It goes without saying that most eyes will be on Stamford Bridge and Old Trafford, especially with the bottom three relegated teams already confirmed, it’s the top of the table where all the interest is.

Utd and Chelsea fight for 1st place of course. Arsenal have been dragged into battle with Tottenham for 3rd spot. Fortunately for Arsenal, they host a Fulham side who will more than likely be focused on Wednesday’s Europa League final in Hamburg on Wednesday.

With a path leading directly into the group stage of the Champions League on offer, 3rd place is a prize worth chasing. Not only does the play off place awarded to 4th mean a risk of not actually reaching the competition, but it potentially provides an unwelcome distraction right as the new season starts – the two-legged play-off matches are scheduled for 17th/18th and 24th/25th August.

It’s a similar story with 5th, 6th & 7th places and the Europa League. 7th place will mean joining the competition in the 3rd qualification round and with legs scheduled for 29th July and 5th August that will clearly have an impact on pre-season planning.

The teams that finish 5th and 6th will join the Europa League in the 4th and final qualification round which will take place on 19th & 26th August.

Man City can finish 5th or 6th. Villa can finish in 5th, 6th or 7th and Liverpool could wind up in either 6th or 7th place. Personally, I want 5th, of course I do, but I’ll take finishing above Liverpool.

Below the top 7, there’s literally nothing but pride at stake. Everton will obviously be extremely disappointed to miss out on a European place and will take no comfort from the fact that they cannot be passed for 8th.

Birmingham City are practically guaranteed a top 10 finish and it has to be said, that’s quite an achievement. Credit where it’s due. With Wolves staying up and West Brom rejoining us, it promises to be an interesting season in the midlands next year.

By 6pm on Sunday it will all be over and there will be no more questions left to answer. If I was willing to stick my neck on the block and make a prediction, I’d say that the top 7 will not change. For once each of the 7 teams have their destiny in their own hands and all could and should win their fixtures.

In the end, then, it will come down to who throws it away if there are to be any changes to the order of the top 7. As I’m fond of pointing out, predictions in this game are entirely pointless, so I won’t be putting my neck on that block. Can you see any of the 7 slipping up though?

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The one point of interest during the bore-fest in North London came late on when Shay Given attempted to make a fairly routine looking save from what could have been Arsenal’s first real shot on goal of the second half. The Irishman landed awkwardly and from the painful reaction – later requiring oxygen as he was stretchered off – it seemed likely that he had dislocated his shoulder, which was later confirmed.

His replacement was not the familiar face of the perpetual bench warmer Stuart Taylor, who is injured himself, but a young man from the Faroe Islands of all places; Gunnar Nielsen. I joked on Twitter at the time about the irony of Man City, with all their money, having to rely on the services of some kid from the Faroes as a back up. A couple of people responded by pointing out that Joe Hart was on season long loan at Birmingham City. I hadn’t forgotten, the point stands, Man City sanctioned that deal.

I call Nielsen a ‘kid’, which in goalkeeping terms is true to a point, but he’s actually 23. He was brought to City by Mark Hughes from Blackburn and the Welshman was also responsible for bringing him to Lancashire in the first place. Perhaps not a ringing endorsement, but someone somewhere must have seen something in him and while the Faroes are far from footballing giants, he is an international player.

My assumption was that Neilsen was probably third choice goal keeper and would therefore start against us on Saturday with someone from the City academy on the bench. City had other ideas. It’s emerged that Neilsen is actually their fourth choice with 27 year old Colombian David González Giraldo third choice, but also injured. Either way, clearly City don’t really want to be dropping so far down the ladder; Neilsen’s OK to sit on the bench, but they don’t want to actually play him. With Hart stuck in Birmingham, are we to assume that City lacked the foresight to ensure there was a recall clause in Hart’s season loan deal?

As it turns out, Manchester City employ no less than 9 goalkeepers. Nine! However, they still went cap in hand to the Premier League to ask for special dispensation to sign an emergency goalkeeper to plug the gap. The powers that be acquiesced and Marton Fulop grabbed his gloves and headed down to Eastlands from Sunderland.

