Don't wanna worry anyone but...part deux!!

A couple of months ago I posted a thread entitled “Don’t wanna worry anyone but….”, which outlined my grave concerns that we could end up going into our game against Watford at the end of November on no more than 6 or 7 points.
However, a lot has changed since then. OK our results have gone as I thought they would, but now with a new manager, I can’t help but feel positive again. It’s about time the tide turned for our club, and maybe, just maybe Remi Garde is the man to do it.
Looking forward, we have 8 games until the January transfer window opens. I believe that Garde will keep us in touch until that time, and then Lerner will allow him to improve the squad if he feels he needs to. I don’t think a manager, particularly one with a good reputation and one that has been in demand elsewhere, would have taken this job (without his first choice assistants) unless certain promises had been made by the owner.
So with 24 points to play for until January, I think we need to secure around half of them to be in with a shout of staying up.

Here are the point’s tallies of the bottom 3 at the end of December in recent seasons:
2014/15 (after 19 games): 18th – 16pts; 19th – 16pts; 20th – 13pts
2013/14 (after 19 games): 18th – 16pts; 19th – 14pts; 20th – 14pts
2012/13 (after 20 games): 18th – 17pts; 19th – 13pts; 20th – 10pts
2011/12 (after 19 games): 18th – 15pts; 19th – 14pts; 20th – 13pts
2010/11 (after 19 games): 18th – 19pts; 19th – 18pts; 20th – 17pts

To gain at least 12 points by January our home form simply must improve. Words cannot describe how bad a home side we have been since O’Neill left. We play Man City, Watford, Arsenal and West Ham at Villa Park before January.
For me, we must be looking to beat Watford and West Ham for sure. I think West Ham are beatable as they seem to be a bit hit and miss, particularly against the lower placed teams. I think 8 points from these games would be an incredible return, but realistically 6pts is the minimum requirement.

Away from home we go to Everton, Southampton, Newcastle and Norwich. I really think we can get something in all of these games if we don’t give away stupid goals (big IF I know!!). I don’t think 6pts from these fixtures is beyond us, in fact if we do pick up a couple of results early in Garde’s tenure and the confidence comes back, we could pick up 8 or 9pts from these away games. We have been very close in a lot of games, even with a tactically inept buffoon pulling the strings. If Garde proves to be even 50% better than Sherwood, then I'm certain a lot of our 1 goal defeats can easily be turned into points.

So in my opinion it is very possible for us to pick up 12 points before January . We could even nick a couple more if the tide turns our way and we build a bit of momentum. I think for certain though, any less than 10 points over these 8 games and we can kiss goodbye to the premier league this season.
Adding 12pts now to get us onto 16pts on 1st Jan will still leave us with an unbelievable mountain to climb…bear in mind we had 21 points on 1st January a year ago!!!

I'm backing Remi Garde to be the man that gets us going. He is a completely different character to anything we have had at the club in years, perhaps that is what is needed? If reports are true, then he is a manager that Randy Lerner is excited by....can that be said about any of them since O'Neill?
I really believe Lerner will prove his doubters wrong and get the cheque book out in January. He did it for Houllier, and I am certain he will do it again, especially as we spent so little (net) in the summer.

I sense the dawning of a new exciting era for Aston Villa.

It's imperative that we start picking points. How we do it I couldn't care less.

It would be good news if Garde could settle on a team and get them playing well before the end of December when the run of "easy" matches are coming up.

12 wins is needed to stay in this league

We have a right battle on our hands this season...again. Hoping Garde can sort it out quickly and that Lerner opens the bloody cheque book in the next window.

NARLA24 wrote:We have a right battle on our hands this season...again. Hoping Garde can sort it out quickly and that Lerner opens the bloody cheque book in the next window.

Totally agree...but that was a bonus point on Sunday....so only 11 to go till new year!!

ViewFromT2 wrote:

NARLA24 wrote:We have a right battle on our hands this season...again. Hoping Garde can sort it out quickly and that Lerner opens the bloody cheque book in the next window.

Totally agree...but that was a bonus point on Sunday....so only 11 to go till new year!!

Got a feeling that Garde could turn out to be a stroke of genius. Although we are in the preverbial shite at the moment i have full faith that things will turn out fine and we may finish in a very healthy position at the end of the season.

So 2 games into these 8 fixtures, and we have 1 point...pretty much what I thought we could get, only not from the game I expected!
We now need a minimum of 11 points until the new year in my view if we have any hope of staying up. Saturday is the biggest game I can remember, and anything less than 3 points and I truly believe it's goodnight Vienna!
A defeat could kill the players once and for all...a victory, and who knows!
We simply must beat Watford and West Ham and pick up something at home to Arsenal too in my view.
We also have to pick up 5/6 points from trips to Southampton, Newcastle and Norwich....

