Guess it was inevitable that a paper would name the ‘culprits’ of the ‘incident’ at the spa.
The NOTW are the first to come out and say it was Collins and Dunne and that they have apologies through the NOTW for it.
They say it is unlikely to save Dunne from leaving Villa.
As the drinks flowed at the Champneys Springs spa in Measham, Leicestershire, last Wednesday night, Dunne unleashed a stinging attack on Houllier’s backroom staff.
A source said: “He told them a few home truths, mainly about life under Houllier. A number of the senior players remain unhappy about how things are going.”
Dunne said: “I apologise unreservedly for my behaviour on Wednesday night. It was not acceptable and I am genuinely sorry.”
Collins said: “We were wrong. This should not have happened and I apologise for the part I played.”
This is so very messy now, no names were released until now, some had guessed at these two, maybe some had ITK information but why ‘apologise’ through the NOTW and not through the club.
Does not add up, especially as the story is different from the story earlier that stated the row was between two players and not mentioned a staff member.
EDIT : 23:21 – Sunday Mercury have the same story – LINK and say too it was them two pissed up after open bar agreed by Houllier and they had a go at the backroom boys, so not just one.
EDIT : 23:36 – The Mirror have a less sensational version of this story saying Houllier will simply remind the players of their responsibilities in public
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We signed some very good players under O’Neil and yes a number of duffs. Ash, Downing, Milner, Delph are all superb players. Carew was our leading scorer for three years on the spin. Collins, Dunne, Cuellar, Warnock, Friedel made up the 4th best defensive unit in the Premier League last season. Throw in the likes of Gabby, Petrov, Reo Coker, Heskey, Luke Young and emerging talents such as Clark, Albrighton, Delfouneso, Bannan and Houllier inherited a very good squad.
These players don’t become bad players over night unless of course you have a manager who hasn’t a clue in terms of tactics and who fails to motivate and inspire the best out of them. We unfortunately now have such a manager.
The fact he spent 30 mill in January and since then we find ourselves on a run of one win in 6 losing 3 just exacerbates what a poor, poor job he is doing.
I just hope we don’t pay the ultimate price under the useless, clueless, b**lckless,, way past it fool.
The 7 goal thrashing in our 31st game last season and another 6 goal pasting in our 2nd game of this season. The cracks were there and getting wider before GH took over.
7 goal thrashing was very much the exception tot the. Overall we conceded 39 in 38 league games last season. 17 in the first 19, 22 in the last 19 in fact if you take out the 7-0 freak result against Chelsea we conceded just 15 goals in the other 18 league games in the second half of the season which is excellent.
The 6-0 at Newcastle was under a rookie manager and I apportion no blame to either Mon or Houllier for that as that would be stupid.
We had a very good defensive record under Mon and we have a very, very poor one under Houllier. The fact he won’t take responsibility for it is disgusting and says it all about the man. He is giving players a ready made excuse with his attitude and its a very dangerous game he is playing.
7 goal thrashing was very much the exception to the rule. Overall we conceded 39 in 38 league games last season. 17 in the first 19, 22 in the last 19 in fact if you take out the 7-0 freak result against Chelsea we conceded just 15 goals in the other 18 league games in the second half of the season which is excellent.
The 6-0 at Newcastle was under a rookie manager and I apportion no blame to either Mon or Houllier for that as that would be stupid.
We had a very good defensive record under Mon and we have a very, very poor one under Houllier. The fact he won’t take responsibility for it is disgusting and says it all about the man. He is giving players a ready made excuse with his attitude and its a very dangerous game he is playing
7 goal mauling away to the best team in the league? dont see what the newcastle game has to do with o’neill or houllier
The point is out of 10 league games played either side of the summer; we had suffered a 6 goal and 7 goal thrashings. Pretend all was rosy and O’Neill walked out for no reason if it suits your anti GH agenda. Thats up to you
UTV
i aint pretending all was rosy under o’neill, i just find it funny that people were slagging off o’neill last year, and now houllier can do no wrong? The results speak for themselves. i dont have an anti-houllier agenda, i just dont enjoy watching us lose, give up in cup matches & then blame it all on the previous management
UTV
I don’t like going over old ground.
I want to draw a line under O’Neill; but when people like you keep trying to convince us that he left some sort of fantastic legacy that has been dismantled by GH, I have to speak out.
Throughout history it’s always been a lot easier to set up a witchunt than it is to logically analyse in depth the logical causes of any given situation.
Just a thought; if the fickle lot do get their way and GH is burned at the stake; who do they really think would fancy taking his place? Megson, Curbishley, Ince?
UTV
nor do i like going over old ground, thats why im getting fed up with people blaming MON for our troubles this year. & wen have i ever said that he left a fantastic legacy? never. ive just stated the facts. Houllier shouldnt be sacked, because as uv alluded to thered be no better option currently, still doesnt mean i think hes done a good job. u cant argue with our defensive record last year compared to this nor too our position in the table.
were never gonna agree, u think hes done a good job, i think hes done a bad job. lets just get stay up this season and have a nice long summer holiday. Im exhausted…
No mate the point is this. Last season under Mon we conceded 39 goals – 17 in the first half of the season 22 in the second half which included a freak 7-0 result and meant we conceded just 15 in the other 18 games that made up the second part of the season.
