Riza hints at weakened team at Villa

"If we were like 12th in the league now, weren't where we are in the league, I would have no issues with putting out my full strength side and say if we lost against Burnley but found a way to beat Villa - that's utopia.

But that's not the situation. We've got a lot of things we need to deal with moving forwards in the league so we're not in that position."





OMER RIZA:



"It's going to be a very tough game. Nothing is impossible in football.

I always say there's three outcomes - win, lose or draw. Hopefully it's not a draw because that takes us into extra time and we have injuries.

We'll go there and give our best.

It will be a mix of first team, under 21s and under 18s.

If we were like 12th in the league now, weren't where we are in the league, I would have no issues with putting out my full strength side and say if we lost against Burnley but found a way to beat Villa - that's utopia.

But that's not the situation. We've got a lot of things we need to deal with moving forwards in the league so we're not in that position.

We'll do our best, that's all we can do."

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I agree the league is far more important and wouldn't want any of our first 11 to pick up a stupid injury, if we could sneak an early goal on Tuesday burnley are so used to not conceding it may rattle them a bit and we could pinch something from the game

I agree with him, its also a free hit for the youngsters

Keep the faith with the mix that has got us this far.

His interview was apologetic and pretty much saying they are throwing the tie. Its a shame but totally understand. Burnley next week is way more important. The main aim is to not get pumped and give the youngsters an experience by the sound of it.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

Name one championship or Premier league club who as put out its strongest team in cup?
All use 1st team and mixture of youngsters.....precisely what riza just said?. so how is our club pathetic when villa will field a reserve side to... funny enough they’ve got big euro game Tues aswell...

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

Name one championship or Premier league club who as put out its strongest team in cup?
All use 1st team and mixture of youngsters.....precisely what riza just said?. so how is our club pathetic when villa will field a reserve side to... funny enough they’ve got big euro game Tues aswell...

Allan, that’s a logical post and one that doesn’t fit with the ‘must slate club and Riza at every opportunity’

So I’m sure you’ll be told you’re wrong.

Got a feeling Riza will play his strongest team available and so he should !!

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

We couldn’t even beat Pompey, yet you think we can beat a champions league team with the likes of Rashford and Asensio?

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

We couldn’t even beat Pompey, yet you think we can beat a champions league team with the likes of Rashford and Asensio?

Yes

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

Agree with that, league has to be the focus and Riza's comments make sense.

If we suffered a couple of serious injuries to key players, people would say Riza shouldn't have played them.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

There are plenty of reasons why our full strength team couldn't beat Aston Villa, who are 10th in the Premier League and in the Last 16 of the Champions League.

I'm going to Villa and looking forward to it but league has to be the priority.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

There are plenty of reasons why our full strength team couldn't beat Aston Villa, who are 10th in the Premier League and in the Last 16 of the Champions League.

I'm going to Villa and looking forward to it but league has to be the priority.

So you are going to a game with no hope of winning! Hope you enjoy!

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

There are plenty of reasons why our full strength team couldn't beat Aston Villa, who are 10th in the Premier League and in the Last 16 of the Champions League.

I'm going to Villa and looking forward to it but league has to be the priority.

So you are going to a game with no hope of winning! Hope you enjoy!

Surely it’s called being realistic?

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

There are plenty of reasons why our full strength team couldn't beat Aston Villa, who are 10th in the Premier League and in the Last 16 of the Champions League.

I'm going to Villa and looking forward to it but league has to be the priority.

So you are going to a game with no hope of winning! Hope you enjoy!

I support the team, whatever team is put out.

Went to most games in the Premier League knowing we were likely to lose.

Anyone who thinks this game is more important than Burnley are living on another planet.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

We have been simply surviving for years. Should we survive relegation again, then next season will be the same. Let's try and win something rather than just surviving, no reason why we couldn't beat Villa with a strong team.

There are plenty of reasons why our full strength team couldn't beat Aston Villa, who are 10th in the Premier League and in the Last 16 of the Champions League.

I'm going to Villa and looking forward to it but league has to be the priority.

So you are going to a game with no hope of winning! Hope you enjoy!

