Bluearmyfox28

I’m convinced Cooper thought singing Zaha would be enough for us to be saved. Once that fell through I think he lost his mind a little.

#WelcomeWoyo.

I honestly believe his best position is a right wing back in a back 5 and not as a winger.

Are you on spice?

Difference is Ric, Enzo had the whole summer to make that change and he still wanted to make further change in the January window. Ruud’s got 4 weeks. Enzo had more to spend in the championship than Ruud has got in the premier league and that’s ignoring how much more unsellable baggage Ruud has got due to Cooper’s recruitment. Ultimately, I agree to a point with what you are saying but if we throw the towel in now, half way through the season can you imagine how much more of a joke of a club we would look? That has long term effects and makes you look like a joke club. Yes, we look down and out but this season for points and results has been strange and it’s not over yet.

I fully stand by Ruud still and I stand by a previous statement that if we go down I hope we stick with Ruud and rebuild with him. Anyone that has the slightest understanding of football can see we’ve improved massively under Ruud compared to how we was under Cooper. The fact Ruud has made us competitive in games with this group of players is impressive as far as I’m concerned.

Give me an oil rich Saudi at least they know how to run a successful business.

£45m on Skipp, Edouard (loan fee), Okoli and Ayew. Vile.

What’s the outstanding amount on his original transfer fee?

His dribbling style also reminds me very much of a winger, wouldn’t be surprised if he had a position swap at some point of his youth career which could explain the poor defensive stats.

So few different highlight clips here, never seen him play before so solely going off the highlights… the lad has physical attributes in abundance, his burst of acceleration appears unreal, he’s got great ability to drive upfield with the ball and he’s often looking for the overlap exploiting space. I noticed as well he appears quite calm with the ball at the back which is needed after what we’ve seen from JJ. downside is he appears to have zero quality in the final third and doesn’t appear to look like the fighting type of player. Positionally, he often looks out of place too so is going to need someone like Coady alongside him constantly in his ear. pro’s and con’s which is expected for the money we have available, the one thing I will say is his downside appears similar to JJ’s but he appears to also offer more than JJ so time will tell.

Who to believe

Ruud stated that he’s taken a lot of responsibility on ensuring the right players are targeted so I’m willing to trust his judgement. Important to remember we can’t judge him on these signings based on the finances he has available to him.

This works if you played them as inverted wingers, problem being is it works if you have attacking fullbacks

Are we missing the fact is states loan not permanent transfer?

From the footage I’ve been able to find of Kristensen (his time in denmark) interestingly, he spent a lot of his time at right back or the right side of a back 3 which may further indicate a plan to move to a back 3? From what I’ve seen he appears very similar to Vestergaard but he has a tad more pace and loves switching the ball with long diagonal passes. He doesn’t appear to use his size as well as he could though, again similar to Vesty.

Explains where Rudkin’s been on holiday then

Looked decent before his move, very good on the ball, aggressive off the ball in the press and appears to have some pace about him. Obviously left footed which gives us some balance, however, he doesn’t look like someone who can play in a 2, instead looks good for a 3 at the back.

Yeah I’m reading through this thread as we speak and I genuinely find it baffling that people think we were better or on par with Cooper’s team. Absolutely delusional, Ruud genuinely has my full backing, I’ve been impressed with how far we’ve come from how we looked under Cooper in the short amount of training time we’ve had. I find it hilarious when some fans are so opinionated but choose to ignore the clear obstacles Ruud has been dealt already. I would go as far to say if we continue to improve the way we have the past 5 weeks, I would stick with Ruud to get us back into the prem too.

Agreed, I think we’ve seen a huge improvement. It’s easy to forget about the past, we was dreadful under Cooper and I was scratching my head how we got the amount of points we had. Questions do need to be asked with regards to Buonanotte not being picked, but I think Ruud tried to nullify Digne today who plays a huge role in their attacking build up. Do I agree with the decision? No. But I can see the thinking and I actually think Ayew had a good game. I asked the same question in the post match thread but for everyone that’s Ruud out based on results how many points did you expect from our last 5 games? To clarify that was Newcastle, Wolves, Liverpool, Man City and Villa. At most I thought we would get 3, I'm intrigued what others think though as I honestly think these negative responses are ignoring how difficult this stretch of 5 games has been. As far as I’m concerned from fixtures we realistically had a chance against (West Ham, Wolves, Brighton) I would have wanted 4-6 points. We got 4?!

