I have not felt this feeling in regards to Aston Villa since pre Martin O’Neill – but this is not just another doom&gloom article!
Over the last four or five seasons, Aston Villa have started the campaign to pre-season fitness and friendlies in a good, organised shape. Glamorous friendly victories over Inter Milan, Juventus and Fiorentina. High profile pre-season tournaments like the Peace Cup. Consistent building of the squad with the team looking better and better each year. Keeping Gareth Barry, signing Dunne, Delph, Downing. Even last year, when James Milner was sold, many thought the incoming Stephen Ireland would be an ideal replacement and that the team could kick on and continue to improve.
So rightly justified, I have entered each August for the last five years with a sense of intrigue and optimism. For me, this August isn’t looking so good. We started the summer by losing our manager to health problems, then subsequently appointing one of the most hated men in B6 right now. While I, as always, will give Alex McLeish one season of full support and backing, there are still disgruntled ones out there. I breathed a huge sigh of relief when I saw our first game of the season is not at Villa Park!
We have also lost two star players in Brad Friedel and Ashley Young. We received a reported £16-18m fee for Young, but Friedel went for free. Speculation continues to circle that Downing will go. When speculation lingers for this long, it usually has some mettle to it. Due to this, I am a worried man. I need to cheer myself up.
You have a £45,000,000 transfer budget (thats the £30m i’d hope/suggest/expect Randy would give McLeish + Young sale)
- Who do you bring in? (be realistic with the prices and reputation)
- We are likely to have a wage budget that allows you to pay. With Sidwell, Young, Friedel and Re-Coker gone, thats atleast £150,000 p/w lifted.
- Who do you sell? We have released some players and the squad is thin, but perhaps there are still more players you want rid of?
- Especially interested in everyone’s ideas on GK, LB, CB & LW.
Sam Tighe
twitter: @stighefootball
Aston Villa News 24/7
Andrew I really like your list some very good player on there. There are so many grate players in Europe and around the world that we can get for a decent price and decent wage Villa really needs to expand its scouting network.
There is talk in the Daily Mirror that AM wont Sergio Canales on a season long loan, could be a good singing, any loan singing need to be loan with opt to buy and a price agreed.
No chance we will get Canales with an option to buy. He is seen as one of the most exciting Spanish youngsters and will be loaned for experience only,
Out: Guzan £1M, Beye £1M, Dunne £2.5M, Petrov £2.5M, Heskey £1m
Total £7M plus £18M for A.young & approx £15M from Lerner = £40M
In: G.K – Robinson £5M, Upson £0, Milner £15M, N`Zogbia £10M, NRC £0,
Huntelaar/Pavyulchenko £10M Total = £40M
Robinson/ marshall/ Parish L.Young, Lichaj Collins,Cuellar,Upson,Clark,Baker Warnock,Lowry
albrighton,milner,makoun,nrc,Ireland,delph,bannan,gardner,hogg,downing
Bent, Huntelaar, N`zogbia, agbonlahor, delfouneso, wieman
young,fast,skilfull squad with ability to improve club, sell on value & leaving room for youngsters to progress properly & become fully fledged senior squad players
Would not want Upson or Pav
Trust me Fergusson will be in a Villa shirt next season!
Christ you’re a barrel of laughs and real fun to be round. Mcleish has only been in charge 10 days and most players on their holidays. Get a grip on reality and stop being so bloody pessimistic. We had 4 mangers last season, the worst injury crisis ever seen at Villa Park, played some excellent football (esp when we stuffed Man U 2-2, and chelsea 0-0) and still finished 9th. Young was always gonna go and had been approached by Man U ages ago, that’s why he wouldn’t sign a contract. Friedel is not world class, he is a great shot stopper, but he only ever works in the 6 yard box – does not inspire confidence and as for Downing, I’m not so sure he does want to go, the media and scouse bloggers are stirring it all up. They are not much further forward in their development than us, if at all. They are just arrogant and living in the past, I mean Dalglish. He is only doing the job through some moral duty. I think we should go for Given/Foster, Milner, NZogbia, Walker, Dann, and Sturridge (loan)
Following on from my comment I’d like Villa fans to confirm their wish list for the season (not including the Villa)
Mine are as follows:-
1. Redknapp sent down and banned from being manager/pundit/2nd hand car salesman. His son is also sacked
2. All sponsors pull out of the Monopolies/Champions League and the media stop getting so obsessed with the big 4. Football becomes a level playing field again like it was when we won the European Cup as Champions
3. Premier League refs begin to referee games properly and stop gifting United at least 15 points a season, to such an extent that Vidic quite rightly spends half the season suspended
4. Stoke are charged with offences under the Trades Descriptions Act.
5. Liverpool are banned from any transfer activity involving Villa players
6. Abramovitch is exposed as a money launderer and proceedings are taken to seize his assets. Chelsea do a Leeds
7. The Arab guy with no mates who used his wealth to but 40,000 mancunian pals gets bored and decides to take his money out and invest in our economy directly
8. People are only allowed to support their local team (I am a brummie living in Worcester and go to all home games and some away) I watched Villa Man U in the pub last season – there were 4 of us and about 100 of them, not one with a manc accent – shocking)
9. I remain in this dream for the rest of the season – happy life
Happy days
“Sunderland complete the signing of South Korea striker Ji Dong-won”
Sunderland seem to be very bussye in the market, i know the windows open on friday but we reallt should get a move on
Let’s get Barry Fergusson NOW – great player!