Under Houller we have conceded 41 in 24 and it show no signs of improving. Under the rookie Kev Mac we indeed conceded 6 in one game. We also conceded only 3 goals in the other 4 games he was in charge.
You know what though keep blaming O’Neill. The sad thing about that though is he is no longer here and can do f*ck all about what is happening and the man who can do something as apparently washed his hands of it until the summer. What a sad irresponsible joke of a manager we have.
Yes, last season we finished 6th.
But we amassed points by grinding out odd-goal wins (usually Milner inspired) or lucky draws; most of our time was spent with 10 men behind the ball and us unable to string 2 passes together. Honestly now; how many times did you think the result could have quite easily have gone against us? If you are anything like me, that would have been every home game except one.
And then in the summer we had Milner refusing to play in any of the pre-season friendlies; and the remainder of the team looking outclassed against the likes of Bohemians, Basingstoke, Walsall etc.
That was followed 5 days before kick-off by, O’Neill’s manic walk out.
Then a glimmer of hope as Milner came back in the side for the 3-0 over West Ham and him giving City the ultimatum, ‘pay up or I stay at Villa.’ Then hours later City came and took him.
And 2 days after that we were 6-0 thrashed at newly promoted Newcastle; followed immediately by the feeble exit from Europe at VP.
The truth is the luckiest cup draws in the history of the game and some good results had papered over the cracks. It was all so fragile, and without Milner the whole thing collapsed like a pack of cards.
If turning on GH at this stage of the season makes you happy that’s up to you. Personally, he has my backing.
UTV
luckiest cup draws in history? cardiff (H) sunderland (A) portsmouth (A) Blackburn then Utd. Might be over exagerating there, blackburn (H) burnley (H) birmingham (A) is easier in my opinion. as for these odd goal wins & lucky draws u refer to, any examples? im not sayin sack houllier or anything like that because that would only detrement the club at this stage of the season, but for the life of me cant see how anyone can argue that we are currently in a relegation scrap because of MON.
love it when people with desperate arguments to prove bring in the 7-0, they are of course ignoring for their own benefit that we had three clean sheets in 7 games after that and we won 4 out of 4 and MON got MOTM for April, an inconvient truth maybe ?
I would add in the next lot of games, Houllier basically has to win as many games as he has done in the first 20, that is tough
You should know plenty about desperate arguments. Mr Anti-Villa News and Views.
We’ve been around this argument too many times for it to be of much use. However, for all his faults, MON had the undeniable ability to get the very best out of average players. You could argue that this was his unique quality and one no other managers (GH included) can match. But, equally undeniable is that they ARE average players. That group of players, the defense
I have said if you could combine the two managers then you would have a world class one
they are not average, look at how much players have been sold for and the players at the back did the jobs to the plan.
the problem is now that plan has not changed with a new manager and that will always cause problems. Take the Man city home game, that totally an old style performance and we got the points, the lesson was not learnt.
By ‘average’ i mean ‘mid-table’. For me, our defence is/was just that. I don’t care about the clean sheet figures from over a year ago although I think you are right in that they did the job the were given to do. The style of play MON developed (direct, energetic midfield and whole-hearted/no-nonsense defending) lent itself to cup football and was effective to a point. To consistently break the top 4 or 5 though your defenders need to do much, much more . I don’t think Dunne, or Collins, or Warnock for that matter are capable of doing that. I think THEY know it and i’m certain GH knows it. Maybe he chose the wrong time to pick that fight but the inadequacies and inflexibility of those players are equally to blame.
On a different note, and with respect…the “All we are missing is a gifted playmaker” goes alongside the “what we need is a 20 goal a season man” at the top of the fan-cliche list. Browse any forum, for any team at any level in the close season and you’ll find those words. We were never ‘just one piece missing’.
Oops….in particular, were never good enough to break into the top 4 or 5. Surgery was needed the minute MON left.
what we needed was a top quality play maker brought in and that is the reason we failed.
I still think for the cash spent we got what was expected given how far behind we were.
exaggerated press stories yet again…i have been to Springs and take it from me there is no bar…the only drink you can have is a glass of wine with your meal…unless of course you ”smuggle” a few crates of beer…clearly something has gone on but nothing lie the press have made out…..get rid of the pile of over paid poo that mon bought into the club and move on….
Dunne saves all his shouting and aggression for old men. Can’t believe that some Villa fans would defend him over Sid Cowans and KMac just so they can have another kick at GH.
so do you know what happened then ?
do you know that it was cowans or KM involved at all
and not say Duverne who has a track record for this
of course mentioning a villa legend is a way of spinning it further against Dunne and Collins
Some of the spin I’ve read on here makes me wonder if some of you lot work for AVFC. In fact given some of the PR bull coming out of the club lately and how they tried to censor the press at the pre Bolton press conference I may well be right!
MON is to blame for spitting his dummy out and walking away leaving us in the shit with all viable managers employed. Houllier isnt to blame for that but he is to blame for failing to achieve anything with the same players and correcting deficiences starring him in the face and apparantely distancing himself from the players.
But above all I blame the spineless performances from established players who do not give a shit other than for themselves.
If the crux of the article is true then these players should never play for us again regardless of the management teams failures. No player is bigger than the boss or the club.
No they’re not bigger then the club, they make up the club and without them there would be no club. We need these players until the end of the season and then they could be dropped forever. While I agree that they shouldn’t play, we don’t have another established 2 defenders that play together as often which could cause major problems.
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