So the window shuts shortly on the quietest one we have had with no real hope of quality coming in.
Posted a week or so back on just how quiet the window has been and it could be we actually made a small profit this window with a tiny wage cut. So after the game today it appears once again Mcleish has confirmed no more activity from Villa. This was posted in the Villa talk transfer speculation thread
Eck has just confirmed we on very thin on players but will not be doing anymore business this window.
I do not agree with the premise we are thin on players. I would say looking at the players in the squad and all fit that actually it is quite strong in some areas. However I fear that Chris Herd has a more serious injury that the club have let on and this maybe a problem as Petrov is continuing to play but is clearly tired now.
Of course this is a final confirmation (there are no smoke and mirrors here !!) that money is very tight at Villa. I do believe once some leave in the summer we may have more room to move. However we will have what we have and Mcleish has to be brave with his selections now. For QPR if everyone was fit I would pick
Given, Cuellar, Dunne, Clark, Lichaj, Albrighton, Petrov, Gardner, N’Zog, Ireland, Bent
Yes I have dropped Gabby because for me Ireland has to start but not in a 442 so it was a straight choice between Bent and Gabby and the goal scoring stats swing it for me. The great thing is that it gives 4 homegrown kids a start and thus when players are injured it should be these like Herd, Bannan etc who get a chance.
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Yeah no chance of anyone coming in now. We are desperate for a new defence but coz we are safe this season and out of cup then rl won’t see the point of signing anyone till summer at least. Thou can’t see much being done then either hopefully we will get rid of dross ie dunne, warnock and heskey and maybe a couple of average replacements. Also think bent will be off in summer too
. It’s doom and gloom I’m afraid
well Heskey will go, Beye will go, Guzan will go
think we will try and get rid of some of the others if anyone will pay the wages, Think Dunne can be sold but I am not convinced he is the problem. For me it is the FB’s and that really concerns me that AM brought Mutton (that is not a typo !)
Dunne is def a problem especially how disruptive he was under GH he was bang out of order. Though I agree he’s not only problem. Warnock and mutton need to go ASAP so does beye who’s a complete waste of expensive space. Another mon masterpiece!! I think (dare I say it) if we had a defence as good as blues back four last season we would be challenging for 6th now. The rest of team could play in a relaxed way knowing dunne and co arnt going to drop clangers this would spread confidence throughout the team.
apparently we sold Lowry for a miserly £250k!! I think thats a joke! and there are some rumours that we may sell Bannan
I heard 450 for Lowry …
as for Bannan, I have heard rumours of Celtic on loan but they could easily buy him for a couple of mil
I’d sell Bannan if the money was right, to lightweight. People have compared him to Alex Cropley but I can’t see it myself and I know luka modric aint exactly Arnie but I can’t see Bannan becoming a luka modric.
If (god forbid) we sold a quality young player like Barry Bannan, I fear I would cease paying attention to all things Villa. I’ve already stopped going to the stadium, but if we were to sell one of the few technical, visionary players that we have, the message that would send about this team, I might barely be able to muster the interest to even so much as check results.
Lerners the prob he allowed this to happen he should hav looked into mons spending more what kind of business man allow costs to spill out of control, lerner should hav spent more time running the club instead of leaving it to people who dont hav a clue
Spot on.
What MON bought were players willing to join(we ain’t that popular). Lerner was signing the checks, so no way did he have no idea. Clearly some people are still blaming MON, but as he ain’t told us what happened he must of had a non disclosure put in his payoff(More Lerner coverups). Hope you guys enjoyed the free busses, bet it’s all alright again in Lerner land now innit!
