david-avfc

56 minutes ago, villarule123 said:

That was in the Prem I think. He scored 25 goals in the Championship for Bristol City in the season before. 

Yeah he was very poor in his first Premier League spell with Swansea, don't think he even got as many as 8 - not in the league anyway. Shows why some caution is needed with young Archer, hopefully he takes this preseason by storm but if not a full season in the championship is not the worst idea especially if we had the option of a January recall if needed

12 minutes ago, TRO said:

but thats our stance too.

What exactly has our club done wrong?

If you are saying he is on par with Bellingham, I would say you have misjudged the situation....is he better than Shaw, Little, Gray, Deehan, Barry at a similar age....I'm not sure he is at all.

Foden is another example of huge skill set at 18.

He is a really good young player granted.....but IMO he should be concentrating on learning his trade with Aston Villa......at the same age, thats what all those players above was doing......they wasn't seeking pastures new, despite the outside interest.

He seems to me, that he likes the noise, the attention, the interest.......bit too early for me, to be getting wrapped up in that.

If, its about money.....any donut could see the path JG has taken and how its worked out for him, just fine in terms of spondoolies.....I think CC is playing Russian Roulette with his career and if he is going to be the player his camp say he is......he has no worries getting in to the first team at Aston Villa, lets be honest, finishing 14th isn't exactly the challenge of breaking in to a top 6 side.

I think he has the world at his feet at Aston Villa and if he leaves, I think it will be a mistake.

Think it's a case that he's probably been told how good he is by everyone at the club and all his hangers on which undoubtedly he will already have, friends, relatives, family friends, agents knocking at his door etc, and he probably believes the hype. Even Purslow said Carney is the best youngster in the country so if that's gone to his head no wonder he is maybe expected more, whether that's financial or playing time. 

On paper it's hard to see how there are many better options than staying at Villa, a known quantity for him who are committed to developing him, have one of the best youth set ups around and have proven with Ramsey that youngsters can make their way into the first team. If he's thinking about moving abroad then that's an interesting one for him as the likes of Bellingham and Sancho and the lad at Bayern who now plays for Germany have proven there is a pathway there instead. 

I think the club should have sorted this out one way or another ages ago, they should have said if you aren't committing to us, we aren't committing to you and send him back to the U18's until either he renews, or his contract expires or we got a big offer from somewhere else. I don't think he's done enough on the pitch to warrant starting more games and he's played a lot of minutes for someone just turned 18.

1 minute ago, StewieGriffin said:

You remember Aston Villa FC, 2006-2018, yes?

To which point telling everyone we were prepared is even more farcical!

2 hours ago, FLVillan said:

For me, the primary objective of any new design should be the fact that our colours are Claret & Blue.  Not Blue and Yellow with a hint of Claret. I always found it ironic that as we went away from the round badge, Chelski produced their new "modern" design that is a virtual replica of our old round badge. It would be nice to see the full name rather than AVFC and also to see PREPARED re-introduced.  Although I imagine that would make it too "busy" so I'll leave it up to the computer design geeks...

2 hours ago, Ingram85 said:

While I mostly agree I do think dropping prepared was a good idea as it looks stupid when you’re rubbish, we haven’t won anything of note for nigh on 30 years and even then it was the league cup and we haven’t been a team of note for over a decade. 

I never really got the “prepared” thing, seemed a bit too boy-scout for my liking, and why wouldn’t a professional team be prepared anyway? It never seemed that unique or inspiring or anything to me, although I get that it’s use goes back a long time in our history 

4 hours ago, gilbertoAVFC said:

If anything this only reinforces my point. What's the point of giving such a proven player 90 minutes every game? You know exactly what you're getting with McGinn. There wasn't exactly a ton of pressure.

I get where you’re coming from but Chuk did get minutes at the end of the season when our season had petered out. Our form before that was pretty dismal around Feb time so throwing a player like Carney in would have been a major gamble as we were at risk of sliding down the table, and actually we did take that gamble just with Tim Iroegbunam instead who personally I thought did well and in my opinion contributed more than Carney in his spells 

7 minutes ago, Mic09 said:

I think Zinchenko is a CL starter for the best squad in the world, so if you don't want him at Villa you all lost your minds. 

