To What End?

[brian green]

Why are we being run and managed the way we are?

I accept that some of the stumbling and bumbling which has blighted us since O'Neill  jumped ship is down to human error and downright incompetence right from the top and all through Villa, but I have always considered that, in spite of the incompetence and bad decision making there was some sort of however sketchily thought out plan for our future.

Because by nature I am utterly loyal to Villa I have thought that a plan is in place but it was slow in coming to fruition.   This season I started to become really depressed that the plan included a "no glory" element which allowed the board and the owner to regard the simple survival in the Premiership as a legitimate and adequate ambition so long as the gates held up and the costs went down.

With the passing of the January window my take on the current Villa situation has taken a further downward twist.   The failure to address our terrible defensive and midfield inadequacies even with basic measures such as cover for Ron Vlaar and a bit, even a bit, of midfield brain and savvy, has left me to believe that two things are on the cards which are driving us towards another miserable down-to-the-wire  end of season.   I suspect Paul Lambert has been assured, possibly in writing, that he will not be sacked if we go down and that he must for his part make do and mend with the rag bag of players he has brought in.

That must mean the plan is to make Villa as sellable as possible.   Low debt, low wage bill, low overheads.   If that is the plan Randy Lerner should do the honourable thing and tell us and if it is not the plan, whatever the plan is we should be made aware of it because I am sick us watching us under perform week in week out.   Sorry, but that is the way I feel.

[aj2k77]

August2011, the last time we signed an outfield player from a premier league side.

[PaulWinch again]

I'd agree Brian it's pretty demoralising to be honest, I think the board are showing absolutely no ambition at all. However that doesn't excuse us playing so defensively or our inability to retain possession of the football. Regardless of constraints we should be playing better football than we are on the whole. Our long term 'vision' appears pretty depressing, as is the football we play on the pitch.

[Deano's Mullet]

August2011, the last time we signed an outfield player from a premier league side.

Scratching my head to think who this was. Given's a goalie. Alan Hutton?

[aj2k77]

   If that is the plan Randy Lerner should do the honourable thing and tell us and if it is not the plan, whatever the plan is we should be made aware of it because I am sick us watching us under perform week in week out.   Sorry, but that is the way I feel.

This is it for me. I can take watching us get beat, I,'ve seen us win 2 cups in 28 years of supporting the villa. I can take conceding late winners, we've seen us blow leads and find ways to lose time and time again down the years.

What I can't take is watching our games turn into some weird attack vs defence exhibitions where the majority of the time we are backs to the walls looking like a lower league cup team fighting.

Where has the ambition gone? Expectations are lowered to the point where we dont even expect to keep the ball anymore.

Can anyone see this summer be the turning point or will it be more unknowns bought in?

[aj2k77]

August2011, the last time we signed an outfield player from a premier league side.

Scratching my head to think who this was. Given's a goalie. Alan Hutton?

Hutton it is.

[Deano's Mullet]

And he only featured in 17 league games the previous season for Spuds.

[ROBBO]

Brian i have been saying for a long time that he is looking for a buyer, to get the best deal he can he has done what you suggested, debt free and low wages, that to me is the only logical explanation. Why should he tell us what he's doing? it's his business not ours. I believe he would have released more money but for our table position. If he doesn't sell (buyers are't falling over each other)then i think we will see more of the same in the summer, he might spend a reasonable amount on the purchase price but big wages are out, and i can't blame him after the MON fiasco.

[OzVilla]

For me it's blindingly obvious he's setting us up for a sale and quite frankly I hope he is. We are just hanging in there, whilst he continually reduces the debt and hoping we don't get relegated in the meantime. Going nowhere.

It's not as if he's going to regain his passion for us or suddenly find an extra 100 million to throw at it.

Thanks for the initial optimism Randy but now that's gone the best thing you can do for us is sell us to a rich 'custodian' so we can move forward. Preferably one that won't lose interest after the first setback.

[Richard E]

For me it's blindingly obvious he's setting us up for a sale and quite frankly I hope he is. We are just hanging in there, whilst he continually reduces the debt and hoping we don't get relegated in the meantime. Going nowhere.

It's not as if he's going to regain his passion for us or suddenly find an extra 100 million to throw at it.

Thanks for the initial optimism Randy but now that's gone the best thing you can do for us is sell us to a rich 'custodian' so we can move forward. Preferably one that won't lose interest after the first setback.

Seconded!

[olaftab]

Well if the plan is to make the club sellable it can not be made public as that would have an effect on the sales figure and I am ok with that however please Mr Lerner get on with it PDQ.

[mattjpa]

I was thinking of starting a new topic but it is related to this so I may as we'll post here. I don't have a lot of understanding on the financial workings of the game but was wondering; how exactly do you sell a football club? Do you hire someone in to tout it round generally rich people? Do you advertise it somewhere? Do you make it an attractive acquisition and just wait?
The reason for asking is everything about the way we are being run at the moment leads me to believe we are being sold; the cheap purchases, the investment in players on low wages, bringing in Bertrand on loan when a deal could surely be struck for a potential England international with guaranteed sell on value, the shifting of high earners, investing less in the team than we are earning off the well publicised tv money, Randy's complete loss of interest (he didn't even come when the future king of England came recently), the regression in investment in our assets such as the shelved reinvigoration of the north stand etc.
But if this is the case, surely someone somewhere would have heard something or the story would begin to be leaked by now? I know people like kenwright and Ashley announce their clubs being up for sale but they have nothing to lose - randy would become public enemy no.1 and there is chance we might be up for sale for a long time.
So back to my original question---how do you sell something when nobody knows it's for sale?

[mattjpa]

On a side note, now the anger has calmed from last night I would interested in a poll on whether people still want randy as our owner...

[OzVilla]

I posted n another thread that one thing I do trust Randy to do is sell us to a buyer who has the where with all and interest to take us forward.

Much as I'm disappointed with the last few years i also believe Randy would do the best for us- unlike those previous chancers that infected the Sty for 15 years before selling them out to a penniless chancer.

[Yossarian]

We are another once played with toy of a spoilt little rich boy.

Hey look everybody I have just bought one of those EPL teams. We are going to have so much fun together. We are going to buy lots of players and win the league. I love them so much I am going to get a tattoo of them. They are so much more fun than the Browns.

Do I still own Villa? Really? They are so boring. I hate having to go rainy old England. I want to stay in the Hamptons and play with my new helicopter. Can't I just sell them? Anybody want to buy an EPL team? They even come with no debt and their own ground.