Precedent Set

Earlier in the week I was listening to some podcast or other – ESPN Soccernet I think – and one of the presenters, who happened to have a Mancuian accent, talked about a precedent being set. I knew what was coming and I bet you do too. Yup, back in December 2006 we also had a minor goal keeping crisis of sorts with both Thomas Sørensen and Stuart Taylor picking up injuries in quick succession. I can’t help wondering whether Taylor’s nickname might be ‘Lucky’.

We were forced to rely on the then 21 year old reserve keeper Robert Olejnik – now number one keeper up at Falkirk – to deputise for Taylor, but once Taylor also got injured, MON had similar reservations about handing the gloves to Olejnik as Mancini has over Neilsen.

Hang on here though, a lot of similarities certainly, but a precedent? Really?

Look, no excuses here but Martin O’Neill and Randy Lerner had barely been at Villa for three months at that point. MON had time to make one permanent signing before the Summer window closed in Stiliyan Petrov and admittedly also shored up some weaknesses with a couple of free agent signings. But let’s cut them a little slack if they failed to make having 3 first team quality goalkeepers on the payroll a priority during the limited time they had to work with.

So finding ourselves relying on a promising 21 year old for first team goalkeeping, MON sought permission to make an emergency short term loan, which we were granted. Enter Gabor Kiraly, he of the tracky bottom fame. The Hungarian got us through the tricky month of December and into January, but with a record of 5 losses and 1 draw, it was a case of ‘thanks very much, don’t call us, we’ll call you’ and off he headed.

Life In A Glass House

If I’m honest, I’m not overly impressed about this. It’s really stretching things to draw parallels between our situation in 2006 and Man City now. The word I frequently throw around in relation to City is ‘vulgarity’ and I’m still to find something more appropriate. Call it schadenfreude, call it what you like, but I don’t mind admitting that I found the mess thoroughly amusing. ‘Irony’ doesn’t even begin to describe the situation.

But it’s City’s own doing, isn’t it? As much as I like the image, I doubt very much that Alex McLeish held a gun to Hughes’ head when they did the loan deal for Hart. If they couldn’t work a recall clause in then that’s surely their own problem?

They say that those in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones, but I really don’t care, City are just about the last team in the League that should be given any special treatment because of a lack of players. It’s almost obscene. (Mmmm, I might have a challenger to ‘vulgar’). That said, it’s really just the principle I object to. I object to our situation in 2006 being equated to City now, but I can’t avoid conceding that losing your first three goalkeepers is unlucky to say the least.

If I were to put the boot on the other foot for a moment and try to imagine how we would feel if we lost Friedel, Guzan and Marshall, leaving Elliot Parish to man the sticks, I guess I’d probably agree with any attempts to seek permission for an emergency loan too.

We’ll find out on Saturday, but who’s to say that Fulop will do a better job than Neilsen could have done? Fulop may be more experienced and possibly a technically better goalkeeper, but he’s never played in any City side before. Communication with defenders is a key element to the role and not something they have any chance of having under control in time. If Ash and Downing can send enough crosses into that sweet no man’s land spot leaving City players second guessing who is going to deal with the ball, I can see us benefiting.

So while I don’t agree with City being given special treatment, even at the risk of appearing hypocritical, even if throwing a few stones breaks some glass, in the end it might not matter. It may even work in our favour.

Regardless, it’s a game we have to win to retain a chance of fourth place – we may need a win just to cling on to fifth – and whoever is in goal has to be beaten. That’s all there is to it, no lame excuses.

But if you want to talk about precedents being set, I think City has just laid down a big marker we’ll hear about again some time.

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20th April 2008, Villa Park. A brace each from Ash and Carew topped with a 5th from Gabby. What a day. Some great, great moments. From the goals, to Carew and the ball boy, to Ollie pumping his fists with unbridled joy in the 85th minute. I think that look on his face will be etched in my mind forever!!