He’d be an interesting signing, he’d be worth a punt if the price is right but the problem is despite what people are saying we don’t actually know how good he is in midfield - he simply hasn’t played there for Man City in any tangible capacity for anyone to judge positively or negatively. Yes we all know he’s played there for Ukraine but international football is quite obviously a poor guide to assessing PL quality otherwise the PL would look very different to how it actually does

Carney has been given a chance and hasn’t done enough to warrant any more game time than he’s been given. Tim Iroegbunam did a very solid job and deserved his shots in the first team. Ramsey last season was Ok but worked hard and therefore provided a better alternative to the experienced but slow Hourihane and Barkley in certain games, so deserved his chances and then added the quality to his work rate this season, too. Chukweumeka however wanders around the pitch like he’s the best player in the world, which is ok if he’s setting the world alight but he clearly hasn’t. Probably works in the u18’s where he’s surrounding by kids who only have half the technical ability but in the PL they are all top class players so if you’re not on top form you need to at least work twice as hard instead to help the team. 

Most youngsters go out on loan for a season, this guy seems to be the only one who hasn’t and presumably it’s because of the contract issue. He simply hasn’t done enough here to justify more game time at the age of 18

A very stop start season for Ings, in and out of the team and with varied tactical set ups too.

I think if he was our first choice number 9 he’d score 15 goals+. Strikers rely on match sharpness more than anyone else, it’s always going to be difficult if you’re not the main main unless you’re one of those rare “super sub” players. 

I still believe he was a panic signing, the speed in which it happened and the proximity to the Grealish transfer, with no obvious way he’d actually fit in. Hopefully Gerrard will have worked out how to use him because the constant tweaking trying to force the partnership with Watkins held us back and we can’t continue mucking about with it indefinitely 

48 minutes ago, nepal_villan said:

Exactly. This is what the critics like me were saying. We could have gotten him a lot cheaper. Lyon - the club, and not just their fans, were desperate to get rid of him. At 6-8M he would have been worth a shot. At 16-18M we paid he will go down as a bust.

Considering Burnley signed Maxwell Cornet for €12-15m from the same club last summer you do have to question why we paid €20m for Traore who was out of favour and had come off the back of a relatively poor season. A comparable fee to Cornet would have been OK, personally I think Traore is probably a little better as Cornet mainly stands out better due to being in a poor side devoid of any flair, but considering Traore's declining role at Lyon and that he wasn't popular with fans it seemed like there could have been a better deal to be had. I doubt we'd recoup the €20m we paid to Lyon so would probably be quite a loss if we did sell him. 

I'd like to keep him around as a squad player, he is a maverick and although he can be infuriating at times he is also capable of great individual moments. I don't see why he couldn't be used as a wildcard attacker off the bench or as a rotation option in the squad. 

€4m after a serious long term injury, one year left on his contract and probably wasn't quite good enough anyway, not the worst business in our recent history. Good luck to him, I always liked his work rate and desire even if he did lack some of the natural talent other PL attackers have, although no one can deny he scored some important goals for us and his ability to be in the right place in the right time is a very underrated quality

32 minutes ago, CarryOnVilla said:

But we must get in to Europe now!!! Like now or we die… we can’t wait and we need European level players nooooow or else we die from the embarrassment of not reaching European now

 

But to answer your point, yes we should be doing moneyball thing, but we won’t, because we don’t have the time to develop… for some reason

I think there’s a difference between being clever and being speculative. Some fans seem to be envious of Brighton because they’ve signed a bunch of South Americans or young Europeans that no one has heard of. That’s different to “moneyball” which is using data analysis in a clever way as a main scouting tool to uncover under-appreciated players who pass under the radar.

Brighton do seem like a solidly run club, but as is always the case the grass isn’t always greener and Brighton have had their fair share of poor signings alongside some better ones, as per all clubs. They probably have a long list of flops which none of us can remember because there’d be no reason for a villa fan to remember a crap player from Brighton. 

1 hour ago, John said:

Has anyone thought about whether we might look at offering Andriy Yarmolenko a contract now that West Ham have let him go? He is admittedly the wrong side of 29, but he still looks very good when playing for Ukraine and could offer us another forward option coming off the bench imo, should the likes of Anwar, Trez, Bert, Keinan and possibly Leon leave in this window?

