Olof Mellberg out.

[Dr Butler]

This for me.  If you think about an manageral example, like Brian Little.  Villa have likely had much better managers than Little over the years who didn't produce as much.  Something just clicked with him.

Brian Little isn't just remembered at Villa Park for managing us, though, is he?

he walked on water....after that I'm struggling

[brian green]

Alan McInally got a leg up the legendary ladder above better players like Gerry Hitchens or Cyrille Regis by having a six syllable name which fitted our song.

[RussellC]

Alan McInally got a leg up the legendary ladder above better players like Gerry Hitchens or Cyrille Regis by having a six syllable name which fitted our song.

That's a very good point! I wonder if Benteke was persuaded to sign his extension last summer with the motivation that he may one day cement his status by replacing AM in the ditty...?!

[RussellC]

That's not a dig at Mellberg, far from it, I like the bloke too, it's more a comment on how that bond between players and fans is totally different nowadays compared to, say, the 1970s.

The world's a smaller place now though, I guess. Even in the 1970s leaving a football club must have represented a fairly major upheaval for a player. Certainly, the opportunity to move abroad (let alone to a different continent) wouldn't have crossed too many players' minds.

If some of them had been around now, maybe the likes of Charlie Aitken would have gone to the MLS to see out his playing days, or Pongo doing an 'Emile' and jetting off to Oz...!

[joe_c]

I had been thinking about this recently and I think we need an additional strata of classification, kind of like the steps to canonisation. So if we were to categorize centre halfs (halves?) for example and this is my off the top of my head subjective list)
 
Venerable - Olof Mellberg
Blessed - Allan Evans
Saint - Paul McGrath

I think what paulie says about "affinity" is key, particularly in recent years where there has been little real success on the field and you have to think about intangibles such as player's qualities as people and attitude and whether they get what it means to be Villa when considering their place in the Pantheon and why for example Stilian Petrov would be afforded entry and Andy Townsend might not.

[dave shelley]

That's not a dig at Mellberg, far from it, I like the bloke too, it's more a comment on how that bond between players and fans is totally different nowadays compared to, say, the 1970s.

The world's a smaller place now though, I guess. Even in the 1970s leaving a football club must have represented a fairly major upheaval for a player. Certainly, the opportunity to move abroad (let alone to a different continent) wouldn't have crossed to many players' minds.

If some of them had been around now, maybe the likes of Charlie Aitken would have gone to the MLS to see out his playing days, or Pongo doing an 'Emile' and jetting off to Oz...!

Charlie did though Russell, he played for New York Cosmos, not the MLS I grant you.

[Simon Ward]

All the best Olof with the next stage of your career.

[RussellC]

That's not a dig at Mellberg, far from it, I like the bloke too, it's more a comment on how that bond between players and fans is totally different nowadays compared to, say, the 1970s.

The world's a smaller place now though, I guess. Even in the 1970s leaving a football club must have represented a fairly major upheaval for a player. Certainly, the opportunity to move abroad (let alone to a different continent) wouldn't have crossed to many players' minds.

If some of them had been around now, maybe the likes of Charlie Aitken would have gone to the MLS to see out his playing days, or Pongo doing an 'Emile' and jetting off to Oz...!

Charlie did though Russell, he played for New York Cosmos, not the MLS I grant you.

I stand corrected!

[Olneythelonely]

Olof is absolutely a legend and was a superb defender. It's a shame he spent far too long at right back.

Zlatan has given him plenty of love on his Facebook page. Zlatan and Olof love is pretty much my homoerotic dream, if I had such a thing. *cough* Right, who likes boxing and other manly heterosexual things. BOOBS.

[saunders_heroes]

Would people class him as a Villa legend? It's a tough one for me, but I think I would.

Anyway, I miss him loads. Probably my favourite player whilst he was here.

Not a chance. Good player and I'd love to have a centreback as strong and assured as he was at his peak, but Villa legend? Nah!

[cdbearsfan]

Alan McInally got a leg up the legendary ladder above better players like Gerry Hitchens or Cyrille Regis by having a six syllable name which fitted our song.