Just over two years later and they’re back…

…hopefully for more of the same!!

UTV!!

I’d love to give these pics attribution, but they’ve been sat on my hard drive for 2 years and I honestly couldn’t say where they came from. Sufficed to say that they remain the property of the appropriate copyright holders.

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But a funny thing happened; Barcelona lost 3-1.

That’s not what is intriguing me and causing this little venture from the well trodden Villa path today though. What grabbed my attention is that Mourinho’s side won the game with just 33% of the possession. They won the game by connecting just 158 passes to Barcelona’s 521. That’s a 23% share of the completed passes in the game. I’ve checked. There’s been just two matches in the last 4 seasons that Aston Villa had had a lower CPS in a game:-

• 20% – 26th December ‘07 – Chelsea 4 Aston Villa 4
• 22% – 28th October ‘06 – Liverpool 3 Aston Villa 1

The official Man of the Match; Wesley Sneijder, besides scoring Inter’s crucial equaliser, completed just 10 of the 26 passes he attempted during the course of the match. That’s a 38% completion rate that would make Reo-Coker wince.

30% of Inter’s attempted passes, compared to 14% of Barcelona’s, were classified as “long passes” and those passes had a completion rate of just 36% while Barcelona completed 71% of their long passes. Shhhh, don’t tell Arsene Wenger this though, he’ll call them a long ball team.

Inter’s total pass completion rate was just 58%. Barcelona hooked up 82% of the 636 passes they attempted.

So what?

We beat Liverpool, Chelsea and Man Utd this season with a similar share of possession and although we managed a greater share of the passing game than Inter did against Barcelona, we were far inferior by that measure too.

Could it be that organisation and team spirit go an awful long way? Could it be that a team can truly be greater than the sum of its parts? I believe that is the case and it’s one of the most important qualities MON was looking for when he was assembling the components of this team in my opinion. I sometimes see people lambaste that as if it’s a bad thing. It isn’t. It wins games.

And one final thought on the subject of bringing in the right players at the right time. Last summer there was the usual crying about lack of transfer activity and speculation about a shortage of funds. General Krulak tried to calm fears by insisting that if MON wanted to purchase a player for £30m, he could, the money would be there. Of course, that was twisted into some kind of promise of a £30m player which never materialised, leaving a lot of rattles laying on the ground beside the prams.

One of the names being banded around was a certain Wesley Sneijder. So, let’s get some perspective here people: last night Mr Sneijder was the Man of the Match against Barcelona in the San Siro. Tonight, we run out on the pitch at KC Stadium in Hull. No disrespect to Hull City or the people that live there, but come on!

Incidentally, if we win in Hull tonight, the 3 points will take us to 1,000 points to date in the Premiership. We’ll be only the fifth team to reach that milestone, you already know who the first four were. That will be quite an achievement and interesting to note that 233 of those points will have been earned under Martin O’Neill.

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I suppose the only downside with that mentality is that the instant they fail to win one of the next six – I mean if they fail, obviously – then does that not destroy the motivation that they have? As if it’s suddenly no longer worth pursuing. I don’t know, but I certainly hope they all give it everything until the final whistle of the final game, no matter what.

I frequently talk about the futility of making predictions, but it’s too tempting not to indulge now and again, even if doing so proves the point.  Yes, apparently I was hopelessly optimistic!

Going in, we all knew how bad the month of March has been under Martin O’Neill. However, despite the frustration of the draws and the embarrassment of the Stamford Bridge whooping, March 2010 still turned out to be MON’s best since joining Villa, returning an average of 1.20 points per game.

Yes, this does serve to highlight how low the bar was set with the previous seasons delivering 0.67, 0.40 & 0.25 respectively, but credit where it’s due; it was better. I decided to look at our entire history in the Premiership month by month on a points per game basis and I discovered an interesting little factoid. So far this season, we’ve not suffered a single month where the points per game ratio fell below 1.00.

