dn1982

He should choose England. Picking Ireland would be limiting himself imo. Plus at the end of day, he's a brummie. He's English so he should play for England

You've had plenty of lads play for England that weren't born there, I can list them off if you like!

Sterling being the latest addition to that list

Sterling has lived in England for most of life. Grealish was born in England to English parents and has lived in England his whole life.

What about the English FA trying to get Januzzaj on board about 18 months ago? It happens a lot and don't be surprised to see Jack play for Ireland, he has done so since he was 15

Ireland have a long history of tapping up players with tenors Irish links the best being Tony Cascarino who never had any Irish in him at all! It's a tough position for Jack he's played for Ireland because they called him up as a kid and continued through the ranks but he is English. He should take the summer off have a good think then make a decision for next season. I hope he picks England as he's a joy to watch but Villa seem to do well with an Irish contingent!!

If Clerverley stays with us and plays like he has he'll be back in the England squad in no time. With a European Championship at the end of next season hopefully that's another reason to stay somewhere where you are settled and playing well! I hope this also goes for Benteke!

Posted in midweek football thread but Sherwood and Reilly are at Swindon

 

 

That picture looks shopped! Haha, he looks so out of place there.

 

The best thing about it is Paddy Reilly resting his head on top of that womans.

By why is she kissing Tim's hand.

Surely he's not...................................................................................The messiah.

That's her husband next to her so Tims .....a very naughty boy

Hopefully it is this Gilan Holdings and Adams name has cropped up because of the Azerbaijan connection and that's all. Paul Smith seems like a top level operator so he could easily jut be doing the deal for them. Wishful thinking I know.

If we are safe next weekend I'd play a weakened side against Burnley. Gil Robinson Sinclair Senderos etc all should start IMO but at the minute Sherwood is picking the right team simply because it's playing well and winning! It still baffles me why after every game when nothing's changed though why people are that concerned with Gil. He's not the messiah he's probably been a very naughty boy and is not being picked.

Absolute quality and no where near the finished article!! We are so lucky we got rid of Lambert when we did as Jack was getting frustrated. We got rid of Johnson and Graham 2 other players who were brilliant in the same youth team as Jack and neither got a sniff of a chance. You never know if they're good enough until you have the faith in them to try them out. If we get safe next weekend I can see Robinson starting against Burnley. Another star from that youth team. Aston Villa will soon be the place to be if you're young and talented.

Looking at Paul Smiths time at Chelsea he seemed to work alongside Peter Kenyon so hopefully Fox wouldn't get the bullet. I've no idea what a Business Affairs Director does so if any one does all information would be grateful. I'd like to keep Fox and Sherwood at least for the short term as I think they've bought into the club and always talk us up.

One thing we should realise no player should be judged on how badly they performed under Lambert. Bacuna looked like a headless chicken at FB he now looks pretty solid who knows what miracles Sherwood can do with Gardner and Bennett

Genuinely puzzled at the hostility towards this. Surely the only question is if it will put club on a better financial footing and able to make progress in terms of footballing competence and league position. It's not about the opinions people have formed of the individuals involved through watching a few minutes of them talking on TV.

My hostility towards it is the saddling the club with £75m debt to be able to buy the club. We are losing money ATM how will it be paid back? Using the new TV money? Then how will we invest? We need a buyer to pay the fee outright then any extra income can go to improving the team.

Can't Villa Talk go head to head with this bid? We don't have enough to buy the club, neither do they, we've got a chance here guys. 

 

In all seriousness, if they need to lend money to actually purchase the club, how are they planning to fund transfers? Any deal that puts the club in debt just in order to be purchased is bat shit crazy. Lerner wouldn't go for that, even if he does want out. He's spent so long sorting out the finances, chucking the club back into the red for no good reason would be madness.

 

If they have raised £75 million why don't they take-over a club where they could buy them for say £25 million and then build them up. None of it makes any sense, they would have to chuck £75 million of debt on to Villa to fund it and also want to get involved with Inter Milan, Sporting Lisbon and a few other clubs at the same time? Nothing adds up at all.

Glaziers done exactly this with Man Utd. You dont need money to buy things these days as long as you have a nice suit and good at talking.

Difference being the Glazers had enough money to pay it off if it went tits up by the sound of it we wouldn't be! Crap consortium with seemingly no money to invest!

Adams wants to raise £75m from the city then borrow £75m against the club! That's a joke. It'd mean no money for signings seeing as they couldn't afford the fee. I'd rather keep Lerner!!

As far as I'm aware we never paid out £22m in one season so over 4 years it's roughly £5m a year if the figures are correct. When you're losing £90m it's a drop in the ocean! We got to an unsustainable point after trying to get top four and it needed drastic action. I loved the first half of Lerners tenure and if we win the FA Cup it'll be a great end!

