Tony’s Statement.

[paul_e]

i couldn't care less who he's bought in the past and if he did or not develop them

i'm more concerned with the 23.9 million (+ the Taylor the free gift) he has spent on a lot of players on big wages and wonder whether they will earn there corn next season in getting out of this league

it is relevant though because his signings with us pretty much reflect the way he's always approached the market

[SoccerHQ]

By a player plucked from Dundee by Bruce whose last competitive game was in the European Cup final against Real Madrid?

And that's Steve Bruce's doing?  Er, no.  Bruce may have purchased him but Liverpool nurtured the talent.  Yeah, give Bruce some credit for listening to one of his scouts, Robertson did really well in the Championship for Hull, fair play, but you are stretching it beyond all imagination by suggesting that Bruce is responsible for Robertson playing in the Champs League Final.

Equally, we are talking about Villa, not the teams that Bruce used ti manage, you know, those will far less resources and who really had to pick up youngsters.  He tried to buy promotion and fucked it up.  I hope he proves me wrong and starts having more faith in the kids.  I doubt it though.

Would say Sam Clucas was his best find in recent years. At Chesterfield and played key role when Hull were promoted. Hull then sold him to Swansea for 15m.

[tomd2103]

We certainly should be going down the young players route once our ownership is sorted out.

The tried and tested method failed us big time at the crunch last season.

Only issue I can see is like anything it only takes a few defeats and suddenly young and hungry is cheap method and there's lack of ambition etc.

I didn't mind when we switched to it from 2012 onwards, trouble was our implementation was wrong. Signing likes of Lowton, Bennett and Westwood and immediately making them first team regulars when any other top level club would've had them learning from the bench or even getting loaned out as you see with how Spurs do it.

So all three were playing 30 + times and inevitably they all struggled particularly as the quality in our first team had badly declined at
that point.

Would've worked much better if we'd signed those types when likes of Young, Downing, Milner and Carew were all still at the club but instead had manager back then who'd rather sign Beye and Sidwell to warm the bench.

Other thing with young players is people constantly yearn for them to get a chance and then slag them off if they're not the new Rooney/Mbappe within ten games.

We saw it years ago with Cahill and Steven Davis who've both had brilliant careers, Albrighton was getting flak aswell for a period, Lowton got plenty and has proved himself as a reliable top 10 premier league player and now Davis and Andre Green are getting it.

Even Jack was getting plenty of criticism this time last year.

The development of a great academy should be a no-brainer - doing it properly will almost always bear plenty of fruit as long as we hire the best possible people to oversee it and run it. All too often, however, clubs hire the wrong people in their academy or simply do not give it enough attention (my son worked at the Leeds academy for two years and saw at first hand what happens when mates-of-mates and inarticulate ex-pros come into the academy).
The drafting-in of youngsters and the link between academy and first team are almost-entirely dependent on having the 'right' management and coaching team. Since Lerner came in - and perhaps before - our first-team managers / coaches do not seem to have had a great focus on youth development.
If our circumstances mean that we have to go more purposefully down this route, I'd urge the new owners to do the best possible job of having the right people in the first-team set-up and the Academy set-up. Hire the best available coaches and spend what funds we have to develop a sustainable pipeline of young talent.

Even Citeh - who have bought their way to the top - have invested strongly in their academy.

To have that kind of set up, it is vital to not only have a Director of Football with the vision and experience to oversee the entire structure, but also a manager who fully buys into that philosophy.  We don't have either.

I see our old mate Gregg Evans was at it again in the Birmingham Mail with a big headline and two page spread that we have hit a new low because we can't bring any players in at the minute (even on loan) and probably won't be able to do so until the end of the window when some players have gone.  I wouldn't have thought something that was pretty obvious to anyone who has been following what's going on would have required such sensationalism, but there you go.

[Drummond]

Every manager makes bad signings. I give you the Djemba twins.

[The Moose]

Don't look back in anger......

[paul_e]

Every manager makes bad signings. I give you the Djemba twins.

Of course they do, Ferguson made plenty of dodgy signings, as did Wenger. If you're 50/50 or better most people forget the poor ones but if the good signings are 1 in 4/5 then it suggests problems. If that pattern exists across multiple clubs with vastly different scouting systems then it points at the manager.  At Villa I think our scouting structure has been a big part of the problem for a number of years, even back in the 90s we seemed to regularly buy players because they'd been good against us.

