Extra Press-ure

[old man villa fan]

I think that supporters have to take some blame as well.  The pressure from fans on the Club to buy players, without much thought to the cost to the Club for the fee and wages. I remember one comment on here where somebody pulled another up about the cost of a player and the response he got was "well, it's not my money".

When an owner gets into financial problems, it's who can come in next and fund what I want. There seems to be an expectation that owners should just throw £100s of millions into the pot.

The damage was done when we did not consider the 'worst case scenario' if we didn't spend the Benteke and Delph money well. Since then, we have sailed on hopefully trying to match fans expectations.

It's a twist on what joe_c once said - "I want you to spend your money on my hobby". We expect the owner to pump in large amounts, never take a penny back, and we don't think about what would happen should the time come when he can't keep bankrolling us

Nobody forces owners to buy clubs.  Xia clearly did so because he probably thought he'd get the club back into the Premier League and then get a return on his investment, either through making a profit or more likely from a sale at a price far in excess of what he paid for it.  A few of us have voiced concerns about owners and their ability to finance the club, but usually get told "not to worry about it".

I thought about Xia wanting to get us promoted and sell us on but then thought that it wasn't realistic.  How much would we be worth in the PL, £150m?  How much did he spend to buy us and how much has he invested.  Close on £150m, I would think and that is without paying Lerner the extra £25-30m if we were promoted in the first (I think) season.  So a gamble to just get his money back.

[Behind Bluenose Lines]

Summed up perfectly.

It was always going to be us though, when you think of it. Big enough to be debated in parliament, not quite big enough to be outraged that it's us.

And so nothing will change in English football for the foreseeable...

[Toronto Villa]

I’m sure Xia has a load of other business objectives that he wanted to unlock by getting us up. I don’t think it was about a quick profit. The Commonwealth games area regeneration including Villa Park works better when you have PL money to offset the required investment. In the end he’s been massively stung by putting his faith in Wyness and Bruce, and certainly the latter being given immense resources to get us up and failing.

[wolfman999]

I’m sure Xia has a load of other business objectives that he wanted to unlock by getting us up. I don’t think it was about a quick profit. The Commonwealth games area regeneration including Villa Park works better when you have PL money to offset the required investment. In the end he’s been massively stung by putting his faith in Wyness and Bruce, and certainly the latter being given immense resources to get us up and failing.

To be fair to Bruce, a lot of the money spent when Xia came in was down to Di Mateo and the overpriced garbage he chose to buy. Bruce has not spent a great deal and made a decent profit last summer.

The real damage was done by Lerner and his team of idiots who got us relegated in the first place. They were the cancer in our club, Xia and co have just been naive IMHO.

[tony scott]

Good article Dave by the way when did last make an annual profit?

[Lastfootstamper]

I’m sure Xia has a load of other business objectives that he wanted to unlock by getting us up. I don’t think it was about a quick profit. The Commonwealth games area regeneration including Villa Park works better when you have PL money to offset the required investment. In the end he’s been massively stung by putting his faith in Wyness and Bruce, and certainly the latter being given immense resources to get us up and failing.

To be fair to Bruce, a lot of the money spent when Xia came in was down to Di Mateo and the overpriced garbage he chose to buy. Bruce has not spent a great deal and made a decent profit last summer.

The real damage was done by Lerner and his team of idiots who got us relegated in the first place. They were the cancer in our club, Xia and co have just been naive IMHO.

Not if they played for nothing, no. The wage bill was, is, and shall remain until we get back up, our biggest drain.

I don't think a manager is either responsible or creditable for transfer fees and the sums thereof. Like now, where at best we'll likely have a sell-to-buy policy, I very much doubt that Bruce will be the one doing the selling. Likewise, he won't be the one setting any fees for players we buy.

[mike]

I think the key point for me is that Dave rightly identifies that Zia has calmly fucked over this football club with less apologies for his behaviour and less reproach from the fans than Randy, who at least started well before he fucked us over, and spent a fortune on the likes of MFH due to the flouncy child that was MON.

[Steve67]

This Bruce has spent nothing is a complete loads of bollocks.  He might have got several players in on loan and not physically paid out many transfer fees, but they were all Premier Division players and on decent wedge.  Terry might have cost us nothing in terms of a transfer fee, but 6ok per week and no doubts a signing on fee.  What do people think that Whelan is on?  Grabban and Snodgrass?  Both Prem players and on really decent money.  Bruce has recommended players that he knows are on decent wedge. He talked Round and Wyness into his own Villa engine and it badly, stalled several times, not just against Fulham.  More fool Wyness and Round, but, ultimately, they are ALL responsible for this fuckwittery of a mess that we are in.

[dave.woodhall]

One thing that's been absolutely fucking hilarious is the amount of our local inferiors' supporters slagging the bit about how much notice they're taking of us by, er, spending all day talking about it.

[tomd2103]

I’m sure Xia has a load of other business objectives that he wanted to unlock by getting us up. I don’t think it was about a quick profit. The Commonwealth games area regeneration including Villa Park works better when you have PL money to offset the required investment. In the end he’s been massively stung by putting his faith in Wyness and Bruce, and certainly the latter being given immense resources to get us up and failing.

As someone on here quite brilliantly put it a few years ago when talking about the Lerner / O’Neill situation, when a rich man meets a man with experience, the man with experience usually gets rich and the rich man gets experience. 

[ChicagoLion]

I’m sure Xia has a load of other business objectives that he wanted to unlock by getting us up. I don’t think it was about a quick profit. The Commonwealth games area regeneration including Villa Park works better when you have PL money to offset the required investment. In the end he’s been massively stung by putting his faith in Wyness and Bruce, and certainly the latter being given immense resources to get us up and failing.

As someone on here quite brilliantly put it a few years ago when talking about the Lerner / O’Neill situation, when a rich man meets a man with experience, the man with experience usually gets rich and the rich man gets experience.

One of my favorites.

[JD]

Excellent article Dave and very sober reading. 

[darren woolley]

Another good read Dave.

[Louzie0]

I agree