Once again, simply not good enough: Manchester United 4 Aston Villa 0

i think we played better football than against sunderland espcialy when you consider the opposition but your right we simply aint good enough >:(

That was like a trip to the dentist, I was relieved when it was over. I hope the stupidity of not buying a recognised right back is begining to sink into the managers head now and the sheer lunacy of not strengthening the squad when he had the chance. It was a good training game for them, we never turned up, and I'm starting to wonder where the next goal will come from.

barry must be dropped for salifou :o

Just outclassed, what more can you say?

Special Mentions to ReoCoker and Agbonlahor.

ReoCoker i thought did exceptionally well playing at RB and can hold his head high.

Agbonlahor was fucking shocking and looked like he didn't give a shit.

It's now been 5 games, that's 457 minutes, or the ENTIRE month of March, since an Aston Villa player scored a goal from open play. Before this month we'd picked up almost 60% of our possible points, this last game puts us just above 50%.

I know how much we all hated being under the reign of O'Leary, but I can't remember a single month of his management where we've played as badly and gotten so little as we have this one. This isn't just poor, this is extremely worrying. Had we not started the season so well this is the kind of form that would suck us into a relegation battle.

The O'Neill magic is disappearing - the ability to motivate an average squad to play like a very good one looks like it has fully run its course. The weaknesses are now glaringly obvious and alarmingly exposed.

This will quite simply not work next season. O'Neill may be shrewd with money, but he isn't allowed to be any more. If we don't bolster the squad during the summer, even if it is with more average players, we're in for an extremely rough 08/09.

If we can't beat Bolton next week, we can kiss europe goodbye. The squad's looking tired

well just look at the starting 11.. coker at right back and petrov starting.! MON has to stand up because he has fucked up, forget about the january window last summer he should have bought the players we need. Watched the bolton Game in the pub before the Villa, Cahill was great.! As for Barry being useless what a pile of shit.!! Hes the best player we have he needs players of his level around him..!

Totally agree with you Adam.

Dan is a bender ;D

i thought reo coker and maloney were good, carson has had worse games but to be honest there wasn't much he could do for alot of the goals all i ccan remember is petrov going on abit of a run then losing it. i think we are losing at the moment because teams can read us like a book either pass it for agbonlahor or young to run on to or a long ball for carew, not rocket science well anyway we are going to miss out on europe and its only going to be 1 persons fault, there is no more us fans can do as we have gave more than 100%

this is my first post. i am a regular visitor to this website and i thought now is the time to post a comment. this is mainly out of frustration. is it just me or do we just seem to be a 1 dimensional team. either hit and miss or pass it to the wings. for gods sake we have no clue... gareth barry should have be sold as he is useless and will always play in average team. Gabby is not a striker as he is always running with his head down. i firmly believe that if petrov had a good midfield partner who would take off some of the load, then we would see a different player. martin o'neill has to take the blame... Reo coker at right back, nobody to fight in midfield...he has disappointed me in in his decision making and this takes the cake...i will be shot for this, but i believe martin o'neill is a manager for 80's and early 90's not one to take us into the future...he is definitely pleasing the shareholders as there is minimal investment in QUALITY players. we need quality and in all positions from the player to the coaching staff.

south african villa fan

Looks like my prediction came true.

Graveson..??
Barry sold because he is useless..! Maybe if he someone next to him who could play football and pass the ball, he could get on with his own game..!!

My wishful thinking prediction of villa getting something out of this was .... embarassing

It was about what I expected. It just seems like we kick the ball around and hope something happens as opposed to making something happen. Until Ronaldo scored I thought we were dangerous, but it seems like there is no one on the team who is willing to try and win the game for us.
I did think Reo-Coker played well, though.

Agbonlahor really needs to be dropped.

Man Utd in 18th gear. No need to talk about how bad we was. Light years away.

However thought NRC did well at RB.

