AVillafan.com can break the news that Randy Lerner’s jet is currently sitting in Norway

Just a day after we published our story on McLeish looking set to leave Aston Villa, the club have now confirmed that McLeish’s contract has been terminated with immediate effect.

The is he, isn’t he discussion on whether Alex McLeish will be Aston Villa boss has been going on since the home defeat to Bolton Wanderers. But after this weekend’s emails & texts I have received I can safety say, come as early as Sunday evening. McLeish will be finally gone!

Friday morning started off with look at my Twitter account – seeing if the story on Villas-Boas being linked with the Midlands outfit wasn’t just a dream thanks to the amount of blue M&M’s I had the night before. To my surprise I didn’t dream it & was quite pleased. Suddenly the noise of the ‘suspense’ message tune came from my iPhone. Surprised to be receiving a message soon early I found it to be a text from my mate Doug. The next part nearly made me spit out my coffee! So be warned!

Mate, just been told that McLeish has been sacked & will be announced Sunday after the game! Manager at work is best mates with a recent former Villa player & has inside info!

Now the words, McLeish & sacked are my sort of good news at the minute. Asking if he was kidding me he replied:

Nah, I swear to god mate he saw him last night! And he was also with an ex villa player who is now a football agent who also confirmed it!

One, I know Doug wouldn’t lie to me. He is a passionate about the Villa as I am & even he hates the sight on Alex McLeish standing on our sideline. Two, he isn’t in the know or the type of person to BS anyone. Three, I know the contacts he is talking about but I am not prepared to publish names.

So I went on through the day getting tweets & messages saying the same sort of thing. Some saying he’s going Sunday, some saying by next Friday. Either way, come this time next week I can see McLeish not being Villa boss.

Mat Kendrick & the rest of the press boys had the fun of grilling Alex McLeish for possibly one final time as Villa boss. Mat tweeted some of the comments which came out of that press conference.

Reporter: Is there a question mark over your job? McLeish: I haven’t given that any thought I don’t know – I anticipate still being here next season

Reporter: If you’re not here next season will that be unfair? McLeish: That’s hypothetical

Timothy Abraham from the Express & Star also posted items onto his twitter account:

Alex McLeish on his future: “I don’t know if I’ll be manager but I anticipate it.”

McLeish: “I haven’t heard an open debate about my future?Is it on the radio and in the papers.I don’t get distracted by these things?”

Reporter: Have you had an indication there will be a positive conversation going forward? McLeish: I will have a conversation next week.

McLeish: “I know we are looking at bringing in players to change things.”

As the weekend has gone on I have received more & more information regarding McLeish’s future. Some of the points raised to me include:

• McLeish leaving by Wednesday the latest.
• He has put his house up for sale in Dorridge & he has moved to Welford on Avon.
• Club previously sold just over 5,200 season tickets last month. It is still alarmingly low & one figure given to me shows that they have not reached the 6,000 mark.
• Damien Comolli was at the Spurs game. He is set to replace Paul Faulkner as CEO. Faulker however, will be kept on at the club & moved to the business side of things due to his fantastic work on deals he has pulled off for next season.
• Deals for Leon Best & Danny Guthrie were set to go through. But McLiesh has cancelled 3 meetings over players within the past 3 weeks.

So read into it what you will gang. If you are still doubt it then I am sorry but for me, the above states only one thing, McLeish is doomed at Villa Park. This time next week the flood gates will open with season ticket holders renewing.

You may have noticed that over the past few weeks, in particular this week, things have been a little quiet here on Avillafan.com.

Let me just make it clear, this does not mean it is the beginning of the end for the website, as we are committed as ever for the website to be your number 1 Aston Villa Fansite, Blog & Forum.

The website has suffered recently with both myself and Karl being extremely busy work wise and ill but with a busy footballing summer ahead and a brand new season coming soon we plan to try and make Avillafan.com busier than ever.

So we are asking members of the Avillafan community for there advice on what they would like to see on this website in the future?

What do other websites have that you would like to see? Or what would you like to see that no other website has? Either way we will do our best to make this the number one Aston Villa fansite.

Writers Wanted

As always, we are still on the look for writers/bloggers to write for Avillafan.

If you have knowledge and passion for Aston Villa Football Club, then you could very well be the kind of person we are looking for.

So for all those suggestions, or people interested in writing for Avillafan, please leave a comment below and we will be in touch.

It is time we all took a step backwards in terms of getting Alex McLeish out of this club and took a step forward in getting behind the players.

We all knew in the summer what Alex McLeish was capable of and, following a season, a long hard season with a lot of negatives, we haven’t been proved wrong.

But this isn’t the time to say ‘I told you so’, and neither is it the time for anti-McLeish protests because lets face it, if we are not careful we could be heading to the likes of Derby County and Nottingham Forest next season.

Alex McLeish fan

This doesn’t turn me into a fan of the former Small Heath manager, but all you have to do is look to the Black Country and see what can happen if you are to sack your manager without a proven replacement who has time to turn things around. And time is one thing that this club currently doesn’t have.

I still want Alex McLeish to leave the club – and I am sure a large majority of you also want rid of him, but lets put it on hold until our position in this league is mathematically safe and then you can attend all the anti-McLeish demonstrations you want.

Where will the points come from?

I believe we need another 5-7 points to be safe in this division, and I believe we should stop kidding ourselves in believing we will get points from the likes of Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester United and Liverpool (as much as we would all love to).

We must be aiming to get as many points from our games on the road at both West Bromwich Albion and Norwich. While the games against Bolton and Stoke at Villa Park are crucial. But of course, this wont be possible if we are not fully behind the lads.

Be the 12th man

Now is the time for all those who call themselves fans of this club to stand up and be counted.

Now is the time to make ourselves heard and let the relatively inexperienced bunch of players we have at our disposal know that we are right behind them.

Now is the time we support our football club and leave all the negatives until the season is over.

We are Aston Villa Football Club and we are all very proud of the history we have, whether we were lucky enough to be alive to experience the highs, but one thing we don’t want to add is a relegation from the greatest club league in the world.