Welcome to the Premiership Mr. Pavlyuchenko

We all knew it was a pretty poor performance, but hey it was his debut and even the mighty Berbs didn’t score on his debut. Poor Roman, he’s probably not even met half the squad yet, let alone played football with them.

So all things considered it was refreshing to hear his own honest appraisal of the game.
“Aston Villa defenders didn't give me enough time to get to the ball properly”.

Classic!

I haven’t seen much of his play in Russia, but I don’t remember the Dutch giving him all the time and space he needed in the Euro semi-final. I’d love to imagine Martin O’Neill asking his defence to go easy on the lad because it was his debut.

“Everything was unusual for me. It's a different kind of football, with a different speed,” Pavlyuchenko also told Russia’s Izvestia daily newspaper: “I immediately realised that English football is much faster than in Russia.”

Still every cloud has a silver lining and although he was basically crap, he did like the atmosphere down the Lane.

“But what I also felt was the amazing atmosphere of the Premier League. It's hard to describe. You should feel it. After each good pass or corner, people applaud, they even stand up from their seats to do it. It's really pleasant to play in such surroundings,” he said.

We’ll have to wait and see how he develops during the season and how Ramos chooses to play him. In Russia, he played up front on his own with a roving partner rather than as flat front two as he did with Bent on Monday. It might take a little time to gel.

I for one think he’ll have a tough season and probably won’t come good until next season. He’s already played a lot of games because of the timing of the Russian season so May is going to be a long time coming for him.

Let’s hope I’m proved wrong!

Ramos' Record

It's sad to take a look at the table at the moment. Granted, we've got a game in hand on many sides, but bottom of the league with one point from nine is not where we hoped to be in mid-September.

Tonight's game against Villa is a must win if we're to stay in touch with the teams who will by vying for the other European slots. It's also important if Ramos is to maintain a winning record.

At the moment, we've won 10, drawn 10 and lost 10 of the 30 league games under Ramos' management. One more loss and the statistics start to a point to a less than impressive record (not that it's that impressive anyway!).

That said, I really believe the team is in better shape than last season and we're beginning to find the right balance, but we do need to get a first win. I'm not going to the game tonight, but will be watching it down the boozer and am looking forward to seeing our deadline day signings in action.

It wll be tight against Villa who have also had a bad start, but I'm opting for 2-1.