Anyway......Keep the faith.......Villa till we die

we got the result we expected if we played as badly as the last few games. but i don't think we did play as badly as [i]that[/i], you just haven't given utd their due credit.

ronaldo, rooney and tevez were sublime. that trio on that form would put a few goals past any team at old trafford. our confidence is obviously on a low ebb right now and we were never likely to resist a spanking if we fell behind by a couple.

to extract some positives: i think we saw the best anyone's played at RB for us this season. well done NRC. young & maloney were as tenacious as ever. and, urm, well... SALIFOOOUUUUUUUU!!!!

EVER HAD THE FEELING THAT YOU'VE BEEN CHEATED?
Man Utd are in the same league yet we managed to look like we are in another division and that division is the crap managers division

SACK MON NOW!! AMATEURS WE ARE A PREMIERSHIP TEAM AND YOU HAD A YEAR TO GET A RIGHT BACK YOU IDIOT

I'm not even excited about who we might sign as apart from young I HATE every single signing made by MON, although saying that Salifou should be made player/manager

An embarassment. United could easily have scored 8.

We ended the game with our two foremost central midfielders playing right and left back.

I am not going to blame any players, the buck stops 100% with the manager. The players that he has brought to the club have been nowhere near good enough. Our squad size is actually embarassing - again 100% the fault of the manager. An even bigger slap on the face to MoN is the players he hasn't bought - i would question the sanity of a top manager who doesn't even have one recognised right back for an entire season, defoe continues to bang in the goals propelling portsmouth into europe and Cahill shows MoN what all villa fans knew - Zat isn't fit to clean his boots. Our current state was predicted by many fans months ago.

For those people who continue to harp on about Gareth Barry being our best player - have you actually watched any matches this season?? He has been very very poor all season and is a liability in the central midfield role.

The press releases and media spin coming from the club is nothing short of overhyped propoganda.

Maybe next week - the team will be changed up a bit......actually now that I think about it, even if we wanted to - we cant because thats right we have no players.......

Right now I fail to see this much advertised 'bright future', what exactly has MoN done in two years?? I have no shame in being one of the first to say...

MON OUT

as i recall, MON was quite clear: he didn't want to sell cahill. the fact that cahill is now hacking down players in the box for a team in the relegation zone is down to him.

Nobody even remembers we bought Routledge! Who is he? Where is he? The signings started above average with Carew and Young, and just continue to go downhill! I didnt think we would sign anyone more useless than Zat Knight! Even if he is a Holtender! So am I and I dont expect to play for Villa!

But Routledge is the cream on the cake! We dont even hear about that waste of money anymore! Does he even make the reserves?

Why is it that every player MON signs is having "a small spot of lack of confidence!"

Carson - low confidence
Petrov - no confidence
Zat Knight - no confidence
Routledge - confidence completely off the richter scale!

Why dont we just admit they are all CRAP!

Well i did say yesterday on another topic we would lose 4-0 it was allways going to be one of those scores especialy when you take into account the tierdness of the players and the strenght in depth of man united

I Say this every week and il say it again expect to see more of the same in the comming weeks

Man United were fantastic we really struggled but lets be honest they are a class above us and a lot of people are expecting far more than the team can give against Man United.

We can all expect the team to give there best but sometimes it just isn't enough and today was one of those days.

Lets look at our position 8th and Everton at 5th, Everton are about to play the teams we have played Arsenal, Man U, Chelsea and Arsenal. We even meet Everton soon in 4 matches time possibly.

So what's my point, Europe isn't a lost the cause yet we must however beat Bolton, blues, derby and Everton! then we have Wigan and West Ham.

I'm not too concerned about today's match it was expected deep down, I just hope the team picks up and wins against Bolton. I wouldn't accept anything other than a win.

I think some of you fools are forgetting that Barry put in 2 MOM performances for england just a short while ago.

And Ronaldo got 2 of the lukiest flicks you'll ever see in the game.

