The Championship 2018/19 - Play-off final

How strange that a player from Brazil, playing for Chelsea is actually a villa fan :lol:
 
Has it ever been explained how William became a Villa supporter?

Yep.

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sp...-news/prince-william-aston-villa-fan-14308959

Prince William said: “A long time ago at school I got into football big time. I was looking around for clubs. All my friends at school were either Man United fans or Chelsea fans and I didn’t want to follow the run of the mill teams.

“I wanted to have a team that was more mid-table that could give me more emotional rollercoaster moments.

“Aston Villa’s always had a great history. I have got friends of mine who support Aston Villa and one of the first FA Cup games I went to was Bolton v Aston Villa back in 2000. Sadly, Villa went on to lose to Chelsea"
 
Sad thing is that poor Villa manager will probably get sacked in January.
 
Good to have Villa back up. Next year Leeds, Forest and Blackburn please.
 
Yep.

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sp...-news/prince-william-aston-villa-fan-14308959

Prince William said: “A long time ago at school I got into football big time. I was looking around for clubs. All my friends at school were either Man United fans or Chelsea fans and I didn’t want to follow the run of the mill teams.

“I wanted to have a team that was more mid-table that could give me more emotional rollercoaster moments.

“Aston Villa’s always had a great history. I have got friends of mine who support Aston Villa and one of the first FA Cup games I went to was Bolton v Aston Villa back in 2000. Sadly, Villa went on to lose to Chelsea"
Fair enough; certainly seems passionate about them today :lol:

Thanks!
 
What are the odds for a Terry full kit once more?

491A392E00000578-5383279-image-m-4_1518473867415.jpg
 
Good to have Villa back up. Next year Leeds, Forest and Blackburn please.
Feck that, keep Leeds well away from the PL, in fact I hope they get relegated, feckers.
 
Feck that, keep Leeds well away from the PL, in fact I hope they get relegated, feckers.

Football is boring without the bad guys. Leeds are great villains!

Much prefer to see them up in the Prem than the likes of Norwich or Cardiff.
 


Hate way people do this. He attempted 1 tackle and was successful with it so factually true but it's trying to make it sound better. Thing is, there's nothing wrong with attempting 1 tackle as a central defender during a game, Mings did too (also successful).

What's a ball recovery?
 
Hate way people do this. He attempted 1 tackle and was successful with it so factually true but it's trying to make it sound better. Thing is, there's nothing wrong with attempting 1 tackle as a central defender during a game, Mings did too (also successful).

What's a ball recovery?

Don’t shoot the messenger :lol:
 
Miserable lot the Aston Villa fans are, saw a load of them at Baker Street station and I couldn't tell if they'd won or lost, had to check my phone.

fecks sake, when I saw Porsche finally win again at Le Mans after so many years, I had a grin on me like a Cheshire Cat for days afterwards.

I guess they are Brummies though, so they tend to be inherently depressed.
 
Sad thing is that poor Villa manager will probably get sacked in January.

Yes if we're bottom. You need to remember this is a club that had Lambert in charge for nearly 4 years (different ownership of course). No chance of Dean being sacked if we have a nice no frills mid table season.

Thank you to all my virtual friends (and the odd foe) on here for the well wishes. It's good to be back and I think after the last decade we've had I'll just spend the rest of this week soaking it all up and will start worrying about who should be our left back or centre half for next season by the middle of June.

Have to say premier league is shaping up to be very interesting next year (below the top 2). You have Newcastle coming now with serious cash and all that untapped potential and we're back with a 40k crowd when we're doing well so potential to grow over next 2-3 years.

Just glad to be back part of it all.
 
How much does this game mean financially? Heard someone say that promotion was effectively worth £180m to the winner of the play off final.
Is that close to being right? Any idea how that breaks down?

The common misconception is we'll get a 170m cheque through the post tomorrow morning.

Pretty sure about 25% of it is actually parachute payments which you get yearly so we could get that back as a championship club if the worst happens and we go straight back down (better not!).

You also have existing players who'll get improved contracts (McGinn etc), promotion bonuses etc so that eats into the prize. Getting likes of Tammy and Mings back full time will eat into it aswell.

Most important thing is not to go crazy like Fulham did and sign 8-10 players and completely destroy the spirit we've built over last 3 months. Yes we need strengthening in the usual areas but McGinn and Grealish are two fine midfielders to build around. If we can scout the next Kante that would be amazing midfield for mid table.

I know he's not well liked on this forum for obvious reasons but Tyrone Mings has been amazing for us, that commanding CB we've missed since the days of Laursen and Mellberg. He hardly plays at Bournemouth so very confident we can sign him on a permanent.
 
Four of their starters today are loanees, so they ain’t keeping much of the players.

We will sign Mings and El Ghazi (who improved a lot after xmas) no problem. Seems OGS has big plans for Axel so fair enough. No idea what Chelsea will decide with Tammy. He's not good enough for their level anyway but guess they might hold onto him until January and give him a few run outs in the cups.
 
Yes if we're bottom. You need to remember this is a club that had Lambert in charge for nearly 4 years (different ownership of course). No chance of Dean being sacked if we have a nice no frills mid table season.

Thank you to all my virtual friends (and the odd foe) on here for the well wishes. It's good to be back and I think after the last decade we've had I'll just spend the rest of this week soaking it all up and will start worrying about who should be our left back or centre half for next season by the middle of June.

Have to say premier league is shaping up to be very interesting next year (below the top 2). You have Newcastle coming now with serious cash and all that untapped potential and we're back with a 40k crowd when we're doing well so potential to grow over next 2-3 years.

Just glad to be back part of it all.

Yeah I'm sure you'll be fine. Good to have the Villa back. Nice easy 6 points for us. It was really just a general comment about newly promoted teams and the unrealistic expectations that some of their owners have. I hope that Brighton go down and the Baggies drift into Championship obscurity. They should be careful what they wish for. Hopefully Villa don't make the same mistakes.