Pre season friendlies

Unbelievably it's already time to play ball again. We play Kidderminster and Telford tonight with both matches kicking off at 7:45pm. Both matches are being streamed on the AVFCOfficial YouTube channel.

http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/john-terry-aston-villa-debut-13322111

Steve Bruce is effing clueless!

What kind of message does this send to the other Villa players? .......... "Not only is he earning a sh*t load more than us, he can swan off to Wimbledon and doesn't have to turn up and graft with the rest of us unless it suits him"!!!!!!

Terry is a highly paid footballer who should be earning his money with the rest of the Villa team tonight. Bruce needs to start behaving like a proper manager, and stop acting like a star struck teenager!!!!!!!

Veretout looks a class apart. He ran the midfield with the greatest of ease and his movement off the ball to make himself available is very un Villa like. Amavi also showed a calmness and incisive technique which demonstrated that he to is too good for a Steve Bruce team. Both worked their arses off and are real quality. Sadly these two are not Brucey style players because they play the ball on the floor and they're damn good footballers.

Samba had a cracking full 90 minutes and Green showed that he's got real pace although unfortunately he's too greedy and still doesn't like a tackle. Bree looked good and Lansbury was effective when called upon.

The Kidderminster match was typical Calderwood football .... keep it tight .... sit back .... don't press .... over the top when you can lads!

We won both matches easily against part time opposition, but the fact that we're desperately trying to sell our best two players depresses me!

The fact that Gabby was captain against Telford last night reinforces my view that we haven't learn't anything from last season.

Sorry to be so negative, but I believe that we have one of the best playing squads in the division and I fear that our management will hold them back with an inability (or unwillingness?) to implement the changes that need to be made.

Terry is at Shrewsbury today, so we should see his first run out for Villa. I wonder whether we'll get a hint of tactics or favoured personnel? We'll probably see multi subs with the sheer number of players we have at the moment.

The YouTube stream was good the other night, so hopefully it will be the same at 3 pm today. UTV.

The streams have been pretty decent, watched Kiddie on Wednesday and am watching today's game both on the big TV and the quality has been okay. They've done a decent job of something they don't have to do.

I think Telford was the better game to watch on Wednesday, found the Kidderminster game a bit uninspiring with the 3-0 flattering us. Today has been typical Villa without Kodjia. Toothless in the first 60 then after we made the defensive changes we've conceded two goals. Not the kind of preparation we want but I've never been one to get too concerned about pre-season results.

Late consolation with Lansbury scoring from the spot after a foul on Lyden.

That was the softest of penalties. Still at least we've found a penalty taker. Three in two games!

I know that it's only early pre season, but I don't see anything to indicate we've learn't from last season. The only bright spot for me is the way Veretout is showing the rest of the midfield what the job's about. The way he moves and drops off to find space is something we lacked from any midfielder last season. You can bet we'll show him the door again asap .... can't have people with football brains can we.

Hutton appears to be number one choice which means that a large part of our attacking ball will be recycled through him with absolutely no end result.

Terry yelling at players to offer themselves at throw ins was one of the few positives. It's a really lazy part of our game.

Final question .... why do we play strikers and starve them of service? It's going to be a long old season!

I watched the game last night and the YouTube picture was excellent for 90 minutes. Sadly it was the only thing that was.

Nothing has changed since the worst days of last season. How come every team we come up against play better football than we do? I watched closely trying to discern what we were trying to do and I genuinely couldn't see a plan.

Bruce said some time ago that he wasn't into tactics. He thought that you should be able to put out eleven professionals on the pitch and trust them to react to what was happening. He said that as far as he was concerned management happened off the pitch and that was his strength. Putting his arm around players and making them feel good about themselves, so that they could produce on a match day. All very laudable, but hopelessly outdated when it comes to a modern Championship with some talented coaches and tacticians running competitive teams.

Veretout and Amavi were excellent against Telford and Amavi looked sharp and willing in the next two matches, but both will soon be gone. Nobody else seems willing or able to break the Bruce/Calderwood mould of defensive and dysfunctional football.

I've made my views on Bruce's management clear over a long period now. I like him as a bloke, and I can see why players like him, but football is a multi million pound business and teams need to adopt the latest methods and tactics in order to remain at the cutting edge of this business. Bruce has shown that he is incapable of doing that.

We have a decent squad which we continue to try and weaken by selling the wrong players. We look to be intent on compounding the problem by trying to buy players who are both too old and play in positions that we already have a number of players for. What about the creative supply? We seem to think that it's not important. We clearly are working on the premise that a tight defence will solve everything, while ignoring the fact that we're one of the lowest scoring teams in the division.

I could go on.... and on .... and on ad infinitum, but what's the point? Nobody at AVFC seems to have the sheer common sense to see what is blindingly obvious to most Villa fans. You don't need to be a genius to sort Villa out, you just need the will to make tough decisions.

I watched the game as well and had similar reflections on it. We tried to move the ball around but had no idea of how to do that effectively. Without the moments of genius Kodjia can produce we lack a goal threat. No Kodjia means no party. Should a team with players like Hogan, McCormack, Green, Hourihane and Grealish at their disposal really be like that?

It's the continuing disconnect between our strikers and the rest of the team that is still apparent. We haven't as yet shown any willingness to allow our midfield to fill the space around the box.

We are playing two 45 minute matches today against decent opposition. Will we see shots on target from the Villa?

Will these ones be streamed on YouTube?

The first one started at 12 Sandie. It's just finished with a stunning last twenty five minutes of Villa passing, pressing and scoring three goals. What is this magic? Will I have to eat a whole humble pie?

The final is at 3pm, and it's an excellent picture on YouTube but with no commentary (at least for the first match).

3-0 Villa, and the Villa chants ring out!

The first 20 minutes were typical "tight at the back and not one shot on goal" Villa .... Then Elmo started to battle and break out down the right and the rest of the players followed him. Instead of an isolated Hogan, we suddenly had bodies in the opposition half pressing their box. WHAT AN UNBELIEVABLE TRANSFORMATION!!!!!!