I can understand people saying they want to see how Sherwood reacts when things aren't going to well but did you use that criteria for other managers? How many games did we lose on the bounce under MON for example? Losing 2 games can lead to a run of defeats but Sherwood seems to have the personality to put games behind him and have the manamangement to get players performing again. The players were in a rut when he came so he can turn them around so I for one hope we never lose 3 4 or 5 games on the trot but if we did I'm confident he'd turn it around.

The only bad appointment I think Lerner has done was McLeish. The others never panned out as expected but under Houllier the football was getting better and Lambert just imploded. The Fox appointment for me looks inspired some may not be convinced yet but I'm confident time will prove it correct. He seems to have got a decent manager in aswell alongside good appomimnets on t he financial side. I expect some good sponsorship deals to be announced once we are safe and regardless of a takeover I'm confident we won't be in a relegation battle next year.

Yes I did read that. - But I wouldn't agree with your assumption that it will lead to massivley bigger sponsorhip deals - if we suddenley start announcing ground breaking deals - then I hold up my hands and congratulate TF - but I didn't see any such announcements. 

 

I wouldn't get your hopes up to much about us being the 9th most watched club in the world. Im sure its true by some measure - but in practice it doesn't mean we will be rubbing shoulders with Bayern any time soon.  [all IMO of course]

I wouldn't go on my assumption either as I've not got any experience in brokering massive sponsorship deals or do I know the going rate but luckily we have a CEO who does and we also have a CCO who was involved in getting deals for the London Olympics so if they assume we can get £10m more per year in sponsorship I tend to believe them! Having those 2 in their positions also shows a change in tact as they are leaders in their field which is far and away from Faulkner!!

Wow - its enough to make you walk to villa park on your hands and buy 10 season tickets !

 

Same old same old - recycled spin - (i know one poster who will be impressed though !)

What's spin about it?

 

OK perhaps not spin.

 

But he really hasn't said anything has he ?

 

Theres not one change, initative, or any real reason why next season the club will be any different to what it is now ?

Really? He mentions increasing revenue by £10m a season that's a massive initiative Having Sherwood as a manger and aiming to be the best of the rest is a massive change to where we are now. I think you can say that to achieve top 10 they'll have to be investment so I'm not sure what you want him to say. He's outlined what he wants to do and how he aims to raise revenues to help us do it isn't that his job in a nutshell?

 

I read about increasing revenue - I missed the bit about how this was going to happen

 

Doug always used to aspire to us being champions - without ever putting anything in place to make it happen. TF is aiming for 7th (no problem with that) - but other than saying it - whats he doing to make it happen ?

 

Sherwood as manager - well somebody has to be the manager - and TF would probably say the same about any manager.

 

If its a new dawn for you then great - personally I am expecting us to be much where we are now in 12 months time...

Did you also miss the bit about our global audience? We are the 9th most watch team in the world even more so than Bayern! That's a fact that'll sway sponsorship. It's simple we increase revenue streams and get better deals than currently added into the new TV money means we can invest more in the team. Add that to a manager who on his form granted it's a limited time would see us top 10 you can see there's hope to be had. Every new manager is a new dawn only time will tell if it's a false one so I'd enjoy this while you can rather than waiting for disaster then being happy you was right!

Dof's come in all shapes and sizes. Spurs with Baldini IMO is the wrong way where as Southampton with Les Reed seems to be the right way. Hopefully Sherwood and Reilly can look after the transfer side but I'd like someone to overview the whole football side from having a recruitment strategy for future managers to getting all the teams to play the same sort of football we are seeing now. From MON to Houllier to Mcleish and then Lambert our style of football changed time and again we need continuity that way our youth can flourish knowing when they get to the 1st team it's roughly the same style. Lambert never fancied Grealsih because he wasn't his type Sherwood plays a different style and the lad flourishes. So a DOF would have a list of managers so if Sherwood left we could get them in as they have the same footballing philosophy as the rest of the club.

Wow - its enough to make you walk to villa park on your hands and buy 10 season tickets !

 

Same old same old - recycled spin - (i know one poster who will be impressed though !)

What's spin about it?

 

OK perhaps not spin.

 

But he really hasn't said anything has he ?

 

Theres not one change, initative, or any real reason why next season the club will be any different to what it is now ?

Really? He mentions increasing revenue by £10m a season that's a massive initiative Having Sherwood as a manger and aiming to be the best of the rest is a massive change to where we are now. I think you can say that to achieve top 10 they'll have to be investment so I'm not sure what you want him to say. He's outlined what he wants to do and how he aims to raise revenues to help us do it isn't that his job in a nutshell?

