3 or4 guys in their starting xi who are playing out of their skin this season, and if one goes down it stands to reason they'll see a drop in quality

 

Bet everyone else said the same thing about us last season.

 

We did get lucky with injuries last season though, kinda. Except from Isak.

 

 

Edited December 7, 2023 by Erikse

[janpawel]

Villa also don't play every game 100mph like we do, surely that helps with fitness / injuries 

 

I'm hoping it's the next thing Howe implements as we continue to make progress and improve as a team

[Mazzy]

3 hours ago, The College Dropout said:

All of them would make our bench at the moment, would you disagree?

 

Those 3 probably start for us if everyone is fully fit. 

Diaby, Ramsey & Moreno would probably start for us if they were fully fit and we had a fully fit squad.

 

Duran is the 3rd striker some think is necessary.

 

 

For me - it's the depth of the squad that is so serving them so well. They have Watkins, Kamara, Luiz  and the GK as the spine. But the rest - even at CB - they've got solid options. Even Duran is a good back-up but you wouldn't want to rely on him for 10+ games.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right now, yes they all make our bench, that's not really up for debate as out bench is 75% youth players. Diaby and Ramsey would also certainly be in with a shout on starting when everyone is fit, but Moreno I could take or leave, we just aren't that strong at LB currently (albeit Tino is doing excellent there) that's the only reason I'd take him.

[Andybiotics]

Villa are 1 Watkins injury away from being a club in crisis. They literally have no other Strikers. 

[midds]

28 minutes ago, Andybiotics said:

Villa are 1 Watkins injury away from being a club in crisis. They literally have no other Strikers. 

 

I think that's a bit too dramatic tbh

 

They'd certainly miss him hugely but I can't see it being that bad, they'd just play another striker

[ponsaelius]

29 minutes ago, Andybiotics said:

Villa are 1 Watkins injury away from being a club in crisis. They literally have no other Strikers. 

 

Duran has looked decent when he's played. Diaby is a striker in their system.

[Decky]

Our away form is a massive concern now but seriously, is there any fucking sign of players coming back from injury so we can just rotate maybe one or two of our starting 11 and try and get back to some normality? Is anyone even close?

[buzz]

Just now, Decky said:

Our away form is a massive concern now but seriously, is there any fucking sign of players coming back from injury so we can just rotate maybe one or two of our starting 11 and try and get back to some normality? Is anyone even close?

 

03/04 esque

[Aiston]

Top 4 is going to look a long way away by January 1st.

[Stifler]

1 minute ago, Aiston said:

Top 4 is going to look a long way away by January 1st.

Yeah.

I’ve always thought that it’s disgusting how many games you play at Christmas time.

Absolutely no fucking need for that many games, every other league has gaps, yet we throw more in.

[ExiledGeordie]

No chance with these injuries. If the injuries clear up second half of the season and we sign a couple players then we can have a strong second half of the season though.

[TBG]

Only 21 points clear of Sheff Utd after that

[Stifler]

3 minutes ago, ExiledGeordie said:

No chance with these injuries. If the injuries clear up second half of the season and we sign a couple players then we can have a strong second half of the season though.

FFP has us fucked.

Meanwhile the cunts we played today fucked FFP off, and are in the process of trying to overturn their 10 points deduction, and I won’t be surprised if they do.

[brummie]

3 hours ago, Andybiotics said:

Villa are 1 Watkins injury away from being a club in crisis. They literally have no other Strikers. 

 

That isn't true.

 

We'd play Diaby in the Watkins role and move things around. Not that I think we don't need more options up front - we do - but that is not where our main injury threat lies.

 

When we sold Ings and then Cameron Archer, I thought Emery was nuts. He was right, though, that is a massive part in turning Watkins into what he is today. Also, depressingly because football shouldn't be like this, those sales helped with FFP, esp that of Archer, as a 19m home grown product makes a HUGE difference to the figures.

 

Easily the biggest problem for us would be Martinez being out, as Olsen is dog shit. The second biggest would be at RB as I am not sure Emery entirely trusts Cash and there's limited runway in Konsa playing there.

 

 

Edited December 7, 2023 by brummie

[brummie]

5 hours ago, janpawel said:

Villa also don't play every game 100mph like we do, surely that helps with fitness / injuries 

 

I'm hoping it's the next thing Howe implements as we continue to make progress and improve as a team

 

What I do think is that, even acknowledging we're in the Conference League and not the Champions League which makes things easier to handle, we've probably adapted to it really well. I've been a bit concerned at some of the rotation we've engaged in thus far, but he's proved himself to be right in all of it.

 

If we were playing in the Champions League now, it'd be much, much harder.