Realistic ambitions

[Rick_avfc]

Top 7 finish, good run in the carling cup and winning the fa cup within the next 3 years. Good runs in europe and attracting some exciting new players to take us to the next level

I agree!  I think thats very realistic for Avfc

[eastie]

Battling for 6th to 8th place with good cup runs thrown in and hopefully a cup final win somewhere down the line in the near future.

[Billy Walker]

Realistic ambitions for Villa? Well as the major club of the Midlands I think it would be criminal not to see ourselves as a major player in English and European football.  Or, to put it another way, I think we should have the ambition to compete at that high end of the football pecking order.

At the moment we seem to be settling for second and third best and this, in my view, is underselling our club on a massive scale.  I've just had a quick Wiki search for some stats on (as an example) the city of Valencia in Spain, and I quote:

"Valencia (Spanish: [baˈlenθja]) or València (Valencian: [vaˈlensia]) is the most populous city of the Autonomous Community of Valencia and the third largest city in Spain, with a population of 809,267 in 2010.[1] It is the 15th-most populous municipality in the European Union. About 1,175,000[2] or 1,564,145[3] people live in the Valencia urban area and 1,705,742[4][5][6] or 2,300,000[7] in the Valencia metropolitan area."

I then did a quick search for the City of Birmingham:

" It is the most populous British city outside London, with a population of 1,028,701 (2009 estimate),[2] and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the United Kingdom's second most populous urban area with a population of 2,284,093 (2001 census).[3] Birmingham's metropolitan area, which includes surrounding towns to which it is closely tied through commuting, is also the United Kingdom's second most populous with a population of 3,683,000."

Now, I know this not an exact science and we have a number of clubs competing with us in our area, but reading this I feel that, at the very least, we have the potential to be competing at the very top of the game.  Everything is there to be one of Europe's top club sides.  Where is the ambition?  I totally appreciate everything Randy and the Board have done for us up to this point in time but I'm beginning to think, as things stand, that we do not have the finances or acumen to push our club to a level where we really should compete.  I want our club winning the League and the European Cup again.  Aiming for cup runs and seventh placed finishes would be - for me - totally and utterly letting the people of Birmingham down. It's a huge, huge underselling of our club and region.  It's incredibly frustrating.

[The Situation]

Realistically with a the right manager we should be able to re-establish ourselves as a top 6 team. Winning a cup would be nice too.

[VWBelgian]

Top 7 finish, good run in the carling cup and winning the fa cup within the next 3 years. Good runs in europe and attracting some exciting new players to take us to the next level

I agree!  I think thats very realistic for Avfc

I go for that!

[nepal_villan]

To be on par with Everton, Spurs and to a degree Arsenal. We can't match Chelsea and ManCity financially and ManUtd and Liverpool (when clicking) are the two true giants of English football.

[Billy Walker]

To be on par with Everton, Spurs and to a degree Arsenal. We can't match Chelsea and ManCity financially and ManUtd and Liverpool (when clicking) are the two true giants of English football.

When they are spending more money than everyone else.

 Liverpool didn't win an FA Cup until 1965 - that, for me, does not a true giant make.  Man Utd were nothing until the 1950's.  Cash and ambition is what it is all about.  Relatively speaking, Villa have been hamstrung in these areas since the mid-twentieth century; if we had enough money to really compete it would make for a different story, surely.

With our present set up I'm sure we can compete for top six football but in an ideal world that should be the very minimum of our aspirations.

[nepal_villan]

 Liverpool didn't win an FA Cup until 1965 - that, for me, does not a true giant make.  Man Utd were nothing until the 1950's.  Cash and ambition is what it is all about.  Relatively speaking, Villa have been hamstrung in these areas since the mid-twentieth century; if we had enough money to really compete it would make for a different story, surely.

Britain is right up there with America as a world power. America was nothing until 200 years ago.

[Billy Walker]

 Liverpool didn't win an FA Cup until 1965 - that, for me, does not a true giant make.  Man Utd were nothing until the 1950's.  Cash and ambition is what it is all about.  Relatively speaking, Villa have been hamstrung in these areas since the mid-twentieth century; if we had enough money to really compete it would make for a different story, surely.

Britain is right up there with America as a world power. America was nothing until 200 years ago.

Aye, and China and India will overtake America.  Maybe Brazil too.  The point is nothing stands still!  We were a great club long before Man Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea and Man City - money and ambition has got them/will get them to where they want to be.  "True giants": is there any such thing in football really?  If by "true" we mean "original" then I would say Villa are the "true giants" of the game and - with money and ambition - can be again. 

Scrapping it out for bosses of basement Premier League teams and potential Championship managers (if true) is simply hugely underselling our club and smacks of a criminal lack of ambition.  I trust Randy, however, and believe the ambition is there for us to hire a top class manager.

[Austin1975]

The way things stand at the moment, Premiership survival 

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The future's not bright, it's ginger and sweaty.

[DrGonzo]

Have some 'bottom love' with Pippa Middleton.

[TheSandman]

Europe and cup runs.

Do I expect us to do that next season? I don't know.

[dave.woodhall]

Liverpool didn't win an FA Cup until 1965 - that, for me, does not a true giant make.  Man Utd were nothing until the 1950's. 

Liverpool had won the league as often as we had by that point, and what Manchester United have done since World War 2 eclipses any of our achievements. You can't say that because you were good once you should always be on top, otherwise every season the honours would be divided between us, Sunderland, Preston and the Royal Engineers.

[Ads]

Given McLiesh's record, survival would be an immense achievement.

[Rick_avfc]

With the imminent arrival of AM then it looks like bottom half of the table!