Not sure what the relevance of comparing him with Hitchens is. Yes, he was a great player but if we're going to still sing about players who last played for us more than sixty years ago plenty of others would be ahead of him in the queue, and while I liked Regis, McInally contributed far more for Villa than he did. We'd have gone straight back down in 1989 without his goals (admittedly most of which came before the New Year), we'd probably have sacked Taylor, never signed McGrath and God knows what division we'd have spent most of the time in since.

I think a lot of the liking for McInally is that he still seems to hold the club in genuine affection, the same can't be said about the aforementioned Platt or players who played for a myriad of clubs in England whose affections are therefore watered-down slightly. So it's unlikely that we'd still sing about Dean Saunders, for example, as people associate him as much with the likes of Derby and Oxford as much as they do with us.

It helps that the song is fairly catchy, likewise the Carew song still gets sang from time to time. I also like that we include the original players as a reminder that Villa were singing the ditty well before those song-stealing twats from London who frequent the Old Trafford Gift Shop.

I wouldn't class either Mellberg or McInally as a club "legend" though. I'd reserve that for players who you'd include in the top fifty or so players ever to play for us, or at least those who made a massive difference such as Peter Withe for scoring the most important goal in our history.

I think McInally, and Mellberg, can both fairly be regarded as cult heroes at the Villa though, and I reckon they'd be happy enough with that.

[KevinGage]

Olof is absolutely a legend and was a superb defender. It's a shame he spent far too long at right back.

Zlatan has given him plenty of love on his Facebook page. Zlatan and Olof love is pretty much my homoerotic dream, if I had such a thing. *cough* Right, who likes boxing and other manly heterosexual things. BOOBS.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic
2 hours ago · Edited
The day Olof Mellberg decided to quit the national team it was a great loss to Swedish football and the team. But to me personally it was an even greater loss. When I had him on the team I never had to look back because I knew he was behind me and I could concentrate on what was going on up ahead.

Olof was the person that trigged and challenged me. This drove me to want to do more on the pitch.

Olof had a winner mentality like no other. He simply refused to lose, not only in football but in practically everything. And when he did lose, which rarely happened, he refused to admit it. I think this mentality was what took him a long way in his carreer.

I’ve been doubly lucky when it comes to Olof. Firstly because I got to play with him, and secondly because I got know the person Olof Mellberg, not only the player.

If Olof in my opinion is the best Swedish defender of all times, I think the person Olof is even better.

It is sad that Olof now chooses to end his career because I’m sure he has much more to give.

I wish Olof Mellberg and his family all happiness and love in the future.

Thank you my friend.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic

[Dave]

I don't think a 'legend' necessarily has to have been a world class player, or have won a trophy for the club. I think when it's obvious that someone has a complete affinity for the club (and in particular the supporters) and clearly gave their all whilst wearing the shirt, along with gestures like the shirts at West Ham away, i think they can be considered a club legend.

I'd certainly rather think of Mellberg in that sense than someone like David Platt.

I think you can judge a club by the stature of its legends.

For me the word "legend" implies more than the things you've outlined above, but ultimately, I guess it's all subjective.

I just think it gets bandied about far too often these days.

It's also going to be based on the age of the person talking about it. Somebody who is 16 years old is going to have his own definitions of what constitutes a 'legend' which are unlikely to match your own. You can pick from title winners and European Cup winners, he doesn't have that frame of reference.

It's not his fault that he's not old enough to have seen players that people in their 40s and 50s consider their own 'legends', nor that he has a relatively poor selection of his own to work from compared to anybody in their 30s and older.

[pig]

I did like Olof, he gave me a shirt at West Ham a few years back (and another 3000 people!)

[dave.woodhall]

Cult hero rather than legend. I don't know what the difference is, but I'd say the latter is remembered by everyone even if they never saw him play while the former is remembered by a section of our support (think McGrath compared to Ian Taylor or Sid/Eamonn Deacy).