Knobs

rubbish, we were shoking, and we think we were supposdly trying to get European football next season hahahahahahahah, fuc*ting joke

Oh and Manure would have destroyed [b]any[/b] team on the planet today.

Give credit where it's due, they were bloody good and I actually think we did ok. We just couldn't live with them.

Then again, if MON doesn't get them in, in the summer, I'll be moaning too.

When Man United are on their day, they will destroy any team existing and today was most definitely their day. I expected a defeat and i expected the lads to give it a shot, both my expectations were met.

We just really need a confidence boost now, and where better than Bolton to go? ;)

First i think you have to take your hat off to Man Utd, they did play exceptionally well.

But you then also have to admit that we were poor and our failings were there for all to see. Hit it long and hope for a flick on. Failing that give it to young and hope he either puts in a god cross or gets a free kick. no invention, no movement, no clinical passing, no killer ball.

BIG investment needed in the summer. has been said previously that we need 10 players. You could argue for more. All that would do it bring the numebrs up, but players like Salifuo, Knight, Routledge, Harewood, Berger,Osbourne arent good enough as back up and need to go

That's the spirit lads excuse us losing to man utd cause they are man utd, I mean why would we even think that we are capable of beating another team in our own division? Let's just not even bother worrying if we can beat man utd,lpool,arsenal or chelsea they are above us lets just roll over for them. My friends yorkshire terrier has bigger balls than the villa players showed today

I put this on the other thread as well, but we have to remember that on their day, Utd are as good as any team in the world. And they showed it today.

Villa could've sat back and packed it in, but they tried to play and score, and paid the price. The first goal was unlucky, and Villa could very well have been in the game at 2-1. Yes, the final score could've been much worse than 4-0. But Villa did create some chances, started brightly, and at times looked like they knew what they were about.

At other times, they looked completely at sea. But the reason Utd are so much better isn't just the massive skill they field. It's also the movement off the ball, the work rate. Between youth and Villa's relative inexperience (most of the current setup having played together just more than one calendar year), I don't think it's surprising they don't have the incisive quality in the final third. Obviously, there's a disparity in skill between the sides, but that's really the case for all clubs playing Utd except the Milans and Barcelonas of the world.

Naturally, Petrov has failed to have an impact, and a quality creative midfielder is a must. I'm still confident Villa can get into Europe. And if they don't, I think they will next year.

I do agree Villa need a big summer infusion, but this overall feeling of crisis is more than a bit overblown. Moyes and Hughes have been on the job longer than MON, SGE has spent more for no greater return on points, Portsmouth have done a bit better.

But as far as today goes, Villa tried to take the game to Utd and got spanked for it. Utd can do that to you. Ask Roma.

6 weeks ago, villa's position in the league would have attracted a host of talented, quality players. What everyone's forgetting is, even if Mr L decides to dish out 50 million on transfers, who the f**k is gonna want to sign for a team like Villa now? No European football ( and lets face it, there will be NO European spot for us AGAIN this year), this club lacks real ambition and will probably finish outside the top ten, and although the manager must take some slack for what has happened in the club, he aint the one who throws on that f**ken shirt and accepts those fat f**kers of cheques for doin damn all!!

In all fairness I think most teams would have been spanked against united today, they played some nice football. I think given a bit more time and money O'Neill can improve Villa further.

Joe
www.fourthewinfootball.com

Some of you lot should get a grip. MON out?
FFS.
I was at the game yesterday, and even at 4-0 the 3,000 or so Villa faithful were still singing O'Neill's name.
I'd take their opinion over you whinging f****rs anyday.
Some of you have very short memories and very little patience.

