Tim Sherwood: Villa reject

DaveAV1 wrote:Now Jermain Jenas is backing Sherwood. I have never known so much media support for any manager of any club, when the clear evidence is that the man is totally useless. And by complete contrast I've never known a fanbase so consistent in their condemnation of a manager.

This evidence, backed up by the report above, suggests that Sherwood is truely a Machiavellian character who cynically exploits contacts within the footballing media and indeed the wider football world. His entire focus is on Tim Sherwood and holds this football club, us it's fans and anyone else he falls under his spell in utter contempt. He is not an incompetent chancer, he is a very dangerous and manipulative man.

I am not at all surprised that he manages to dupe our simple minded absent owner. However I believed that Tom Fox, whilst possibly lacking football know how, would be sharp enough to know when he's being taken for a mug. Sadly up until now that doesn't seem to be the case, and unless he wakes up, he must join the Hall of Shame responsible for overseeing the downfall of one of the most historic and successful teams in England.

Fox is not a billionaire who doesn't need to work. Surely if only for the sake of self interest, he must see that his own career will not get off lightly if he is at the helm of what is rapidly becoming a footballing Titanic.

VillaBill wrote:We were all generally pleased how last season finished, the transfer window was as exciting as anyone can remember, Sherwood had us playing 100% better than the Lambert days, but this season has been far worse than any of us could of feared.

We can all be wise after the fact, but I think the general consensus was positive towards Sherwood.

Sherwood had earned his chance at a full season, but it looks pretty clear we are certain for relegation, I just cant see an alternative at the moment, I am at a loss.

DaveAV1 wrote:Jenas is at it again in our very own loyal and knowledgeable Evening Mail. Declaring that we will be relegate with or without the brilliant Mr Sherwood. He blames the board for not strengthening the squad in the summer, nothing to do with Timtastic that one then. He then blames the club for being arrogant enough to not believe we would be in a relegation fight this season. Timmy "we'll never be in a relegation battle again" Sherwood couldn't possibly have anything to do with that either.

Another average footballer from the Harry Rednap school of media manipulation, sticking up for his old school buddy. That coupled with the general hatred of all things from the Midlands and we have an almost runaway train of anti Villa bile coming from the media.

If Fox stands by and lets this happen he should be slaughtered with Lerner and Sherwood. Where are the big hitters with Villa in their blood in the club's hour of need? And no not you Mr Collymore, I said big hitters not big gobs.

Joppe84 wrote:It would explain why Ilori, Veretout, Ayew amongst others isn't playing a lot. Maybe Sherwood is pissed off about this not being the signings he wanted.

Aston Villa tie with Swansea City could be Tim Sherwood’s last stand


Tim Sherwood and the team look down the pitch to Guzan wondering just what the fuck he's going to do next.


Tim Sherwood shoots from the hip and is willing to die on his sword. He will go down fighting. If it is hard to avoid military metaphors, it is because he introduces them to the conversation and his style of management. Aston Villa seem in a relegation battle. Sherwood is a maverick of a general who may lose his commission.

He is a man under pressure and a mass of contradictions. He is the rookie who had never recruited a player until, in one transfer window at Villa, he brought in 13. He is the supposed apostle of attacking football who, in his last home game, fielded five defenders and claims to be bored by Villa’s football.

He is the outspoken critic who remains unsure of his best team. He has the best win percentage of any Tottenham Hotspur manager in the Premier League, but has won just 11 per cent of his top-flight games with Villa this season. The last eight have produced a solitary point. Even that represented a poor result as it came at home to bottom club Sunderland.

And so Saturday’s match against Swansea City assumes huge proportions for Sherwood. It is his misfortune that enviable alternatives can be eyed. Brendan Rodgers’s CV may be slimmer than his replacement at Liverpool, Jurgen Klopp’s, but it is altogether weightier than Sherwood’s.

David Moyes’s achievements on a limited budget at Everton have long suggested he would be an ideal fit for Villa. Should he leave Real Sociedad then he would be an obvious upgrade.

Moyes has a steely eyed determination that enabled him to drag Everton out of trouble. Sherwood has an emotional volatility, which means that a glance at his face, without even hearing his words, can reveal the scoreline. He has been visibly downcast since the opening-day victory at Bournemouth.

He possesses industrial quantities of self-belief. He has produced bullish rhetoric this week, but it never bodes well when interviews contain more defiance than performances.

Villa’s slide is not entirely Sherwood’s fault; not when he was stripped of the spine of his side by the summer departures of Christian Benteke, Fabian Delph and Ron Vlaar, even if all three are injured now anyway.

Much like Rodgers at Liverpool, he has attempted to deflect responsibility for some of the signings. Pointed references to “the club” in the transfer market are signs that many of the French contingent were not his choices. Sherwood can be a figure of John Bull Englishness, and the indications are that he preferred to shop at home.

Yet Joleon Lescott, who some at West Bromwich Albion were happy to see depart, has disappointed in defence. Villa have contrived to acquire a huge cast of attacking midfielders and wingers but much the brightest, Jack Grealish, is a player they already possessed. Sherwood’s struggles to accommodate others have had the feel of unsuccessful auditions. His substitutions have backfired, especially away at Crystal Palace and Leicester City. A laudable draw and a vital win became two defeats.

Now Villa meet a club who were long their inferiors but have overtaken them. It is 1982 European Cup winners against a club that almost dropped out of the Football League in 2003. It is also a meeting of brothers who arrived from Ligue 1 this summer and who symbolise their respective employers: Jordan Ayew is one of Villa’s expensive disappointments, Andre Ayew one of the signings of the season for Swansea.

In a way, Swansea brought the beginning of the end for Sherwood’s predecessor Paul Lambert. Villa only had 27 per cent of possession when they hosted the Welsh side in December 2013. The Scot had created a team with a lamentable inability to keep the ball. When he then switched to prioritise possession, they had no threat.

Lambert’s Villa lost their identity. Perhaps Sherwood’s Villa have never found one. And so a manager who invariably references armed conflict may be waiting to see if the board pull the trigger.