I can't believe we are still only less than 2 wins from safety when we haven't won since the opening day. We are truly terrible at the moment, but the league proves we are not alone. We can get out of this, I'm certain of it....but we really really .....really, need to get going this weekend!!!!!

Round 1
Bournemouth 0-1

Round 2
Man Utd 0-1

Round 3
Crystal Palace 2-1

Round 4
Sunderland 2-2

Round 5
Liverpool 3-2

Round 6
WBA 0-1

Round 7
Liverpool 3-2

Round 8
Stoke 0-1

Round 9
Chelsea 2-0

Round 10
Swansea 1-2

Round 11
Tottenham  3-1

Round 12
Man City 0-0

Round 13
Everton 4-0

So that's 13 matches, 5 points, 10 losses, 10-24 in GD.

My point with this was to highlight the fact that we've played against a lot of good teams. Arguably more than any of the other relegation candidates. If you look at the teams in bold, that's basically sides it's not likely the bottom teams will beat. It amounts to  7/13 matches played. Then add Palace and Leicester who are in-form sides in the league and you're at 9/13, even though we should have had minimum 3 if not 4 points against those two sides.

We are facing worse teams from December - February, so hopefully we can pick some points then.

19th December away against Newcastle

26th December home against West Ham

28th December away against Norwich

2nd January away against Sunderland

12th January home against Crystal Palace

16th January home against Leicester

23th January away against WBA

2nd February away against West Ham

6th February home against Norwich


It's quite feasible we can pick say 20 points here if we get a run of form. MAKE IT HAPPEN.

Now that's my weekly positive post gone, don't tell me I didn't try.

Honestly, I can't see where the next goal is coming from, never mind the next win. I cannot remember a time we've been so toothless. And, he may not be the answer but Kozak??? WTF has he done wrong? I saw him at Wolves and Forest pre-season and he got goals. Actually, he got goals without playing particularly well. Isn't that exactly what we need right now?

20 points is a big ask right now for a team with zero confidence, zero bite and zero goal threat.

So we have played half of the 8 games mentioned at the top of the thread, and we have amassed 2pts from those 4 games!
A par figure would of been 4pts in my view, but for a team in our position less than 5pts from the past 4 games is disappointing.

I think we are 99% down now guys. I will never totally give up hope. I will always think we can win...before every game I think we can win....I cling to the miniscule hope of a miracle, but lets face it. We have played some really really poor teams at home this season (even Stoke at that time we played them were in poor form)....and we haven't beaten any of them!

We need 30pts minimum from 23 games. So that's 10 wins....incidentally, you need to go back to 2010/11 to find the last time we secured more than 10 wins in a season, and even then it was only 12!
The last four seasons we have won 7; 10; 10; 10 games respectively....that is fuckin horrific isn't it?

If we manage to do a McCleish, and stay up with only 7 wins....then we gotta be looking to draw nearly every other game from now on, as 6 wins to add to the 1 we have means we would also need 12 draws from the remaining 23 games to get to 36pts.

Just cannot see us doing it, can anyone?

Unfortunately can't see us staying up this season, we are dire from top to bottom with absolutely no redeeming features!

We can't score, we can't defend, we really are a piss poor side!

ViewFromT2 wrote:The last four seasons we have won 7; 10; 10; 10 games respectively....that is fuckin horrific isn't it?

thats a horrible stat
havent won at home in 8 games, going back to may

to be quite honest, we deserve to go down. no doubt about it.
and i dont think anyone (except villa fans!) will shed any tears.

UnclePanda wrote:

ViewFromT2 wrote:The last four seasons we have won 7; 10; 10; 10 games respectively....that is fuckin horrific isn't it?

thats a horrible stat
havent won at home in 8 games, going back to may

to be quite honest, we deserve to go down.  no doubt about it.
and i dont think anyone (except villa fans!) will shed any tears.

Noone will shed any tears if we go down. The dross football we have played for so long we deserve to go down. Still got confidence in Garde at the moment, we will see.

I like the OP. It speaks a lot of sense. However, don't apply for the vacancy of Mystic Meg. Your worst dreams have come true.

Having won 1 in 15 we now need to win 4 in a row just to keep in touch with those around us and have a chance.
To win we need to score. For example, 2 free headers from 6 yards out. We can't score.

I know a chap scoring for the reserves though ...

mefromhere wrote:Having won 1 in 15 we now need to win 4 in a row just to keep in touch with those around us and have a chance.
To win we need to score. For example, 2 free headers from 6 yards out. We can't score.

I know a chap scoring for the reserves though ...

He won't be eligible. It's called the Bomb Squad. Yes, we still seem to have one.

It's embarrassing really how the top scorer in the Europa League can be demoted to a bottom of the league reserves in 3 years.

He must be awful in training not to even get a chance. From what Garde has said he won't be getting a chance at all. But then again if they are looking to offload him they can't come out and say how bad he is can they.

Maybe theres something else going on.

What you complain ? We have the same goal as Chelsea.

Welcome to the big league.