MON OUT !!!

a better performance by the lads yesterday coker did a great job filling in at right back, seen as it isn't his natural posiiton. the defending at times was shocking though even tho we were playing against rooney, ronaldo and co.

shows how good zat kight is if he cnt even get in the team, with coker having to play in defense, need a lot of players in the summer villa if we are to progress next year at minimum GK, RB, CB, RM,CM,S. as four players are definitly leaving in sorensen, mellberg, berger and carson will go bk to liverpool with MON not willing to pay the huge price tag he has. so our squad has already decreased by 4 before the transfer market has even opened!!

also know one knows the status of bouma after being substituted yet again last night and walking straight down the tunnel with the kit man?? some names flying around that wud be good signings for villa if they get Brad Guzan the american goalie, american goalies seem to have a history of doing well in the premiership, also boswinga and splash the cash on bentley.

I just wrote a comment out but forgot to sign in... does that mean it's lost???? I really cant be arsed writing it out again! It started off some thing like "I think you lot need to..."

Anything you can do Damien or is it lost in web land?

wot reception will cahill get just thought id like to ask your oppinions after reading off villa hompepage

Man U are probably the best team in the world at the moment and they got lucky with the first goal too, which gave us a mountain to climb. We pushed forward and they're just deadly on the break. It's no-one's fault - we're just not good enough yet.

MON has now tried being defensive, going for all out attack and somewhere in the middle against them in the 3 games we've had against them. 3 different line-ups too. You can't blame him for not trying different approaches.

It's all down to the quality of the players, which will only improve if we qualify for the Intertoto and then the UEFA cup. With the possible exceptions of Fergusen, Wenger and Mourinho, I wouldn't want anyone else in charge of our team.

2006dryden, spot on fella, you sound like a true supporter. Starting to think some of these so called fans are a tad fickle and certainly unrealistic. actually ashamed of some of these stupid comments

@ aron c, who gives a monkeys what you think about other peoples opinions, you have yours I have mine. It might shock you but as free thinking humans we all have different thoughts and beliefs and are not all sheep. As for saying so called fans because they are upset at losing and the leadership you sound like a child, the old chestnut you said bad things about my team so I like them more, does that make you a true supporter or gullible? I couldn't care less

Well written Paul E.

Went to the match yesterday with a season ticket holder @ Man U.

He said Man Utd were as good as he had seen and at least Villa came and had a go !!

MON OUT....SERIOUSLY!!! wtf r u people on bout???? WE WERE PLAYIN MAN CHEST TER U NITED!!!! GET IT!!! WE AINT GONNA WIN SO STOP GOIN ON LIKE IT WERE A REAL LOW POINT FOR ASTON VILLA FOOTBALL CLUB!!! i wernt at the game but watched it on tele...well done to the villa FANS who got behind the team despite a rare poor perforance against a far superior side.


UP THE VILLA!!!!!! :) :) :) :)

Heres to a decent run in!!

Taglor - u sound like a sad old bluenose. Seriously go and support BCFC. Can't stand "supporters" like you!! ur the type who puts a dark cloud over villa park on a sunny day!!

UP THE VILLA!!! AND ALL THE SHIT THAT COMES WITH IT!!! ;D ;D

i actually thought we played well. and martin o'neil had the right idea in putting 3 forwards on. i hate it when teams come against man u and play 5 defenders and hoof it up the pith( which is what i was kida expecting from villa yesterday) man united were just unplayable. they are easily the best team in the world at the moment have the best player in the world on top form and were having a bad run. what chance did we have. at least we tried and created a few chances. man u were full of confidence and we are very low on that at the moment. i just wanted to say well played. the scoreline sounds bad but when you are there you would never have thought the final score would have been 4-0. WELL PLAYED VILLA

We are fans of Aston Villa football club. We live in a free society where people have the right to have free opinions and views. To be a fan does not mean that you have to be 100% optimistic all the time and say that your club is better than others in all aspects.
You can interpret how a club is developing in many different ways - a succession of performances, results, quality of players, activities in the transfer market, comparison of performances/results/players against peer clubs etc.etc

To accept yesterdays performance, and even be happy with it because of the quality of the opposition - well I am sorry but that is not good enough for me. We are AVFC for f%&k sake. I am sorry for having high expectations, hopes and ambitions for a club I have supported since I was a kid and I honestly believed with the Lerner and MoN revolution that there would be changes. Maybe Doug wasn't holding us back for 20 years afterall.