[brian green]

A very simple, cheap, easy thing Villa could do is get some acknowledgement postcards printed.  Like a number of supporters over the years I have written to the club to suggest they look at promising young players.  The most recent was Ollie Watkins at Exeter.  I have never ever received a word of reply.  I suspect our scouting set up, like many other clubs, is like what they call the 'canteen culture' in the police.  A culture of hanging about windswept remote football pitches, pubs and greasy spoon motorway service area cafes.  Needs bringing into the 21st century I suggest.

[Ads]

By a player plucked from Dundee by Bruce whose last competitive game was in the European Cup final against Real Madrid?

And that's Steve Bruce's doing?  Er, no.  Bruce may have purchased him but Liverpool nurtured the talent.  Yeah, give Bruce some credit for listening to one of his scouts, Robertson did really well in the Championship for Hull, fair play, but you are stretching it beyond all imagination by suggesting that Bruce is responsible for Robertson playing in the Champs League Final.

Equally, we are talking about Villa, not the teams that Bruce used ti manage, you know, those will far less resources and who really had to pick up youngsters.  He tried to buy promotion and fucked it up.  I hope he proves me wrong and starts having more faith in the kids.  I doubt it though.

I'll concede I cannot win with such myopia. I'll.not mention Clucas.

[mr underhill]

Does anyone know if we really do have obligations to pay £9m over to various sources tomorrow? And, just as importantly if we stand any chance of going into the new season - the most crucial now in recent history imo - without going into administration?

[Ads]

By a player plucked from Dundee by Bruce whose last competitive game was in the European Cup final against Real Madrid?

And that's Steve Bruce's doing?  Er, no.  Bruce may have purchased him but Liverpool nurtured the talent.  Yeah, give Bruce some credit for listening to one of his scouts, Robertson did really well in the Championship for Hull, fair play, but you are stretching it beyond all imagination by suggesting that Bruce is responsible for Robertson playing in the Champs League Final.

Equally, we are talking about Villa, not the teams that Bruce used ti manage, you know, those will far less resources and who really had to pick up youngsters.  He tried to buy promotion and fucked it up.  I hope he proves me wrong and starts having more faith in the kids.  I doubt it though.

Would say Sam Clucas was his best find in recent years. At Chesterfield and played key role when Hull were promoted. Hull then sold him to Swansea for 15m.

We both, at differing times, mentioned then need to sign quality younger players and turn then on for a profit, as Spurs have.

When asked to demonstrate Bruce doing so;

McGuire - signed for £2.5m from Sheffield United and sold for £17m
Robertson - signed from Dundee for £2.85m and sold to Liverpool for £10m
Clucas - signed from Chesterfield for £1.3m and sold to Swansea for £15m

Its all somebody else's doing. It's not solely how Bruce operates, but he does have a record for signing good young players and putting his neck on the line to play them. There's no reason to assume he couldn't find and do the same here.

[Steve67]

I hope you’re right Ads. It’s a longer term strategy I guess and one which tells me we’re in this division for a while. Hopefully Stan Ternent has a few of those types of player up his sleeve, not as if we can afford them.

[kippaxvilla2]

Does anyone know if we really do have obligations to pay £9m over to various sources tomorrow? And, just as importantly if we stand any chance of going into the new season - the most crucial now in recent history imo - without going into administration?

He is kicking the can down the road in terms of player sales by securing loans against various assets.  He hopes to repay these and get us the right side of FFP with player sales.

The problem is the longer sales don’t happen then the more of a funding gap he has to find which on the face of it he is now struggling to do. 

I think we will somehow make it to the start of the season without going into Administration but I would standby for one of our more horrific transfer deadline days. Unless of course we get bought out.

[andrew08]

We’re going to lose Grealish, Chester and Kodja and several others, possibly to teams in our Division, during the last few days of the window.

That’s just the way it is.

[chrisw1]

We’re going to lose Grealish, Chester and Kodja and several others, possibly to teams in our Division, during the last few days of the window.

That’s just the way it is.

At ridiculously low prices.

[Clark W Griswold]

Maybe, but it's only the intense media speculation that we're going off together with Bruce's comments which were not definitive. I find it strange that on the 19th July in a year that the transfer window closes a lot earlier we still haven't bought or sold anyone. The last time it was like this was when Lerner took over. We've still been playing the players that are supposedly on their way in the pre season games. If there is a buyout it could change things dramatically. Or it might not, but at the moment it's very much a 'believe it when I see it' with most of this 'news'.