I don’t think signing West Ham’s cast offs is going to get us anywhere. If he was good enough he’d have started more than 2 games in the last 2 years for them

57 minutes ago, Zatman said:

you can do both though and thats what well organised teams do

for example Real Madrid picked up Valverde and Barcelona got Pedri for around 5 million each and they didnt sign them to sell them

Is that the same Barcelona that paid €35m for Trincao, €35m for Malcolm, €80m for De Jong,  €130m for Dembele? That’s just players under 21, doesn’t include the hundreds of millions they’ve wasted on older players too

Needs to be given a real shot in preseason alongside first team players to see how good he is in a proper team. There’s a huge difference between the PL and championship where the top scorer got 40 goals or against European minnows at u21s, but he has shown a remarkable ability to step up to the next level when given a chance. Think it’s too early to say if he needs a loan or if he can step up until we see more of him in claret and blue - the next 2 months are the perfect opportunity to test him out

7 hours ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

There is a bigger picture at play here, and why wouldn't he " develop ".

It would be more " rotation " than backup IMO. Plus training, playing and observing at a higher level from better players.

I always have to repeat, how do the top clubs constantly do this?

The fear of having strong competetion all over the pitch because they " might not start " is still bizarre to me.

I'd rather have the luxury of having very good players in the squad who might be " frustrated " than having Salifou as back up.

It's frustrating not seeing Sanson get minutes, or Buendia on the bench sometimes, but I tell you what?

I'd much rather have that luxury, than to see them starting at a PL rival, and having a massive dropoff in quality on the bench.

It's also been noted multiple times that the kid can cover more than one position so that alone boosts his chances, and value.

You could do this, or wait for them to go to a rival instead and watch their value triple.

This is also future proofing to a certain extent IMO.

I completely believe we need strength in depth, but it should be remembered that the league position is going to be driven by the players who play the most minutes, not the ones watching on from the stands, and therefore that’s where the priority should always be.

An expensive back up left back is a “nice to have”, not essential and I can’t see it having a material impact on our league position in most cases, as there is no tactical gain in switching that position and fatigue is unlikely to be an issue. The only exception is if there is an unexpected serious injury which is why you need someone competent but you can’t over commit to that one possibility.

£18-20m might not sound like much to some fans, but some basic maths will tell you only 5 players in that bracket and you’re up to £100m, a hell of a lot of money for players who probably aren’t going to make a particularly tangible difference to our final league position

4 hours ago, Peter Griffin said:

I think part of the problem with trying to sign Hickey is that he probably doesn't want to be challenging for his place. Yes he would be a nice addition but our Polish goal scorer and Digne will be first choice FBs imo and it will be tough to displace them

 and why pay £18m for a 20 year old who isn’t going to develop whilst they’re sat on the bench for several seasons, or indeed why pay £18m for a back up left back at all

1 hour ago, villa4europe said:

Yeah I agree, we had the peace cup batch of bannan, Albrighton, Clark, weimann and then the next batch won the next gen so the talent was there it was more a case of struggling to break through and if they did break through it was to a shit team that was down in the dumps

We don't integrate them very well

We’ve always had a decent academy, lots of football league players started out their careers at villa, but we always seemed to lack the ones with that extra bit of PL quality. Seems like that’s now maybe changing.

I often wonder if the likes of Kevin MacDonald etc were the problem, the old guard from previous era’s who didn’t know what it meant to be a 21st century PL footballer - the accusations of bullying suggest he was rather old hat - but seems like we’ve now refreshed things behind the scenes and are trying to operate the academy in an elite and modern way, I can only see it continuing to be a success 

3 hours ago, PaulMcGrath_5 said:

The buy back clause is only applicable to the club that sold him... Kind of the point. 

The release clause would only force them to accept our bid at the agreed value, the new club would still have complete discretion whether to accept or reject any bids from a 3rd party club at any value, and of course the player would still have to agree to the switch anyway

11 hours ago, VillaHatesMe said:

Harry Winks is available. Thoughts?

Overhyped “young” (now 25/26 I believe) English midfielder who happens to play for a fashionable London team. Never seen what he really offers, 18 starts for them in the last 2 years sums it up

1 hour ago, HalfTimePost said:

Their stock price is down over 80% in the last 6 months.

It's fell so much itsbimpacted the shares of their competitors as it created fear the market isn't as strong as believed. Their competitor Carzam blamed this for Carzam going bust this week.

