day by day

14th September: Chester City 0 Villa 1. It's gone beyond a joke now. No, that's not right. This one was a joke, so bad it was funny. The mood was set by the team line up, five at the back against a team 86 places below us in the league who've got one up front. And that set the scene for the night's 'entertainment'. There's no point dwelling on this match, I would hate to remind anybody who was there of the ninety minute endurance test they went through. If there had been anything on offer outside the ground, or if the social club hadn't forgot to renew their licence, I wonder how many would have stayed to the end. At half time there was a good few wondering if it was worth the fifteen minute hike to the nearest pub. After the match fun-loving Johnnie G had the nerve to praise the players for keeping a clean sheet. It's almost like he's doing it deliberately.

18th September: Villa 1 Bradford City 0. Match reports are starting to come in two varieties. If we play a decent team we play badly and lose. If we play a crap team we play boringly and win 1-0. The only surprise today was that the tablet of stone that had 5-3-2 carved on it got lost and we went into battle with a flat back four. All that proved is that we can be as
uninspiring with four defenders as we can with five. Steve Watson has surely completed the fastest decline in Premiership history and the sight of him failing to get the ball past the 84 year old Peter Beagrie will live in the memory. Merson came on and for half an hour we at least had one player who can do something with the ball. The rest seemed to share a strange lethargy. By the end of the match it was as though they'd gone through extra time in a semi-final rather than a ninety minute
stroll against relegation fodder.

19th September: Paul Merson reckons that his book, due out this week, will upset a few people but he ain't bothered, nosiree.

20-24th September: Merson reveals that he's blown Ł35k in a month gambling, he's had a few dressing room bust ups, he's thinking about retiring because he isn't good enough anymore and the world should feel sorry for him. The reason why he's addicted to drink, drugs and gambling? Well it ain't Paul Merson, that's for sure.

21st September: Villa 5 Chester City 0. So finally we scored a few goals, and even if it was only Chester City it's always good to get them. Even then there were a few glitches on the night. The hardest part of the proceedings was actually getting into the ground, with the Villa's unrivalled ability to turn good ideas into monumental cock-ups given another airing. Top marks to the satirists who chanted "Thompson for England" even if the amount of adolescents at the match made it sound a bit like a schoolboy international.

22nd September: Customer Care the Aston Villa way. "Serves you right, should have got here earlier"

25th September: The day starts off with an exclusive in the Sun. Doug "I'm going to be here for ever. I'm going to win the championship. I am Aston Villa." Or words to that effect. So there. The day gets no better. Leicester 3 Villa 1. If you're going do anything you simply have to get results at places like Leicester, bogey team or not. We weren't unlucky, we were simply
second best. The gap between their team of honest triers and our collection of good-enough-to-win-the-league-in-our- leader's-dreams was worrying. Four at the back or five doesn't seem to make much odds, although I would have thought that our brick shithouse defender would have been better marking their brick shithouse forward while our skilful and a bit quick defender should have been marking their little bloke up front. But I'm not the manager, so what do I know? No invention, no service to the forwards, no real stability at the back. These are turning into worrying times to be a Villa supporter and JG's radio interview afterwards, well.. To blame the referee after a performance like this smacks of a man under pressure and looking for excuses. Even Tom Ross disagreed.

27th September: Paul Merson, at his book launch, has a word or two to say about his colleagues and their perceptions of success. Surprisingly, our usually talkative manager is stuck for a reply.

30th September But what he's already said lands him a FA disrepute charge from last Saturday. When he goes down for the hearing he'll be able to split the petrol with Gareth Southgate, who is up for the same incident.

1st October: Stan's coming back. Not for long, according to a back-to-his-garrulous-best JG.

2nd October: Villa 0 Liverpool 0. With the exception of last season, every time Liverpool play at Villa we say it's the worst Liverpool team ever. This time it surely must be. If if wasn't for the name you'd say they were relegation candidates and we weren't much better. This was, of course, a match ruined by the most officious display of refereeing imaginable. I even felt sorry for Steve Staunton. For a description of the play, see any match report this season. The team were unimaginative and unconcerned. It seems Paul Merson was right, the players don't care enough. An hour after the match I was still angry that we'd thrown two points away. I doubt any of them were all that bothered.

4th October: Benito Carbone is poised to sign for Ł1.2 million, which can only mean one thing.

5th October: Villa pull out of the deal because of Carbone's wage demands. Now there's a surprise.

11th October: Villa are linked, again, with a bid for Haim Revivo. Don't all yawn at once.

12th October: Carbone says he wants to stop at Wednesday. Which seems to rule yet another one out.

13th October: Villa 3 Manchester Utd Reserves 0. No, I'm not being unduly critical, just realistic. Few things piss me off in football more than the way Alex Ferguson gets fawned over by an adoring, sycophantic media when he's done more damage to English football than the Luftwaffe. Fair enough, nobody really expected a full team but eight unknowns, a fat Australian, a Norwegian reserve who wished he was somewhere else and proof from the Netherlands that evolution doesn't always work was an insult to the paying punters. Didn't have a problem putting out a full team in that testimonial two days ago, did you Alex? Now let me see who benefited from that. Oh yes, you did. The Villa did as well as they could, a
professional display from a team who at least realised that in the circumstances they had an obligation to make sure the night wasn't completely wasted. JJ scored a great goal and the abuse their keeper got was worth the admission money alone. Our problems last season started after losing 4-1 at Stamford Bridge, let's hope the reverse is true now. There's
still a law which says all Englishmen must practice their archery on Sunday afternoon and an FA regulation that all teams must play their strongest available team at all times. I don't know which one sounds most obsolete .

14th October: Ferguson's excuse - "We had eleven injuries". Presumably a result of last Monday's exertions. Anybody want to have a bet how many will get better between now and Saturday? Stan might be staying at Fulham, provided we can drop the asking price enough.

15th October: Stan's back.

16th October: Praise be, 'tis a miracle. Eleven injuries on Wednesday, nine of them cleared up by this afternoon. It must be something in the water.