To those people who dont want to hear views other than what a fantastic job MoN is doing, our great 5 year plan, and want to see a list of 100 or so players that we are linked with but wont sign - just use the club web site.

ps - Barry two 'recent' MOM performances for England were over 6 months ago. It just proves the point how poor he has been for Villa recently that people have to go back 6 months ago for performances with a different team to say he is playing well.

Well it boils down to poor passing, poor (or no) movement off the ball, nobody at the far edge of the box for corners, which is where the ball always ends up if we clear the first man!
Man utd demonstrated all these in abundance and were the best team I have seen play against Villa since they last played us!
Yes we need about 8 players in the summer, and I have every confidence in MON.
Remember the team we played yesterday are managed by a man who was one game away from the sack, and won nothing for the first 4 years he was there, be a fan, be realistic and have some faith and hope Randy Lerner will too. The atmosphere around the club is 100 times better than when O'Dreary was in charge.
Keep trying Martin, the real season ticket holding fans are behind you.
Mick trinity lower.

For f**ks sake, to those few who are declaring 'MON OUT' - I respect everybody's right to an opinion, but don't talk such utter sh!te.

Liverpool have just come away from Old Trafford on the receiving end of a 3 - 0 spanking and against us they scored one more. No other team in the League outside Arsenal and Chelsea would have lived with Man U yesterday and I daresay most teams would have got hammered more than 4 - 0. We went and tried to play football rather than shut up shop and, Damien, we DID play some neat football. I honestly don't think we did a whole lot wrong yestersay, but when the team is THAT much better than you and in this sort of hot run then - well, you haven't got a prayer.

I was far more embarrassed when Sunderland beat us, yesterday was the best we've played since the Arsenal game.

The moaning bitches on this site who can't take losing away to Man U need to sort themselves out, you're making me feel sick.

Also, as I said, that post was directed at those wo seem to have lost sight of what MON has done here. There are some great posts already up here which I couldn't agree more with.

I can't believe it, supersean what has MON done? what have we won this season and are we in europe?
Sam Villa , you thought we played well losing 4-0 and looking like tits?
Dazz you call that loss a sunny day? and why are you so ok with losing to man utd we are in the same league, even if they had had the balls to get at them it would have been better.
Jeez maybe I should support bcfc as a lot of the Villa fans have lost it big time. When did you start being happy with no europe and no cups? I can't go this is silly

Jeez, MON out? Give it a rest.

We are going to do better than last season by a considerable margin if form comes back to the side, which I believe it will. Europe is a massive benchmark, but you can't doubt that we are a much better side than we were a year ago.

MON knows next season is the big one, that is when we start to push that little bit more for that place, WE know, we should be.

Ok....Lets put it this way, how many of you having a moan really believed we'd beat ManU?
Really? enough to take a trip down the bookies and bet your hard earned?
Thought not!!
This was ManU unstoppable at home for gods sake.
Truth is we are all sore coz we lost and it hurts when we remember the Deadly Doug days, so it has made us all suspicious and guarded.
What we have is infinitely better than what we had, how do you expect the team to play? most are carrying minor knocks and there is no cover.
MON should have bought i hear you all shout but WHO??
Who would have made a difference in that game?
Jermain Defoe..lets see if he's still scoring at the end of the season, don't let the past destroy what is an important step toward the future.
Give the man a chance.

TIME!

Is about all we can say really. Managers need time!!

After a good nights sleep i think we can look back at the season so far and say that Villa have done well. Not spectacular. Not as well as some had hoped after early season form. But certainly not badly.

Yes there's been some dark days (but lets put yesterday into context - Man U are the best team in the country and Ronadlo the best player) But every team has bad days. And for every crappy result/performance there's been a good one to offset it.