Not interesting? OK, well here’s a little quiz question for you then (answer at the bottom) – only one manager has so far managed to steer Villa through an entire Premiership season without suffering a single monthly points per game ratio of less than 1.00. Can you name that manager? (The answer might surprise you)

Extrapolation

Just for fun, this is not a prediction y’understand.

MON’s average points per game ratios at Villa for the months of April and May before this season are 1.79 and 1.50 respectively. (It should be noted that May generally only contains 1 or 2 games though) If we achieve the same rates this season, with 5 games in April and 2 in May, we should expect a return of about 12 points. Of course, we’ve already played the first of those games, getting three points against Bolton.

We had 51 points before the Bolton game, so, based on these averages, that would extrapolate to a finish of 63 points. That’s 1 point better than last season, but is highly unlikely to be enough to deliver a top four finish. You can see why MON is saying that we need to win the remaining games.

We currently have 54 points, so if we were to win the final 6 games, we’d finish the season on 72 points. That would be a 10 point improvement on last season, which would be phenomenal, and would have been good enough for at least 4th place in 15 out of 17 Premiership seasons.

I have a feeling that the final outcome will be somewhere between the two, but we clearly need to at least match our average April and May performances under MON to deliver a single point improvement on last year. If we do that at least, where it places us in the table is out of our hands. That’s down to how everyone else around us does, we can only control our own record.

Home And Away

So, six games to go and it’s three at home, three away.

While our home record isn’t bad, we could have done with 1 or 2 of the 7 draws being wins. Then again, when you actually look at those 7 draws – Man City, Tottenham, West Ham, Arsenal, Man Utd, Wolves, and Sunderland – it’s probably just the last 2, and possibly the West Ham game, that might have made you wince a little if you were shown those results at the start of the season. Given that Wolves and Sunderland came during the infamous month of March and we had to fight back from being behind in both, I’ll take them!!

We’ve only lost twice at home; Liverpool were extremely fortunate to leave with all the spoils and the less said about the opening day debacle against Wigan, the better. But still, overall, not a bad record at all.

So the sequence of the final six games in terms of venue works quite nicely for us I think. Starting with Everton tonight at Villa Park, we follow that up with trips to Portsmouth and then Hull. Then we have a certain home derby game which I’m sure will be fairly low key (/sarcasm). The away game at Man City is potentially huge and precedes the season finale; Blackburn at Villa Park.

Even with my eternal optimism, I can’t honestly see 18 points there, but there could be a decent haul if things go our way. As I keep saying, whatever we do with these 6 games, where we place in the final table will be defined by the teams around us. Tottenham are about to enter the triple whammy I’ve been looking forward to tonight at home to Arsenal. They’ll follow that up with matches against Chelsea and Utd, but I didn’t expect that they’d be entering this sequence off the back of losses to Sunderland and Portsmouth at Wembley. Whether that helps or hinders them remains to be seen, but naturally we all hope it hinders.

So here’s hoping to a cracking start and a superb atmosphere at Villa Park tonight. If we do win, we’ll move back above Liverpool, but retain a game in hand. And if Tottenham lose, we’ll be within a point. A pretty tasty prospect I’m sure you’ll agree.

Oh, yes, quiz question – would you believe that the only manager to go an entire Premiership season without suffering a single monthly points per game ratio below 1.00 is David O’Leary? It’s true, 2003/04. Martin O’Neill could be the first to repeat that achievement this season.

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Once again, the live blog will be mostly fed from the Aston Villa Central Live Twitter account, so there will be a little lag – I think it looks for updates every minute of so. You can add your comments to the Live Blog if you wish, but it’s not designed to act like a chat room, so comments do require approval before they appear.

Clear as mud? Good. [Simple version: Pre-match news below, live blog on page 2]

Starting XI: Friedel, Cuellar, Dunne, Collins, Warnock, A Young, Milner, Petrov, Downing, Carew, Agbonlahor. Subs: L Young, Sidwell, Delfouneso, Delph, Heskey, Guzan, Beye.