I think we need a DOF but one that works alongside the manager who has the last say on signings. The Southampton model with Les Reed is ideal. Managers do come and go and we need a long term plan to build the club. Southampton have a list of managers that suit them at all times just in case they lose their manager that way they can continue the recruitment and development of the club without too much of a hiccup. Ideally if Sherwood wanted a LB the DOF would get a list of 10 or so and let him pick his choice.

We are always going to be linked to Spurs players and I'd say a lot of it is lazy journalism to fill column inches.

Wow - its enough to make you walk to villa park on your hands and buy 10 season tickets !

 

Same old same old - recycled spin - (i know one poster who will be impressed though !)

What's spin about it?

Had Sherwood been our manager all season, and he continued having us play the way we have so far under him, I'm confident we'd have been safe a while ago.

Maybe, maybe not.

Certainly if we'd played like we currently are playing for a whole season then we'd be mid table at worst, imo.

However, I think it remains to be seen if Sherwood can get that level of performance out of his teams for a whole season. He's never been tested for that period of time.

I think Sherwood has done excellent with us, but his success seems to be based primarily on getting individuals performing better and raising the confidence of the team. Not to say he's tactically inept, he's not, but I think his main weapon is motivation.

Which is fantastic given our position now. But keeping players motivated to that level over a long period of time is hard. In a way it's how MON used to do it and we are well used to the March slump that came with that approach.

I'm hopeful under Sherwood, but I do think that's his main barrier to success here. Maintaining that motivation amongst his team over a long period of time.

Granted he hasn't managed a whole season but he's had 2 halves and has done very well so far. Who knows he might be better with a preseason! All the other bits about getting players playing better isn't that just management? MON was a one trick pony with exceptional manamangement skills. If Sherwood can match that with added tactical nous we might have a gem on our hand only time will tell but so far so good!

I don't disagree with that.

My point really was that he's only ever had the honeymoon period with a club. That few months after taking over where its relatively easy (emphasis on relatively, its never "easy") to get that jump in motivation over the previous regime and get the players playing to a higher standard.

He's not yet had to deal with the come down from that bounce and continue to motivate and set out his team to get results without that to help him.

That's not a criticism, and I'm not for one second saying he can't do it. I'm just saying I don't think he's ever needed to show that yet and that will be the true test of his managerial ability.

How many times have we seen managers have a good season, be praised as the next big thing, and then to revert back to being average or worse?

I'm hopeful that Sherwood won't be one of those, but that is the test, IMO.

I suppose that depends on how long the so called bounce lasts! Half a season is quite a long time but I agree he hasn't had the dip in form yet to challenge him but you never know he may not get one

Had Sherwood been our manager all season, and he continued having us play the way we have so far under him, I'm confident we'd have been safe a while ago.

Maybe, maybe not.

 

Certainly if we'd played like we currently are playing for a whole season then we'd be mid table at worst, imo.

 

However, I think it remains to be seen if Sherwood can get that level of performance out of his teams for a whole season. He's never been tested for that period of time.

 

I think Sherwood has done excellent with us, but his success seems to be based primarily on getting individuals performing better and raising the confidence of the team. Not to say he's tactically inept, he's not, but I think his main weapon is motivation.

Which is fantastic given our position now. But keeping players motivated to that level over a long period of time is hard. In a way it's how MON used to do it and we are well used to the March slump that came with that approach.

 

I'm hopeful under Sherwood, but I do think that's his main barrier to success here. Maintaining that motivation amongst his team over a long period of time.

Granted he hasn't managed a whole season but he's had 2 halves and has done very well so far. Who knows he might be better with a preseason! All the other bits about getting players playing better isn't that just management? MON was a one trick pony with exceptional manamangement skills. If Sherwood can match that with added tactical nous we might have a gem on our hand only time will tell but so far so good!

Czech media a little while back said Kozak is ready to play. It might just be down to Sherwood at the moment. With Agbonlahor injured and Weimann having a poor season, I'd rather have Kozak on the bench.

I haven't seen him in the u21's much though. He'd be ideal off the bench at the minute

Richards on a free for me is a no brainer give him a 2 year deal with options to extend if he's playing regular. At one point he was the next big thing then injuries and not being fancied by managers took its toll. Wasn't he on our books as a kid? LB is the biggest concern at the back for me, I'd also sell Weimann and get in another striker. CM isn't too bad if Cleverley signs add into that Gardner I think that's ok for now. Hopefully Gil can be the other wide creative player we need. I'd try to sell Nzogbia but if not I'd be happy with just signing Sinclair Cleverley LB CF and a new GK for the start of pre season.

Any news on him? Would it be too much to have him fit enough for the bench for the final as its his birthday?? The BBC would love that wouldn't they!!!