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Preview Percy is on his own this week with Daisy having the weekend off. He also has a new electronic gadget to play with. What could possibly go wrong? How long have you got? Here’s his look at the FA Cup visit to Aston Villa...

Next up we schlep up the M1 and M6 to Birmingham where we will be hosted by Aston Villa in the third round of the FA Cup. Kick-off is at 8pm on Friday for the benefit of ITV, which will probably annoy lovers of brain-dead soap operas. Good.




This will be the first of the third round ties to be played under the latest change in the FA’s policy of “Let’s tinker the hell out of the Cup until nobody cares anymore”. Should the scores be level at full time there will be 30 mins of extra time followed by kicks from the penalty mark should they be required.

That went down about as well as you might expect with clubs from the lower leagues. Oh - and no VAR until the fifth round, apparently.

So Villa then. Ok I know this is the Cup and, consequently, league form may or may not be relevant; but I need to write about something to do with our opponents (would be nice for a change – Ed) and, since Daisy has the day off because they have yet to sign anyone in the current window it’s all down to me this week.

The colour-coordinated game-chart is a bit of a patchwork quilt affair. After four wins in their first five, they then went into a spell of three draws from their next four. This was followed by three defeats in four, then three wins in four. You get the picture.

Their last three have seen them go down 3-0 at Newcastle, draw 2-2 at home with Brighton and beat Leicester 2-1. Their overall record is won nine, drawn five and lost six, leaving them in eighth place with 32 points from 20 played.

In the League Cup they beat Wycombe away before going down 2-1 at home to Palace in the 4th round. In Europe, in the So-Called Champions League, under the new “Let’s do everything to ensure that the big boys don’t accidentally get knocked-out” format they are sitting in sixth place, being one of six clubs on 13 points occupying seeded positions for the knockout phases.

There are, however a further eleven clubs within three points of sixth place so quite a lot to be sorted out there. Their next two games at the end of the month see them visit Monaco and play host to Celtic. If you’re a travelling Villa fan, you’re probably grateful that the fixtures came out that way round.

Probably the big surprise for them this season has been the form of top scorer Jhon Duran who at one stage this season looked certain to sign for us, allegedly. That deal fell through for whatever reason and promptly came back to bite us on the proverbial on the opening day of the season a game.

It was a match notable for the extraordinary amount of time wasting undertaken by goalkeeper and serial irritant Martinez who started running down the clock after less than 20 minutes of the first half. The proposed law change that will see corners awarded when ‘keepers fail to release the ball into play will be interesting at Villa Park when it comes in.




The vagaries of the modern game are such that we may not see Martinez on Friday night. Aussie international Joe Gauci played in the two League Cup ties and the usual squad rotation may see Martinez benched for the evening, which will give us a better chance of getting home at a reasonable hour.

Duran on the other hand will definitely be missing as he serves the last of a three-match ban for a red card received up at Newcastle. Injuries will keep Carlos, Torres, Philogene and McGinn out of the squad, though the absence of Duran will be alleviated by the return from suspension of Morgan Rogers.

Let us move on to the Wild And Wacky World of Association Football. And it’s Arsenal’s turn to be the subject of this week’s Excuse Of The Week. You see their inability to score in the first leg of their League Cup Semi-Final was due to the ball.

Apparently, balls in the League Cup aren’t round enough. Or they’re too round, I forget which as I was too busy laughing at a stadium that was half-empty. One can only suspect that their supporters had forgotten that there was a second leg to come in a few weeks’ time and that a late goal might have made that more interesting.

My learned friend Rio of this parish had an alternative theory for the mass exodus. They had finally all decided to take the advice of their shirt sponsors and all left to visit Rwanda at once.

And so to us. So farewell then, Senor Lopetegui, whose departure was handled with all the class one has come to expect from our current owners.

It all started with leaks in the general direction of TalkSport which were accompanied by the standard comments to the effect that the board were determined to discover the source of the leak. Again. The whole farcical situation put one in mind of the still splendid after all these years Yes Prime Minister – to paraphrase Sir Humphrey, it would appear that the Ship of State is not the only ship that leaks from the top.

