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Thursday, July 13, 2000
Something has got to give....What the hell is going on with our football club? I am beginning to get sick of us being the laughing stock of the tabloids when, for once, I can't argue with anything that's been written. When is someone going to come forward and explain what is happening? I can't remember a loger period without JG being quoted in the press and where's Deadly, our esteemed director of football? Clearly not wheeling and dealing in the transfer market that's for sure. I consider Luc Nilis a signing from last season as it was signed and sealed before the last game which means not a single signing so far. The list of names we have supposedly been about to sign/interested in signing is laughable......Jao Pinto, Gomes, Sutton, Ginola, Lennon, Staunton, Gudjonnson, Nyarko etc etc.......how close have we actually come to signing any of them? How can we expect to when both our manager and chairman are on holiday? So far we've sold two solid squad players for massive losses (personally I was actually looking forward to Watson moving inside to centre back when Ugo & Southgate leave as I think that's his best position). Add to that Southgate, Ugo, Merson & Joachim desperate to get away and Carbone's likely no-return and it all adds up to an absolute farce. How can we go from last season when towards the end I genuinely believed we had the makings of a good squad which, with a couple of big game-changing players added could realistically challenge the likes of Leeds and Chelsea for the 3rd Champions league spot to where we are now....in complete and utter disarray.......somebody has to do some explaining and very quickly. I had to laugh today when I read in the paper that the President of Real Madrid has offered to pay for all 75,000 members' season tickets should he fail to sign Luis Figo before the start of the season (a personal hit of £6million should he have to cough up).........can you imaging Deadly making that sort of pact with the us?????? Mind you, in light of reports that we've only sold 6,000 season tickets so far he wouldn't be too out of pocket.
It looks like Doug could be very lonely sat in his new £15 million stand on his own. I'm stuggling to remember the last time a stand banged in 25 goals in a season............ Monday, May 22, 2000
No excuses...Well....we've only got ourselves to blame. Realistically we couldn't have asked Chelsea to play any worse than they did on the day...we just weren't good enough to beat them when they played badly so quite frankly we got what we deserved.....nothing. We put out our first choice 11 and they couldn't create a clear cut chance in 90 minutes....that to me was more disappointing than losing.Taylor wasn't fit but tried his heart out as always leaving George and Merse to cover much of Tayls' ground...not a good start when you're only playing 3 in midfield and the ball was being played too early up front to Dion giving Delaney and Wright no time to get forward to support. Which brings me onto my main point this week. The Final comvinced me that we are a worse team with Dion in it...a strange thing to say about our leading scorer but just think about it for a moment. What I mean is that with the players we currently have we play better without Dion. Our great run this season started when Dion got injured and a mini poor run began again when he returned. Dion gives players the easy option of just playing the ball long as we did time and time again on Saturday. The result is that our wide players cannot possibly get far enough up the pitch to support and Dion and Carbone/Joachim are isolated with no support...end result...the ball comes straight back. When Dion was out we had to pass the ball through the midfield allowing players like Merson and Carbone to get on the ball but also Wright and Delaney time to get foward and support in wide positions. This delay in turn gave Taylor and Boateng time to make runs beyond the front two to get into scoring positions...remember Tayls' scoring streak after Christmas? I cannot remember a single Villa player making a run (and getting close to receiving the ball) beyond Dion. We made life so easy for Lebeof because Desailly just took the first ball and either won it or Leboef swept up behind him under no pressure at all as Dion was alwyas the furthest man forward. If we were going to play to the gameplan of aiming for Dion's head why wasn't Stone on the pitch playing as a winger to at least get crosses in from further up the pitch. If Chelsea had played the way we did Ugo and Gareth would have had just as easy an afternoon as we gave their defenders. Anyway...I'm too depressed to write much more for now. Living and working in London my Monday morning has been horrific...Chelsea fans everywhere....neutrals giving me shit for the way we played and approached the game and the worst thing of all is that I have no answer. At least the general concensus is that we outsung them! Even if it did seem as though every neutral ticket had gone to Chelsea fans....did anyone else get that impression? Any ideas on how this happened? Tuesday, April 18, 2000