In case you missed it yesterday, I recently spotted an old video on TV of Johnny Dixon making an acceptance speech of sorts following victory in the 1957 FA Cup final. Unfortunately I can’t grab that video, but I did record the audio which you can listen to below. A completely different era for sure.

Premiership Fixtures

Just two games in the Premiership today; both involving teams fighting relegation, so no real consequence to our own league campaign, but interesting appetizers to our match at Wembley. Both kick off at 3pm.

• Hull v Burnley
• West Ham v Sunderland

Also, the Grand National will be running at 4.15pm if that’s your bag. And football fans all around the world will surely be watching the El Classico which kicks off at 9pm.

The James Milner interview on BBC’s Football Focus is worth checking out. James is always good value, a thoughtful and honest player. [AVFC OS]

I know a couple of the usual suspects speculated that James Collins had deleted his Twitter account after issuing a public apology for the 7-1 defeat under some kind of instruction from the club. Of course, that’s absolute nonsense. James explains that he simply decided “it was time to concentrate on playing football”.

James Collins
It was tough to take for myself. I’ve been pretty happy with my form over the last couple of months and to drop that [performance] in the middle was quite strange so I thought I would put [the apology] out there. It was maybe a comment that I shouldn’t have made looking back on it. But it did give the fans a chance to see how I was feeling. It’s all right taking all the hype and the congratulations but I think when you play bad you’ve got to be the first to admit it. And I’m big enough and ugly enough.

Martin O’Neill says that the confidence is back. [The Guardian]

The last time we were at Wembley, for the Carling Cup final, I seem to remember making a reference to entertainers being dragged into finals of yore. For some reason Stan Boardman springs to mind, but it could be anyone of his ilk for all I care. Anyway, apparently the team were “entertained” by a magician before the last Wembley game, but James Collins reveals that’s not the case this time. [The Telegraph]

This is not strictly related to the game and I probably will refer to it again in future posts, but Randy Lerner and COO Paul Faulkner have recently given an interview with The Independent’s Tom Watt and, as ever, have had one or two interesting things to say.

Randy Lerner
You know, I think back to the final in February. Manchester United are a huge club, a one-off, for all sorts of historical reasons. But I wasn’t sitting at Wembley, looking at United and thinking: ‘I wish we were them.’ I’d rather celebrate the things we’ve got that they don’t.

I looked along at our end of Wembley and it was rammed: scarves, banners, non-stop singing, absolutely behind the team. And this wasn’t a little club out on a jolly. It was 10 years since we’d been there and it felt like our supporters were dusting themselves down and saying: ‘Yes. That’s us. We’re the Villa.’

If you’re worried about the effect that the 7-1 beating has had on us, as I and many Villa fans are, Rob Smith has some excellent examples of teams that have bounced back from heavy losses to inflict revenge and vanquish their conquerors. [The Guardian]

The Wembley pitch has been relaid for the 10th time this season, following heavy criticism after the Carling Cup final and England vs Egypt friendly. [The Guardian]

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I’m not completely sure how I’m going to handle the match itself. I definitely want to do something on Twitter as usual, but I’m leaning towards also doing a live blog. On the other hand, both are distractions during a live game and this one’s a bit special. I’d like to enjoy it myself!! I’ll just play it by ear, but I’m definitely intending to get the best pictures uploaded via Twitter up for everyone to share.

Lots more news to catch up on shortly. Firstly, I’ve posted a gallery of some of the final preparations going on at Wembley today. [Aston Villa Central]

First up, Petrov says he wants to repay faith placed in him. [Football Fanhouse]

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Stiliyan Petrov deserves a special mention. He was sent home suffering a virus prior to Wednesday’s FA Cup match with Crystal Palace and there’s been some speculation since then that he may not make the final. He’s much more positive and said that he trained lightly yesterday. I’d assume at this stage that he didn’t travel with the rest of the squad, but perhaps I’d do better to remember what happens when one assumes.

