The Curse: Aston Villa 1 Portsmouth 3

Forget the curse, Villa were shit. End of story.

Disapointing. We didn't do much wrong today, other than get the ball into the net, and Portsmouth were fortunate, though Muntari's strikes were good.

Oh well here's hoping next Saturday is better. :(

i wouldnt say we were shit ..

i think MO'N putting barry to left back tells me he doesn't rate him as an attacking central midfielder but it also says he is maybe too scared to drop him ..

i think if we took our chances like pompey did we would have won .. but at the end of the day we didn't .. they did

not a nice start to a weekend

am i the only one who thinks berger is not good enough also i feel sorry for maloney!

im disapointed with that result becuz there the kind of games we need to be winning to grab the euro spot oh well hi ho and all that!

UTV!!!

We were undone by two spectacular goals.

We lost today because Pompey have strong physical fit players all over the field. I dont like the way their players basically barge our players off the ball but it seems to work. Gabby and young were just knocked off the ball too easily. They were'nt trying to dive they're just physically not strong enough.

I think pompey will do well this year, not because they have better players, but because they're all strong and are hard to out-muscle.

Anyway, I think Knight should be dropped and Davies given a go. But more importantly i think we need to buy a really good right winger and right back in january.

I agree, Berger just doesn't cut the mustard anymore

no doubt taglor will say what most think ;)

It's not the end of the world. We lost to a decent team who are doing really well recently. Yes we should be giving them a run for their money but sometimes it just doesn't happen, I think today was one of them days.

It shows that, whilst we have made good progress, there is still a way to go if we are to really start making an assualt on the top 4. Think we really need a good right sided midfielder. Everything is going down the left, which isn't bad with Young playing there, but it becomes predictable and maybe teams are starting to realise that if they keep tabs on him our other options are not quite as strong. We need to be able to chop and change the play more effectively.

Hopefully we will bounce straight back!!

Yeah, it was disappointing. Portsmouth is a good team, but we didn't really play with the same fire that we've shown in recent games. Maybe it'll be a wake-up call to some of the younger players that just because they give Arsenal a run for the money one week that they aren't going to just get a win because they're playing at Villa Park.
I agree we need a little extra something in midfield, and I thought Knight was poor again after being pretty good the last few weeks.

We desperately need someone for the right side. Gardner doesn't give us much over there. I'm not convinced that Petrov provides the answer, either.

We didn't look bad today. We had several tremendous chances. James was fortunate to have stopped Gabby twice in the first half, and he was fortunate that Gabby hit the cross bar in the second.

Pompey just had too much strength in the midfield for us to cope with. I agree that they do get away with a lot of shoving.

Bouma coming off ruined it for me. He has every reason to feel hard done by. Shocking decision. Man of the Match.

they werent nothing special today apart from the two muntari goals which proved our undoing but wins against sunderland and man c and we could be riding high again. weve got to keep the faith and hope

UTV!!!!

the ref was diabolical he just booked players for the fun of it maybe hes on a xmas bonus for all the non bookings he can get but to be honest we didnt help our selves today its seems like long ball to carew flick on to gabby or free kicks from young but the rest of the prem have so easily worked this out not all teams can cope we need a right back a real goal poacher and a man mountain for centre half

I havent seen the match but i did hear that it was a pretty equal game. From what i have heard i think we have been given a taste of our own medicine, sounds as if Pompey just took their chances whereas we wasted ours. Think against Blackburn didnt we have less chances but were just more clinical infront of goal?

We can and will bounce back from this, isnt it Sunderland next which should be a good hangover cure.

UTV

i thought harry's reaction was disgraceful. i know he must have taken the accusations to heart but villa were 3-0 down and just taking the mick and his response was poor. even worse than paul jewells last season.

on the game, the turning point was laursen's miss. a goal then and we would have almost certainly won but we had luck when we won 4 in a row and it didn't happen today.
we'll bounce back next week
UTV

Arrlui, Bouma came off today as he has been suffering with flu! managed as long as he could then came off. He did alright today, but his poor miskick did lead to there first goal.

I was at the game today and some of our play was just poor, especially when we started hoofing it up the field to Carew. Some of the passing was terrible at times and there was no real invention. Why bring in Berger ahead of Maloney? I think we were all a bit surprised at that. Give Maloney a chance!
If one of the missed chances had gone in, then it might have been a different story but some of the defending was very shaky. Zat Knight needs some serious competition because he is looking very average at times. He cannot always be our first choice centre back.
The transfer window is fast approaching and work needs to be done. As much as we love Mellberg, that situation needs to be sorted out ASAP. If he stays, then great! We sign a right back and move Mellberg back to the centre. We need at least 3 players who will make a real difference and add extra quality to the squad. We've had a decent start to the season but consistency is the key.

as far as i could see the only real reason maloney wasnt brought on ahead of berger is because he must be leaving in january back to celtic.what a wasted oppurtunity

For those of you who have questioned O'neill over his choice of Petrov over Gardner please watch the highlights of the game today. Gardner was one of the poorest players on the field. Not Premier League quality. And another note - Rednapp stuck two fingers up at our part of the crowd today - we should not have to put up with that. People were jeering him but I was not. That, however, is irrelevant. he is a premier league manager paid a lot of money to take that abuse. He proved today that he is the 'wide boy' loud mouth dodgy character that the press have made him out to be. Disgraceful. Damian - I think you should use your links to submit a formal complaint

villa wer poor 2day...now we can all come back 2 the reality of life as a villa fan..i'm sorry but Craig Gardner is rubbish...the only reason his poor peformances have gone unknown is because he has popped up with a few goals ( which wer pretty simple to be honest) today it was plain for all to see he is not a premiership player and we won't get into europe with the likes of him. I'm not being harsh and i gave him a chance..he is slow and what does he bring to the table????

dissapointing. If we are going to be top six we need to take the likes of pompey at home. That said from what I saw of the highlights we just didn't (as has already been said) take the chances while they did. Also apart from the fluke the two other pompey goals were the sort of thing you can't really do much about.

Our team is so predictable. long ball to Carew, carew heads in on hoping someone is going to run onto it!! Bouma does it all the time. Defenders are to good these days to play the long ball game..They also play it out wide to Young too much. Glen Johnson ate Young up and spat him out...

They need to change the way they do things...maybe change formation..OR even go back to to basics..Such as passing and crossing..BECAUSE ITS SHIT.. Reo-coker could be a great defensive midfielder..but sometimes he gets caught out in dangerous areas of midfield..Hence the 3rd goal. And his passing is RUSTY..:)

Zat Night deserves two punches for being nut megged..Im suprised O'Neil hasnt opted to change players around because of performance..Give Davies a go!!!

Overall Redknapp made O'Neil look like a championship coach. He out brained our geeky looking coach on and off the field.

Go back to basics Villa..

Lets face it we aint good enough!!! Sides like Portsmouth and yes even Arsenal should be beaten at home if we want to be considered as a top 6 side. Still a long way to go and I shall reserve my judgement on Mr O' Neill to see who he buys in January that is of course if he does buy, or jumps ship and takes the english job.

we were v poor. Need to bounce back witha win on sat.
As for Redknapp he put 3 fingers up signalling they were 3-0 up. Stop complaining about it - we were giving him stick he has simply having some banter back. If u cant take it dont give it out. The people having a go at him are just looking for something to pick on the the sake of.