ere we goPersonally i think the 3 games since we won at Wembley have been the most encouraging in recent memory. Let's look at the scenario...our first FA Cup Final in 43 years and following Chelsea's win against Newcastle the likelihood is we'll qualify for Europe even if we lose on May 20 courtesy of either Chelsea's exploits in the Champion's league or their final league position above us. To roll off the 3 wins we have in quite different scenarios has given me great heart not only in the ability but in the spirit we have in the team now. Sheff Wed fighting for their lives were dispatched at the death, some might say luckily, but aren't late,late winners the hall mark of that team from Old Trafford who are the yardstick any ambitious club should be marking themselves against? Onto Leeds to complete a treble of wins over a more highly rated team than our own (all at crucial stages in both our seasons I might add) with a fantastic rearguard action (and some luck) and yet another great performance from our so called "dodgy keeper". And finally at White Hart Lane on Saturday from being 2-0 down and seemingly out of the game the temptation must have been there to let one game slide but seeing that comeback and the confidence from each of the last 3 scorers to even attempt the strikes that became great goals speaks volumes for the atmosphere in the club right now. Following on from my last post regarding our "boo boy" section do you think Allan Wright would have even attempted that strike when he was public enemy number one not so long ago for fear of missing and the groans that would bring from the crowd? The most encouraging aspect recently has been the public displays of togetherness from the whole squad and from that comes pride in both collective and individual performances. I get the feeling that no-one wants to underperform in any game for two reasons...the first being they don't want to let their teammates down and secondly their is a very real risk that should they lose their place they will find it difficult to get it back. JG is quite right to praise Allan Thompson's attitude in recent weeks and the guy should keep his place as long as he performs....that is the mentality of great sides and we appear to be starting to get it....and it's no coincidence that the results are following. Let's assume Man U have wrapped up the Prmiership well before their visit to us on May 14 and speculate that it's just possible we could, given recent form and the fact that 3 out of our 4 remaining games are at home, collect maximum points from our last 4 games. It is not impossible, given the run ins of the sides above us that we could, just could sneak thrid place with a further 12 points. It's not so long ago we were 1-0 down at home to Sheff Wed at half time and the team were being booed off the pitch. That same team and manager are in dnager of winning the FA Cup and qualfying for the Champions league (or UEFA at least) 5 months later.....we have boguth no-one in that period, but the thing we have gained is confidence and we, the supporters breed that or destroy it. Our attitude affects the performances of our team and that of the opposition and the sooner we realise it the better. Villa Park can be one of the loudest and most difficult gorounds for opposition teams to come if we choose to make it that way.....and the team needs us most when things aren't going our way not when we're cruising. Let's face facts, the team are likely to improve on last season's finishing position in spite of us and not because of us...and that stinks. Crowds are down, noise is down and it is the players inspiring our contribution when surely it should be a joint effort?We have a squad which is capable, as they are proving, of being competitive> I'm not saying for a minute it's the finished article but for the first time in a while we have players pushing for every position and this can only be healthy. We have continued our sound defence in spite of our captian's recent absence with a previously untried youngster performing well in his place. Ian Taylor has not been missed when at one stage he looked like the key to our success. This is one of the most promising squads of players the Villa have had since 1980 (but how many of us realised the potential of that squad until well into the season...I know I didn't). However, the key is will we capitalise on this foundation or let another opportunity slide by again as we have in the past.........over to you Doug.....mow is the time we should be upping the pressure on Doug..when things are going well. It's easy to criticise when things are going wrong and we are better at that than most and at these times scapegoats are easily found. We have been guilty in the past of letting the management (in the non-playing sense) of our club get away with being complacent when things are going relatively well. A long overdue FA Cup win and Europe (in whatever guise it turns out) should be the start of our development not be looked at as a job well done. It is consistent success which makes great clubs and attracts the best talent time and again. How nice would it be to belive the weekend press speculation that Luc Nillis is trying to persuade a £20M rated striker to join him at Villa next season. I don't doubt Nillis could have a role in influecning his current strike partners choice of next club but I have to ask myself how attractive we are to a player like Van Nistelrooy given the other clubs vying for his signature and can we realistically expect our chairman to lay out more on one player than he is on developing our ground to accomodate fans we don't currently have.
