Cuellar shut up!, Osbourne out, Wenger rallying cry and are Villa off the rails?

March 3, 2009 by Martin Banks
Filed under: Aston Villa 

OK then, for today’s blog post, I promise I won’t mention Arsenal!

There’s been no shortage of press coverage for our beloved club this last week or two, and a lot of it has been pretty negative. A season that was powering forward at full steam, seems to have come off the rails in recent weeks. So is it time to panic? Nah, I don’t think so. Yeah we haven’t had much in the way of convincing results, but if you look at it closely it’s not panic time yet.

  • Everton in the FA Cup was always going to be difficult; they had a point to prove after the previous meeting and let’s be honest, when Everton are on their game (and by Everton I mainly mean Arteta and Cahill), they are very hard to beat. And they wanted it more than us, because try as we might to convince ourselves, our mind was on the league moreso than the FA Cup.
  • CSKA at home wasn’t bad and away the kids gave it a damn good go. We lost, but you can’t help but feel that MON engineered it that way.
  • Chelsea were on their new-manager buzz, but we still made it very hard for them and if Young’s free kick had been an inch or two lower that may have given us a draw.
  • And Stoke was going well for 88 minutes. Enough said on that though.

So yeah, whilst it’s all been a bit of a cacker, it isn’t time to give up yet. We’re still 4th and still 6 points clear of our nearest rival… errr… can’t think of their name at the minute.

Nobody panic, keep the love and keep the faith, we’ll get back to winning ways soon (Wednesday hopefully).

What else has been going on then?

Isaiah Osbourne is going out on loan to Nottingham Forest for 2 months. I think this is a good thing, as the lad is never going to improve or build his confidence by sitting on our bench (at best), and we have plenty of options in the middle of the park. Whether he will ever be good enough for the ‘new improved Villa’ is debatable, but I’m willing to give the guy some patience as he, like me, is a huge life-long Villa fan.

Sky Sports have reported that Carlos Cuellar thinks Ronaldo should stay with Man Utd, as a move to Real Madrid wouldn’t suit his style. My advice: Shut up Carlos, let the nob leave!

And finally, our last minute decaying against Stoke may have given that team in 5th a kick up the arse to drive the remainder of their season. So we need to get back on our game and quick, a 6 point gap can disappear quickly if you relax.

Sweet, I got through with no mention of Arsenal, well I mentioned them once but I think I got away with it :)


Comments

3 Comments on Cuellar shut up!, Osbourne out, Wenger rallying cry and are Villa off the rails?

  1. mike on Tue, 3rd Mar 2009 12:13

    2. Im not so convinced. We havnt won a game for 4. We looked a bit tired at times against stoke, and lets not pretend it was the last 2 mins. stoke gave us warning on more than one occasion. i dont want to take away from a really good season but i am worried. i think arsenal are better than us by far and if we fail to beat man city this week it could disapear very quickly. so i can only pray for no injuries or panic. we cant pick and choose the games we want to win

  2. Mr Scooch on Tue, 3rd Mar 2009 12:42

    3. Christ I hope you lot f**k up soon. I’ve been thinking that you will sooner or later for the least few months now and you don’t seem to!!! In all honesty tho, if we had to give our CL spot to any team in the Premiership then I’d choose you guys for it. You’ve had a great season so far and you have one of the best managers around. That being said tho I still reckon you should lose at least the next 5 or 6 games, Thanks

  3. Simon Preston on Tue, 3rd Mar 2009 23:13

    4. That comfortable 4th spot we had is now looking a lot less comfortable. Arsenal easily saw off West Brom (as you would expect a top 4 side to do against one of the teams that usually prop up the table… ahem) and Man City is not going to be easy. Saw them play last week in the UEFA cup and they are starting to look a little dangerous. Should we draw or lose that then we’ll have Arsenal breathing down our necks and ready to jump into our place.
    Good to see Mr Scooch deliver some kind words in our direction. Always nice to see some gentlemenly like conduct in this day and age. ;)

Tell me what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!