I support the team, whatever team is put out.

Went to most games in the Premier League knowing we were likely to lose.

Anyone who thinks this game is more important than Burnley are living on another planet.

I would say it's very unlikely that we can beat Burnley, but there's always a chance with the right approach.

no brainer survival in championship more important rest the players play u21 u18s

Hard to take though for the 5K plus who are going up to Birmingham on a Friday night though. The club need to think about the fans as well.

In my opinion we should be giving it our best shot and going with the best team we have available, confident in or ability and position to avoid the drop. These opportunities come along far too infrequently.

This time next year you'll have forgotten the win against Hull and the result against Burnley. If we win at Villa on Friday you'll still remember it on your dying day.

Take the 76 -77 season, bar a terrifying trip to the Den I can barely remember single aspect of that league season. I remember the FA Cup games against Spurs, Wrexham and Everton like they were yesterday.

Im on the fence!

I love Footsoldiers enthusiasm for the Cup, its tournament football where anything can happen and stays long in the memory if you pull off an upset, replays over the years, iconic photographs and even chants come from it. Our last run to the final and the experiences along the way will stay with me forever. Not so our time in the Premier League. The magic of all cup football. 'We beat Real Madrid' etc! Peter Sayers winner against Spurs was on Match of the Days opening credits for years!

I understand many posters caution on here. We are very much in a huge relegation battle with a rookie manager. But,,,,I am going up there tomorrow hoping to see a good team selection on the pitch and give a great account of themselves as I am sure our support will. And you never know. I am buzzing for it and therefore while its sensible to rest some players i will be disappointed if theres U21s and U18s on the teamsheet, I want to go for it we have a squad to do that. I like to think with good management a great cup result can aid league form not hinder it. As far as injury risks thats every game and training session. Lets go for it!

I would imagine that most of the 5500 fans that bought a ticket for Friday's game would have in the back of their mind that we wouldn't put out our full strength team because of the position we are in the league. I agree with what he says that if we were comfortable mid table then obviously we would give it a good go with the strongest team available, but 6 pts clear of relegation with 12 games to go is certainly not comfortable regarding relegation, we've had terrible injuries so we cannot risk losing more first team regulars.

The cup run is our only joy this season and a game to look forward to. Throwing the tie and playing a weakened team is Pathetic imo. Just shows how much our club has fallen and become a circus. Tan out!

I disagree.

Losing Mannsverk and Salech or Robinson along with an injury to another defender would really harm our survival in the championship.

That has to come first.

I agree with this, the cup games we use to bring players back up to speed and give youngsters experience, with three games in six days, two of them away games, we need to rest players for the league games, as above Villa will be doing the same.

Championship is the priority.

Anyone who bought a ticket thinking we'd put out our strongest team hasn't seen many of our cup performances in the last 5 years or so.
Successive managers have all given a game to those on the periphery of the 1st team or returning from injury.


You never know, some of the youngsters may actually shine and gain some valuable experience from the opportunity.

Hard to take though for the 5K plus who are going up to Birmingham on a Friday night though. The club need to think about the fans as well.

See your point but I bet every single one of our fans travelling would swap a win v Villa for championship survival. I’m sure most will travel in hope and for the trip to a prem ground rather than serious thoughts of winning.

I don't think it'll be as bad as it sounds. I suspect most of the bench from Tuesday will get a start.

Be good to see Issac Davies given a start up front. I'm interested to see if he's improved since his stint in Belgium.

Your tactics are why we are where we are, games we should have won we didn't sorry but hard working fans taking time of work and paying good money so you can put out a weak team and then when we get stuffed you can blame that stinks. I'm all for resting players but these feckers are on good wages and contracted to play football not have a rest ffs.

You will nearly 7k city fans there and your already talking the game down

"I always say there's three outcomes - win, lose or draw... No shit Sherlock

I don't think it'll be as bad as it sounds. I suspect most of the bench from Tuesday will get a start.

Be good to see Issac Davies given a start up front. I'm interested to see if he's improved since his stint in Belgium.

Agree with all of that.

As has been said by others, the fans going will know what to expect.

The vast majority of fans agree with Riza too.