Winning the FA Cup and qualifying for Europe would make us more "marketable" to top players but if we think that our handling of the Carbone situation (especially given the nominal transfer fee involved) will go unnoticed by any prospective transfer target of ours would be very naive. My view on the Carbone saga, for what it's worth (it's my log after all!) is pay the guy (within reason) what it takes to keep him. We (the club and the fans) should start to look at transfer deals in terms of the overall package for the length of contract the player signs not just in a pounds per week equation. Credit to Chelsea for being the first to really grasp this and paying top players top wages IF they are available either free or for a nominal fee as they are soon to be exlcuded (Chris Sutton excluded...hahaha). Let's not forget that Man Utd broke their pay structure not for Roy Keane but first for our own Mark Bosnich on the grounds that to sign a similar keeper in todays market would cost upwards of £4-5 million before they sat down to discuss salary. For all his tantrums and dodgy Alice bands, Carbone has made a difference to our team and added another dimension which is essential to progression in any competition these days. Would we have beaten Leeds in the FA Cup without Carbone? I don't think so..and should we gon on to win the Cup that alone would more than fund the money required to keep the guy at the club for the next 3 years..it's so rare we've had a potential solo match winner at the club full stop let alone one who expresses such public desire to stay and we are in danger of letting him slip away which would be tragic. When you look at the total money outlayed (transfer fee and wages)on any recent signing Carbone represents the value deal Villa have been offered in our recent [cropped. 7,600 character limit.] Thursday, April 6, 2000
Although I don't really care who we play in the final I do..if that makes any sense. I'd much rather play Newcastle than Chelsea. Nothing to do with football.....I just think it would be a better day out if we were playing Newcastle. We would be stirred to louder and more prolonged singing in response to the Toon army, it would be a more colourful day out and the nasty edge Chelsea bring would not be missed in the slightest. The Cup Final is one day when I would like to feel I can wear my Villa shirt with pride and not have to worry about any trouble. However, with Chelsea I would have to think very seriously about whether it was worth it. From where I live near Maidenhead I would do most of my travelling to the game in the close vacinity of Chelsea fans and my experience of them is that there are still many nasty bastards amongst them and I would not want my day ruined before it had begun at Paddington Station at 11am!
So come on Newcastle!!! So far so good. 11 years old...5 years as a Villa fan...the 2 biggest trophies in the game and the 2 biggest pints of my life. The 19 years since then have been something of a mixed bag and my thoughts on our great club and its running will come out in later postings but for the next few days I only want positive thoughts hence my reminiscing back to those great days.
The fact is that as good as those days were, there is still and alwasy has been, something special about the FACup Final. It's the first game of football I ever remember watching. It was that great day they used to make a "Question of Sport" special for. It was so great a day they used to have a programme the night before entitiled "Who'll win the Cup".It was so great a day teams were forgiven making some of the worst pop records in history and better still fans were forgiven for buying them. I used to get so jealous of the supporters of the team in the final for such unashamed focus on their teams and dream how great it would be when Villa inevitably got to the final. Note the WHEN Villa got to the final. My teens came and went....into my twenties....last year I reached 30 and still no FA Cup Final. This was getting silly. I remember singing the old song including the line "seven times we've won it no-one else can catch us up". Well they had caught us up...and overtaken us.
Working in media, as I have for the last 10 years, it is the world of corporate hospitality. More on that in later postings aswell...but suffice it to say I could have attended most FA Cup Finals in those 10 years courtesy of corporate tickets or sponsors freebies. I have refused to take advantage of this for two reasons. First and foremost I swore to myself that the first FA Cup Final I saw would have the Villa in it and secondly because the FA Cup Final is so special I would hate to go to a Cup Final as a neutral knowing my attendance was almost cerntainly depriving someone as passionate as me the Cup Final day they've dreamt of supporting their team.
So here we are....hours to go...I've been daring myself not to dream but I can't help thinking that this was somehow meant to be. Drawing the lucky losers, being behind against Leeds before THAT hat trick, those unbearable 45 minutes against Everton. The fact that as I'm writing this I see we've sold out all our tickets for the semi. Venus is in line with Jupiter or something and this is destined to be our year.
Wouldn't it be just like the Villa to wait until the last Cup Final at Wembley as we know it to grant me my dream.
Maybe those hours learning the words to "Abide with Me" will not be wasted after all....... |