I heard MON didn’t get a pay off, and the court case was to protect his reputation, he is all about himself and his CV … He said he would get into the top four within 5 yrs, 4 years on and he spent £100m+ sent the wage bill soaring and built a very average team who had absolutely no chance of being able to get to or compete in the CL. If you seriously think the team MON blew all that money on (more than Redknap has at Spurs in a shorter time frame) could compete against Barca, Real, Bayern, Man Utd, AC Milan, Inter etc etc … then you are deluded. The dressing room was split and rumours of Milner left because of this. I want to see the club stable, run properly within its means whilst the rest self implode, I hope McLeish is gone in the summer but I doubt it. UTV
Who are you replying too? If it was me, it makes no sense and doesn’t really answer anything. Also Spurs are more popular due to their geographical location, so no wonder good quality players will go there. Do you really think were more stable? First time I’ve heard MON got no cash(strange when his payoff was one of the excuses for not spending)
Oh aand spurs had a decent squad when Plastic face took over(something that could not be said of Villa when Doug sold to Lerner)
people tend to forget about that
this was his first team then
H Gomes, A Hutton, V Corluka, L King, B Assou-Ekotto, D Bentley, J Jenas, T Huddlestone, L Modric, J O’Hara (A Lennon, 70), R Pavlyuchenko (D Bent, 67)
ignore=ing Hutton then not a bad team at all and BAle was there of course
aye and a few more. ie Berbatov, Keane, Defoe just to name some.
Where’s the link to the pay off amount ? show me proof of the figures ? where’s the link or comment from the club for it being the reason for not spending ? all rumour, if you had the pleasure of speaking to people associated with the club instead of internet rumours and false ITK’s then you would see a very different picture of Villa under MON. He did well and I thank him for that, but its come at a very heavy price …And those very players Redknap inherited were second or third from bottom if I remember rightly ? UTV
eh!, so can you prove what you claim?????? Oh and the team plastic face inherited had a poor start to their season that’s all after succesive years of good positions. Very easy to hide behind no public info on payouts especially as you “Heard” no money was paid(you’re so funny, it’s a rumour your using to back up claim). I assure you there are quotes out there that say different, but I really can’t be bothered to scour old press releases(Maybe you could as you’re obviously commited to your original statement).
The proof is the state of our squad now ….. when the players were put through proper training regimes by Houllier, using our state of the art training complex the way it should have and all broke down crocked and injured. As for ‘hearing things’ I can assure you it came straight to my ears at a charity even I was at recently with ex and current Villa players and staff. And I don’t mean the tea lady. I liked MON, it wasn’t something I expected to hear, I don’t like McLeish or his ways and am not a fan of his tactics, but it was said, as outsiders we will never know, but in the circles of football it is well known apparently. I emailed Ian a couple of days after the event so this isn’t rumour.
You never considered you may of been fed some false info. It’s all cloak and daggers from VP these days. I had decent ITK of my own last summer ie Agent family member which all came true, even the surprise signing of Lennon(not so great a surprise in hindsight)
As I said we will never know, but the lips it came from were two legends, one currently employed, one not and a current midfielder. From the lips not Chinese whispers. The current situation is frustrating them and big changes will happen in the summer. They didn’t say in what way, just big changes.
Any reason you haven’t picked Keane?
because
1) I hate loans and agree with Wenger totally on it and banning loans for players over 21
2) He will be gone shortly
Would you bench Messi if he was on loan with us? This is ridicoulous. Keane is better than every other our AMC.
Hopefully heskey,collins,warnock,beye,dunne and hutton will leave in the summer but hutton wont because he was bought only six months ago which is a shame! Also petrov is getting on so would swap him for a younger goal scoring midfielder! A whole new back four is a must but i would settle for dann and a new left back!
Gutted, Cuellar is going. He should be playing at right back. Agree with your side, but I’d like to see Stevens have a go in the team. He’s looked good in reserves. Daniel Johnson also, he looked very lively against Marseille. In fact gve the reserve team a game!!
Not sure about Daniel Johnson (and yes I was at the game) thought his finishing was woeful, his passing sloppy and he didn’t track back. Appears (imo) a little over confident.
Yeah his finishing was poor mate, but at least he brought a bit of urgency to the side. Jordon Graham also looks very exciting. It’ll be a good side in a few years and I’m looking forward to watching them….if we can keep hold of them that is.
They played well and if had took half their chances would have been out of sight, a shame really. A bit of controversy over the next gen competition, being a by invite only some clubs have complained its giving the players from the participating an unfair advantage, pathetic if you ask me.
