In the old days the Europa League meant something. But back then it was the UEFA cup it offered a straight forward knock out competition, limited number of rounds and excitement each round and for Villa knock outs on away goals !
The thing is with CL it gives you the cash to build a squad to basically have another half season of games if you get to the final, the Europa League does not do that and thus teams get really stretched. Yes someone may say, look at Fulham but they do not play their away games anyway ! Seriously though they have done well but had few injuries this season but their league form has stuttered, for teams like us hoping to get into the higher levels in the league it is simply a distraction we do not need.
I have to day I have been totally consistent here and always hated the competition, I supported fully the decision to pull out of the Moscow game because getting 4th is that vital. The Europa league is not the FA or even Carling cup people care about those competitions they do not about the Europa league. I mean say we qualified for it next season we may have 6PM kick offs at Villa Park, can you imagine the attendance for that ?
UEFA have totally ruined their own competition by making it Chumps League lite because UEFA do not need a competition that is different from the CL but subservient to it.
Wished someone would put it to death.
Aston Villa News 24/7
You needn’t worry Ian I don’t think we qualify in 8th place ?
unliek the vocal minority I have more faith than that
but a part of me IF we do not win FA cup I would finish 8th not to be in the blasted competition
I disagree.
While the top 4 is the holy grail, I’d rather have the Europa than not for 2 reasons.
Ist, it’s simply more to watch and go for.
2nd, it’s good experience for the players, in that they have to travel and play different styles of play.
I know it might seem like a pile now, but if Fulham or Pool were to win it, I’m sure they would look at it the same way as we do with our first LC win.
Siverware is Silverware after all.
And tbh, I’d rather have the Europa over the LC, given the way the latter has been devalued recently.
Although I would accept it can spoil the prem side of things.
I forgot.
I’d say that even if Fulham don’t win the Europa, there will be many a fan regarding Juventas as one of their best ever games, a la Inter, Barce etc for us?
You can’t beat European football whatever it’s called imo.
Villan your right they would remember that game but hey are a small club, we are not
Do you think Liverpool want the Europa over 4th ?
If the EL was a straight knock out would be with you totally
but it demands a CL squad without the CL money, imagine if we were still in it now ??
Youth side would have to play in it !!
“Do you think Liverpool want the Europa over 4th ?”
That’s not a valid point imo, because don’t Pool have a bit of history in the CL of late to be able to look down their noses at Europa?
I don’t think we’re in that position yet
“but it demands a CL squad without the CL money, imagine if we were still in it now ??”
So Fulham have a better squad than us?
They’re doing ok.
And if you look at some of the teams left, I don’t think it’s as second-rate as some make out.
Of course, the money is the big difference.
If they could up that some, it would be a different kettle of fish.
It is a shit load of games though, I agree.
And would involve rotation.
So we’d be knackered from the off
to compare us to Fulham is a bit false, due to their home form, I believe they take their foot of the pedal away from home and the results show that totally.
whereas every game we have to go for it, in fact in the early rounds Fulham basically played a reserve side, only took it seriously once they were close to qualifying.
As much as I don’t want to compare us to Fulham, the sad fact is we’re much closer to them than Pool when it comes to Europe recently Ian.
Perhaps a good question would be why are they so close to us in the league and have done miles better in the Europa when they’ve taken their foot off the gas, whereas we have to go for it every game, to no effect?
I think I’ve made it clear that I love MON, but 7 draws in 10 games ain’t good imo.
Hmm.
Questions, questions.
we of course have done much better in domestic cups and we are a way i front of them in the league
I guess the point is that Hodgson targetted the EL a while back when the league looked safe, They got lucky against Juve playing basically a 4th choice centre back pairing and a blatant cheat of a ref
good luck to them but the last 8 is hardly full of the top quality some claim the EL is
That’s a harsh assessment of Fulham’s campaign and I could liken our domestic cup runs in that we had comparitively easy draws.
But I don’t want to go down that road.
At least not as far as some lunatic I read on another forum, who purports to be a Villa fan saying that if we beat Chelsea and go on to win the cup, we won’t have “achieved it”.
It’s not over till the fat bird sings, imo.
wonder if that fan has his semi ticket yet or if we got to the final will be moaning about the lack of tickets ?
Never left a message on here before but like to read the blogs. However, this something I feel really strongly about. Not only have they ruined the UEFA Cup (something even Maradona was thrilled to lift with Napoli) they have the cheek to allow other teams to drop out of the CL and come straight into the shitty EL – how demoralising is that for a team that’s battled through qualifying rounds, etc? Been a bit of an armchair fan this year, but I think Villa should keep the faith with going for fourth. Spurs have got FA Cup commitments as well now, Man City are under so much pressure and Liverpool are not good at all. You never know, we might pip all of them.