Let’s hope he’s fit and well in time. I’m not convinced that a less than 100% Petrov is better than the other options, but then this is a big occasion and he has the experience to deal with it. My suspicion would have to be that he’ll move mountains to make sure he can play and you just try to stop him.

Arguably the biggest selection headache that MON has, or at least the one that’s the hottest topic of debate among the fans right now, is the choice of goal keeper. An opinion I keep running into is that Brad Guzan deserves to get the nod and on that note you’ll get no argument from me, he most certainly does deserve it. However, you would do very well to convince me that’s an appropriate basis to pick a side for any game, let alone the club’s first cup final in a decade.

I think there’s a certain argument to leaving him out for his own benefit. If picked, he could play a blinder, perhaps put in a match winning performance, and his star would rise exponentially, but what would happen if he stunk up the place and even cost us the game? Anyone remember what happened to Scott Carson after he flopped on his England debut? Exactly!

Some people might claim that at 38, Brad Friedel as lost some of sharpness, but I’m not so sure. Even if that were true, his experience and positional sense allows him to still make many saves that other keepers couldn’t. Guzan looked far more comfortable in his area against Palace this week than he had against Blackburn in the semi-final, but there was still a break down in communication between him and Carlos Cuellar over who should deal with a dangerous ball into the box. In the end, Cuellar hoofed it to safety, but both men had plenty to say to each other afterward.

Personally, and this is just a hunch, having shown that he was willing to put Friedel into a cup game at Selhurst Park, I think MON was resting the older Brad when he started the younger one in the replay. It could be that he was giving the apprentice one final chance to state his case for the final and, if that’s the case, only the manager will know whether he’s done enough.

Perhaps one solution would be to start with Friedel and keep a substitution in hand, which shouldn’t be difficult for MON, and should we end up going to penalties, bring Guzan on just before the final whistle, just in time for the shoot out. If there’s one thing we can all agree on; there’s no question who we would want in goal if it came to the dreaded shoot out.

Stephen Warnock has been making a headline or two in the last 24 hours, or more accurately Wayne Bridge has dragged his name into the limelight. Apparently Bridge doesn’t want to go to South Africa, opening up the door to a list of suitors for the role of Ashley Cole’s understudy. I know, who wouldn’t want that role, right? As far as timing and occasion goes, could this be a better opportunity for Warnock to show what he’s got?

Across the back, Carlos Cuellar and Richard Dunne have to be as nailed on to start as it’s possible to be, so it’s just a question whether rested James Collins will be recalled to partner Dunne in the middle, with Cuellar at right back, or whether Luke Young will get the nod at full back.

As much as Collins has impressed me since he joined, I feel that Luke Young is a better right back than Carlos Cuellar and that he and Dunne have barely put a foot wrong in the middle, so if it were my decision, Collins would start on the bench. If the 3 centre backs had been more productive from corners and free kicks, as I’ve lamented before, I’d be temped to say that the benefits of playing all three outweigh the deficits at full back, but they haven’t.

In midfield, could it be that MON recently handed Fabian Delph a rare Premiership start against Man Utd with this game in mind? Delph put in his best performance for Villa to date in that game and the confidence derived from that could be invaluable should he be called upon at Wembley. He certainly seems to be genuinely ahead of Steve Sidwell now, so if Petrov isn’t available, we’d have to expect the youngster to start. 20 years old, starting a Wembley final against Man Utd, it’s a big ask.

Whatever the selection problems in the middle, we all know that James Milner, Ashley Young and Stewart Downing will be in the starting XI. I mean, aside from a meteorite crashing into the team hotel, we all know this. I have little add to this, except to repeat that I was particularly happy with the 4-2-3-1 MON put out against Utd last time. Just saying.

If Stan is available, and MON does go with the 4-2-3-1 again, then it’s Gabby Agbonlahor plowing the top field alone. However, John Carew won and scored two penalties very well to kill off Palace on Wednesday so can’t be discounted and Emile Heskey is always in the frame for a start.