We are now to be managed by former Brighton and Chelsea boss Graham Potter. This brings us back to a few years ago when Potter was first linked with us, it being leaked (probably to TalkSport again) that the board were not impressed by Potter on the grounds that he was only doing well due to the fact that Brighton had a well set-up data-based transfer policy.

Like somehow that were a bad thing. Clearly there’s been a change of heart somewhere in the upper echelons, because the one thing we don’t seem to have is any sort of transfer policy.




Potter's first job will be to try and be luckier. Saturday’s game bore a remarkable resemblance to the away defeat at Leicester before Christmas. Ok we weren’t as dominant at the City of Manchester Stadium perhaps as we had been in the Midlands, but we definitely had our moments.

Unfortunately, it’s no use creating chance after chance if you have no end product to show for it. Particularly if you have a habit of giving the ball away in midfield with a defence showing all the intelligence and urgency of an HMRC inspector. Quite simply if you give four goals away in a game you are on a hiding to nothing.

Like the Leicester game we also had a mind-bogglingly appalling refereeing decision at a key moment which had a game-changing effect. I would love to know exactly what Michael Salisbury was thinking when he pulled up Summerville for a foul he hallucinated. Summerville would have been away clear on goal and, with the score at 1-0, an equaliser would have had very contrasting effects on the respective confidences of the two teams.

I know there are various conspiracy theories about on the bizarre effect that refereeing a so-called top five club has on match officials. However, I think one needs to apply the principle of Occam’s Razor to the state of refereeing, a concept that suggests that where there are a number of explanations for a state of affairs the simplest explanation is the one that is most likely to be correct.

In this case, English referees are, by and large, dreadful as a result of years of PGMOL failing to deal with the situation. If they would expend half the energy on improving referees that they spend in trying to justify bad decisions made by their employees who knows how much things might improve. Of course, for that to happen PGMOL would have to bite the bullet and admit all is not well.

We have injuries. Antonio and Bowen are obviously out. Todibo has a mystery knock and Emerson’s late injury was to prove very costly last weekend. On the bright side Fabianski will have served his concussion suspension and. All being well, he will be available for selection.

Difficult to predict this one. It’s a Cup game which means that you can never be quite sure what sort of side will take the field – for either side. Then we will have the new manager in place, probably. Mr Potter will have his own ideas as to what constitute his best first XI, something that one always suspected Mr Lopetegui never quite knew.

So I’ve left the prediction to the Predict-O-Matic-O-Tron, a gadget that Daisy bought me for Christmas on the grounds that it might improve my hit rate. Or come up with a lottery win.

Having worked out how the infernal thing works (apparently you have to put the batteries in FIRST) the £2 that would have gone on buying the club a puncture repair kit to plug all of those leaks will instead be going on the game to finish 2-2 after extra time with us going through on penalties. Apparently the Predict-O-Matic-O-Tron has already sent the money over Mr Winstone.

Enjoy the game!




When Last We met At Villa Park:Lost 4-1 Premier League October 2023
Eleven players having an off day is the opening paragraph to my match notes, though 4-1 did seem a bit harsh, including as it did the softest of penalties .

Referee: Tim Robinson
Yeah, whatever.

Danger Man: Ollie Watkins
Given how close Duran was to signing for us, apparently, it was tempting to go for him but Duran’s sending off against Newcastle means he’s suspended so I’ve gone for Watkins as top League scorer.

Percy and Daisy’s Aston Villa Fact Of The Week Type Thing
Some Villa-supporting astronomers clubbed together to have one of the less visible stars in the constellation of Orion re-named “The Villa Star”. This is one of those things where a company separates the gullible from their money by sending out a certificate that cuts no swathe with the International Astronomical Union who refuses to recognise such frippery. However, when questioned, they did say that they’d be happy to rename the Black Hole in Cygnus after Tottenham’s trophy cabinet for a pint of Scruttocks Faintly Dirigible Real Ale and a bag of pork scratchings.

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