I'm not saying that MON is the messiah (after all that title is reserved for KK at Newcastle), but 8th in the league isn't bad. We could still finish top 6, so lets get behind the team and the manager and see where we are at the end of the season!

TIME!

Is about all we can say really. Managers need time!!

After a good nights sleep i think we can look back at the season so far and say that Villa have done well. Not spectacular. Not as well as some had hoped after early season form. But certainly not badly.

Yes there's been some dark days (but lets put yesterday into context - Man U are the best team in the country and Ronadlo the best player) But every team has bad days. And for every crappy result/performance there's been a good one to offset it.

I'm not saying that MON is the messiah (after all that title is reserved for KK at Newcastle), but 8th in the league isn't bad. We could still finish top 6, so lets get behind the team and the manager and see where we are at the end of the season!

Congrats, Damien. You've lost a reader. Seriously, a bad stretch of five games, one of the losses to the absolute cream of the Premiership this year running on top form, and we've got the long knives out for O'Neill? Bet you're not held to the same standard you're holding MON to at your day job.

And let's not even delve into your inexplicable agenda against Gareth Barry. Did he shag your sister?

How can anyone who really supports the villa keep banging on about how good man u are I would NEVER admit that any team was better than my beloved club even if they did spank us! and yes i do wear claret and blue shaded glasses. MON is the right manager .....at the moment , but that could soon change if we are not top 5 by next oct/nov.I fully support the lads but some do need to show more passion (are you not motivated by the MORLEY, WITHE, SHAW etc banners) Come on lads give us something to shout about and get stuck in! Villa till i die.

Agree with pretty much every1 has said. Barry has been playin crap.and 4 more than a couple of months. NRC actually had a go and I thought he was 1 of our best. thats saying something. I dont care if we dont have any1 else drop the agbon as he has been playin total s*#t. if you can score goals with your ego he'd b leading the league. Had so much hope and optimism around xmas but gone now. the way we playin wouldn't surprise if west ham/tottenham etc catch us.
Thaks MON!!!

kayarcee, you've left so won't be reading this, but the reason i'm pissed off is because i predicted that it would happen. my actual prediction was 'we'd get spanked' and we did.

so what if they're the best team in the league. are sunderland, pompey and middlesbrough? but thats not the point and if you read what i've said above i've even said i think he's the right man and that we can move forward under him

it's easy to say they are the best - but the others are not and there was no football. for pretty much all season now, all they've done is hit long and hopeful balls. i dont want to go back and look at the football last season because if i see it there too i'll be even more depressed - the only thing that seems to have changed is the fight and running

but to barry. it's just my opinion that we are not going to break the top four with him in the team. it's just my opinion and while he could have shagged my sister if i had one, it's nothing personal, i just dont see a one trick player, who is slow and really only can put in a good cross from 40 years out as someone who we will move forward with. but dont hate me for it because i've been saying it for years

Look, I thnk you guys are forgetting that we have gone to 3 of the big 4 this season and got a point! Are there any other teams in the league that can claim that, and not to mention that we were a whisker away from beating Arsenal!

Yes we have had a poor month, but EVERY team in the league has peaks and troths in form, we are at the bottom of our form at the moment, surely when the team and manager needs us behind them, not turning on them.

Dare a say some of us are fickle!

Oh and not to mention even arsenal got spanked at utd in the FA cup!

I total agree with Adam & Scoops83,

Man U played a full strength team that really outplay Villa, Rooney, Ronaldo and Tevez ran villa ragged all afternoon (the phrase men v boys comes to mind but the said 3 are just boys), with Scholes and Carrick pulling the strings in midfield, every time they attacked it looked as if they were going to score. I managed to get a ticket but was sitting in the Man U end for my sins but all credit to the travelling fans that sang their hearts out for the lads. But let’s put this into some sort of reality check they thump Liverpool last week 3-0 when it could have been 6, and as Scoops pointed out they thumped Arsenal 4-0 a month ago, playing keep football.