If your sums are right Ian and we’ve made a £200-250k profit, that should get us a top player.
Oh.
On second thoughts that’s £4-5k a week for a year.
Enda Stevens type quality (not that I’m saying he’s no good, but we need proven ability).
Is this really what we’re down too?
Pathetic, imo.
We need beefing up, simple.
Not to challenge for anything (the thought is a joke), but just to stay competitive in mid table.
I can’t believe a club as big as Villa isn’t going to make a signing in this window, when something is so blatantly needed, if not just to cheer us up a bit
Even Ellis would have pulled something out of the bag, imo.
It’s never been said that money is tight regarding a player’s fee. It’s the wages that we have to watch. With another 3 top earning players off the wage bill in the summer, we will buy, but not at the unsustainable levels MON did. This season is a complete write off though, but to stay on an even keel financially it was always going to be. The problem we have is that it will be McLeish doing the spending and he’s hardly covered himself in glory in that department so far.
Exactly. I agree fully.
Hutton and Warnock out the team now, Lichaj and Stevens in now, they will learn and adapt, the other pair just get worse and are supposed seasoned pro’s. UTV
Heard a rumour that AVFC suspended a member of staff today for tweeting.
Any ideas who?
fucking prob barry bannan since his incident with drink drivinghe aint got no where near the first eleven really and we need that passing ability
Bodymoorinsider has deleted the twiiter account they had, although most of the stuff they put was not revealing at all and looked made up if I am honest.
to be a proper ITK you have to get something right
find it strange that they could find out unless a stupid idiot was using a works PC
The way businesses find out is by monitoring IP addresses using their wifi & then looking back at the times of the tweets.
where have you heard this?
This is the dullest transfer window to date, not just for Villa but for everyone
You don’t need to spend big money to get very good players, and to build a very good, very watchable team. Norwich are an excellent team with some excellent players, and they all know their jobs. The manager is adored by the fans, and the ground is packed every match with passionate fans.
Peter, that right, but Norwich has one of the brightest manager prospects atm. I don´t critize AM because there are enough people here who are doing that instead. But Paul Lambert will not stay long with Norwich. One of the bigger clubs will catch him as I expect various changes in management this summer: Redknapp for England, Wenger could leave, the same with Mancini (if they don´t clinch Prem title), maybe Dalglish and Villa-Boaz.
Keane has to start against QPR. He gives us a better chance to win this game and people pay for that. So absolutely no reason to sub him. He was outstanding in his last 3 games.
Can´t hear this argument about paper thin squad: we let some players go out on loan, so nobody can blame a thin squad. Even if we can call them back.
About homegrown talent: let us pick up some points then we have time to introduce them.
And I am a lifelong Villan who was born in Aston!
We have a stop gap loanee in Keane for another month, and you can bet that’s it.
Anyway, could we trust McLeish to bring in any decent players? Look at his failures at blues, and do we need any more pathetic cast off’s like the dreadful Hutton? Zigic anybody? Jesus wept what a bad buy that was.
It’s just a dream, but imagine what a difference a manger like Mourinho would make all round at Villa Park, he’s after a job in the PL, and if Lerner really had any ambition, he would push the boat out to get that man, and get rid of his pathetic stability programme, and the manager he so stupidly employed.
But we all know he’s not got any ambition whatsoever, except to make as much money out of the club as he can, hence his stability rubbish.
For me, this transfer window is the classic “Catch-22″; and it’s a nightmare. Would anyone disagree that Villa’s defence could at best be described as inadequate, and is too often simply woeful? Yet if Hutton, Collins, Dunne and Warnock had miraculously be moved on this Jan, and Lerner had given McLeish 30 mill for a new back line, does anybody think that he’d have spent it well? My reading of his mentality is that we’d simply have ended up bringing in another group of players which as uninspiring as the technically limited group of hoofers we’d just gotten rid of. The question of McLeish and transfers is just another one of many things about the Villa which keeps me lying awake at nights these days.
It’s been very quiet. However we are trying to reduce the wage bill so perhaps we ought not to be surprised.
I think Heskey will go on a loan before the end of the transfer window.
Okay, I hope…