If I’m Ruud I’m starting Hamza at right back no matter what. Clear instructions on what you want from him and allow yourself 90 minutes to analyse if you are happy with what you see in case a new signing hasn’t arrived to replace JJ.

So had some time to think about the performance as emotions usually clout judgement as seen by the majority of the initial reactions on here. First of all people need to realise Villa park is a very tough ground to come to and get anything from they’ve played 11 games at home, lost 1, drew 4 and won 6. To nullify them for the majority of the game was impressive. I think a lot of the criticism on Ruud has been very unwarranted so far. He’s had 5 weeks in charge which is around the equivalent of a pre season but a lot less time on the training field, He’s also missing a lot of key players through injuries. For me, his identity is already showing, we’ve been so much better defensively despite individual errors (nothing a manager can do) and I’ve seen multiple sequences moving forward where we look impressive. Today, however, Ruud got his game management wrong, I don’t mind the idea of keeping it compact and tight on the basis the last 20/30 minutes you push for the win if it’s there for the taking. That opportunity arose when we scored the equaliser, at that moment we should have pushed for it. Instead we became more compact which Villa quickly realised and started throwing bodies forward and pinned us in as they realised we wasn’t threatening and happy with a draw. That’s on Ruud. I’ve seen many commenting about “getting a result against a poor Villa side” I honestly believe we made them look poor, we didn’t allow them to build anything in the final third until the last 20 minutes. We closed down quickly and played on their first touch every-time in the final third often winning the ball back which Villa fans were clearly becoming frustrated with. That’s our aggressiveness off the ball which deserves credit. A replacement for JJ needs to be No.1 priority and needs to be done before our next premier league game. Give Hamza a start at right back against QPR and see if you like what he offers. JJ’s confidence is completely shot and he needs to be taken out of the firing line. With regards to today’s mistake I honestly think Ayew was expecting the ball to be hooked down the line and appeared surprised to be given the ball so late, that’s on JJ (Once again). Mavididi also isn’t good enough to be starting. Everytime I’ve thought he’s been dangerous this season has consisted of him coming off the bench and impacting the game with tired legs. Nothing wrong in that but a starter on the left wing is needed. People saying there is no improvement from Cooper are right based of results on paper, but basing that off performances is delusional as far as I’m concerned. We are showing improvements week after week, we’ve been solid defensively, our press off the ball is aggressive and successful on several occasions and we’ve seen tidy patterns of play several times per game. I do wonder if Ruud is struggling with trusting his squad in terms of in game management, we seen similar from Enzo last season yet this year his subs have been completely different. I truthfully believe we’ve seen huge strides forward in Ruud and despite results (individual errors) I’ve been impressed by Ruud other than the wolves game. It’s important to ask ourselves prior to the 5 game stretch how many points did we realistically believe we would get against Villa, Man City, Liverpool, Wolves and Newcastle? I would have expected 3 points at most. Does it feel awful? Yes. But this run of 5 games does not define our season and the league table was always going to look ugly for us after this stretch. Moving forward, we need a minimum of 4 points in the next two games with 6 points obviously being perfect which I think is realistic. Truth is we need 5 signings potentially 4 after Thomas’ performance today. Right back, centre back, winger and striker all in desperate need of reinforcements. Thomas’ performance today may have kept him In as a capable back up until the end of the season. Apologise to anyone that got to the end of this, didn’t expect it to be so long!

Couldn’t agree more.

He’s clearly played Ayew in an attempt to nullify Digne, what I don’t understand is when you play defensive like that you invite pressure onto you which makes the player your attempting to nullify more effective!

I just don’t understand it at this point, our attacking movement looked the best it’s looked all season, so why change it? I could understand if Bounanotte was a luxury player, lazy in the press but he sets a better pressing tempo than Ayew does. All I can think at this point is Ruud thinks Ayew is a better defensive option to support JJ for obvious reasons.