Honestly, I’ve absolutely no clue whether MON will fancy a 4-4-2 against Utd or not. No clue. None. The good thing is that Alex Ferguson can be none the wiser either, not that he will necessarily pick his team around our likely selection though. As I understand it, he may not have rich pickings anyway, with several key players unavailable.

I want to finish up by mentioning that Nathan Delfouneso has caught Stuart Pearce’s eye and received his first call up to the England Under-21 squad for the European Championship qualifier with group leaders Greece next week along with Fabian Delph. Brad Guzan is in the US squad travelling to Amsterdam for a friendly against Holland next week and we wait to see who Fabio Capello will call up for England’s friendly against Egypt.

Actually, one final, final thing. I’ve deliberately avoided referring to Guzan as “Little Brad” or anything similar in this post since I noticed earlier that he’s the same height and 20 lbs heavier than the man we sing about being bigger than me and you. It seems that little Brad is bigger than him which pretty much makes him the biggest player in the squad and it’s well known that Americans don’t get irony.

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Since we’re all probably still riding on a high from achieving our first Wembley final in 10 years, can anyone think of the link from that game to this one? Answer at the bottom.

Alright, word on the street is that MON will ring the changes and rest some very tired legs after Wednesday’s heroics. Quite right too. From the sounds of things, Fabian Delph will be starting in the middle with either Reo-Coker or Steve Sidwell alongside him, possibly both. Petrov will be rested and is carrying a slight Achilles injury. Carew is not yet ready to return.

Obviously we can’t expect the spectacular atmosphere from midweek, but Brighton are bringing a lot of fans with the intent of enjoying their day. Let’s face it, and no disrespect to the south coast side, all things being equal, this is their final. They’ll come and give it everything they’ve got and we’ve all seen Villa go out prematurely in such circumstances, so hopefully whoever MON sends out will play their hearts out.

In all honesty, the draw has been very kind to Villa and they just have to grab this opportunity to ease into the fifth round with both hands. The 5th round contains the last 16 teams, or if you think of it in World Cup terms; it’s the first knock out round after the group stage. Serious business and definitely no easy games. Also just one of three games to the final, but we don’t want to get carried away dreaming about two trips to Wembley just yet.

For those of us not heading to Villa Park today, there’s just about no chance of seeing this game I’m afraid. The FA is notoriously restrictive about which games get televised live and that goes all around the world. If it’s not on TV somewhere in the world, it can’t be streamed. As ever, I’ll update what I find on Twitter, but it’s going to be very limited coverage.

Assuming our name is in the hat, you’ll want to be looking out for the draw on Sunday just after 6pm GMT.

The answer to the question at the top was of course that Brighton’s manager is Gus Poyet who was a member of the Chelsea side that beat us 1-0 in the FA Cup Final back in 2000. You knew that though, right? On that subject, the scorer of the only goal that day, Roberto Di Matteo, is now in charge of West Brom who host Newcastle this round. Talk about attack of the barcodes!

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• FA Cup – Aston Villa vs Chelsea – Matchday Build Up and Live Blog

OK, we’re just hours away from kicking off one of the most important games in recent memory and I have to admit to being both excited and not a little nervous.

It’s effectively half time, but we have the advantage of having the lead and the home support for the second half. We’re just 90 minutes away from booking our first trip to Wembley in a decade!!

Martin O’Neill knows all about the League Cup and I can’t imagine for a second that he’s going to allow his side to be complacent enough to miss out on this opportunity today. But let’s not count any chickens yet, Blackburn are unlikely not to put up some kind of fight.

This won’t be easy, we’ll need performances all round the pitch and we may just need to score a goal or two, so let’s hope we take the chances when they come this time.  I’m looking at you Mr Heskey!!

If anything major comes up before kick off I’ll update it here, but otherwise it’s over to Twitter soon.

UTV!!

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