Market isn't as strong as it was. Atleast in the eyes of investors

Lots of digital related stocks shot up during covid because they offered a solution to physical restrictions during lockdown, and now have since come back down so I wouldn’t read too much in to their share price as it’s the same story for basically any company which did well in that period, and on a day to day back  the share price would make no difference to their operations.

With inflation escalating higher and concerns of a recession looming later in the year it would be logical to expect the second hand car market to slow down as consumers tighten their belts. Add to that the return of physical showrooms and dealers too, it’s a tough mix. So it makes sense to cut back now in advance of that - in many ways recessions are caused by self fulfilling prophecies as business lay off workers in anticipation of a slowdown which in turn actually causes the slowdown. 

I actually bought my last car through Cazoo during lockdown and I can vouch for them, it was a good service and I felt like I got a reasonable deal. But I knew exactly what I wanted, so maybe doesn’t have universal appeal but to me it did feel like the future of car buying unlike having to haggle in a car park with a dodgy dealer who’s telling you your trade-in is only worth half as much because of all those dents and scrapes you can’t see. I would expect they’d separate out operational spending with marketing spending (ie sponsorships) at least for now as for example in my case, I’d have never purchased my car online without knowing who Cazoo were from TV and sponsoring Villa so the marketing element is probably still key for them 

Still not entirely sure whether Bissouma is the right player for us anyway, he plays as a defensive midfielder for Brighton, and his passing stats suggest he offers very little creativity,

As a "6" he made a lot of sense, as he's comfortable on the ball but excellent defensively so he's like the perfect combination of Nakamba (good defensively but poor on the ball) and Luiz (good on the ball but poor defensively), but as we've already signed Kamara to fill that spot I'm not sure where that leaves our interest in Bissouma. There must be more proven number 8's around than Brighton's most defensive midfielder?

Personally I don't see Luiz as a number 8 either, to play in that role you have to be able to some of the midfield graft but also be dynamic and have a bit of technical ability and creativity to link the play between the defensive units and the attacking units. Looking at our current players I think Ramsey is the perfect player for that role, whereas Luiz is a bit too slow and although he's a decent passer of the ball doesn't really have enough creativity in the final third - someone more defensive than Luiz doesn't seem like they'd be the right fit to be honest, and at a cost of £30m+ I feel like there would possibly be better players to suit the system. 

34 minutes ago, useless said:

Transfer window opens this Friday, things should start happening then.

Not sure where this sudden idea has come from that we haven't got any money, just because we've signed a few players on free transfers doesn't mean to say we haven't got any money, I'm sure if the right deal comes along we will smash our transfer record no problem.

Much interest in Trezeguet according to his agent, six goals and four assists in thirteen appearances at Istanbul Basaksehir FK so been a good loan spell for him, but just one year left on his contract, so we won't be getting a lot of money for him, still he's been more than worth whatever it is we paid for him.

I don't think we are short of a few bob to be honest, however it is important to balance the books as we don't want to end up like Everton having to tighten their belts due to FFP after a period of overspending and underperforming. Or like us in the later Lerner years when he decided to stop funding the deficits. Obviously Grealish has given us a bit of a clean slate, for now, but we've still been spending like crazy since we were promoted and now appear to be willing to hand out some very big contracts too, I think the club has a strategy in all this so not a huge concern but we should still be sensible nonetheless

25 minutes ago, TheMelvillan said:

if we were big enough to offer him a clean slate and let bygones go by, then would Targett be reasonable backup for Digne this season?. He did well for Newcastle.

I guess maybe the argument against it will be that

a) he's been a bit of a tool since going to Newcastle (can put that down to Stockholm syndrome perhaps)

b) he was in stinkin form when he last played for us

c) showed poor character and bottled the fight for his place

d) doesnt have the mobility/ speed to fit our advanced fullback strategy 

 

However at least we know what we are getting

Targett is more than good enough as back up (and indeed probably as first choice for most bottom half / mid table PL clubs), but he's already nailed his colours to the mast saying he wants to play regularly. He's had a bit of stick for it but I think it's fair enough if he wants to play, many other players get slated for being content picking up a wage not playing so in a sense it's refreshing to see the opposite. 

Personally I don't think we really need to push the boat out too much for a back up left back, realistically they aren't going to play often so it's probably best to go with the cheapest option who could do the job.