Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine
Heroes & Villains => Heroes Discussion => Topic started by: kippaxvilla2 on September 01, 2025, 09:24:54 PM
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Do your worst.
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We haven't brought in the quality of players anyone involved around the club would have wanted... but we have improved areas of the squad and at least have some experience, premier league tested players. 4/10
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I think its been a very poor window i am afraid. Elliot saves monchi for now but the rwst if the signings good grief
I genuinely feel this teams worse than the team two years ago with diaby and luiz.
I think not improving the defence and yet another window of no right back is really really bad. Stuck with bloody cash all season again is a bit depressing.
The one thing that is going to be interesting is how emi gets on as he has alot of apologising to do.
One final point not sure who is ollies backup as we havent replaced duran. Assuming it's Guessand
3/10 for me. Very poor monchi
But will bacl the players have no choice but i see us struggling to finish top 7
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Assuming Elliott and Sancho have signed, 5/10. Which is about 3/10 higher than I expected yesterday.
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Like Elliot, not sure on Sancho, Guesand looks handy, the new Longlet likely to be like the old one and I don't give 2 fucks about Emi either way.
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Very poor. The execution of the apparent plan and lack of plan B filtered through to the dressing room and ultimately on to the pitch. Monchi should go.
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1/10
Shit.
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We’ve kept Martinez although it’s obvious he expected to go. Bizot for Olsen seems a good upgrade.
Disappointed we’ve not upgraded at right back or right centre half. Lindelof looks sensible 4th choice and can probably cover across the back 4 at a push.
Maybe Garcia will get some more minutes - if there were no takers for Cash it’s probably why we’ve not upgraded there.
In terms of the players out Bailey you can understand and I think the Ramsey deal was about right given his injury record, if we’ve replaced him with Elliot, reduced the wage bill and made a small cash profit that’s very good business.
Sancho could go either way, many thought Rashford was a mistake and he worked out.
It really is down to Emery to work his magic, again in Jan if we are in the hunt we may push the boat out again.
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A few squad players have gone. No big names gone. Ramsey was a big loss, but him being injured in his first game hints at maybe not such a huge loss as feared. Nobody in but a couple of squad fillers and loans. Elliott as a replacement for Ramsey may turn out to be an upgrade. Overall, me. Just win the europa league ffs
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I think the squad is weaker, wage bill is better.
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I think the squad is weaker, wage bill is better.
By the sounds of it, if that is the case, the transfer team have done their job. Now Emery has to preform a minor miracle and rally the troops.
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Having been forced to reduce wages then it stands to reason we aren’t as strong. Best players cost a lot and couldn’t do that. I’m just glad we didn’t sell any key starting players. They all now need to play better.
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Really hard to tell to be honest, if you accept we were heavily restricted.
We’ll see what the players do, but at least we have 4 senior centre halves now and some attacking options, with some width.
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Disappointing and confusing window all round. The Emi farce needs to be sorted ASAP, absolutely ridiculous. And I thought the point was to get rid of the wages of Donk/Moreno etc, and yet we get more potential deadwood of Lindehof on a reported £112k a week and Sancho on considerably more. Baffling. Elliot and Guessand all good there tbh. 2 players surplus at Man Utd and one at Liverpool suggests not much global scouting going on?
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I feel better today than I did last night, thinking it was Lindelof in and Emi out.
Elliot I feel will be good business, don’t know a lot about him other than player of the tournament for the U21’s. But my Scouse mate reckons he’ll be brilliant for us and we have a cracking player on our hands, I’ll take it.
Sancho could be great or a disaster, let’s see what Unai can instil in him.
5/10 I guess.
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Obviously, I'm sad to see Ramsey go and I'd have loved to bring in more players. But we are limited by the rules that bind us, and being overly critical feels like slagging off Nelson Mandela for not running any marathons between 1962 and 1991.
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Having been forced to reduce wages then it stands to reason we aren’t as strong. Best players cost a lot and couldn’t do that. I’m just glad we didn’t sell any key starting players. They all now need to play better.
Have we though those 200k wages on sancho are a killer
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A muddled window, didnt look like we had much of a plan but we have no idea what was going on in the background with the potential for players to be told that they might be leaving. Sancho, Elliot and Guessand are half decent signings but time will tell. At least Elliot and Sancho are ‘premier league’ fit and can slot straight in. Lindelof was pants for Madchester, I hope he becomes a rugged battler for us when called upon.
Keeping Kamara, Digne, Youri was good. Not losing Martinez is also good but the copybook is certainly blotted. Emery now needs to settle them all back down and start focussing on being hard to play against.
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Disappointing and confusing window all round. The Emi farce needs to be sorted ASAP, absolutely ridiculous. And I thought the point was to get rid of the wages of Donk/Moreno etc, and yet we get more potential deadwood of Lindehof on a reported £112k a week and Sancho on considerably more. Baffling. Elliot and Guessand all good there tbh. 2 players surplus at Man Utd and one at Liverpool suggests not much global scouting going on?
Agree with a lot of that BUT, Lindehof will cost us £12m over the 2 years, we wouldn't have been able to get an up and coming kid in for that kind of package so, whilst it isn't anything to get the juices flowing, its alright as a deal for a back up. Sancho, less so.
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The lack of a right back is baffling. My only assumption is that he rates Garcia and he’ll get game time when he is fit.
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Remember when we used to bitch about how many Chelsea would have out on loan, we have sent 18 out.
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And I thought the point was to get rid of the wages of Donk/Moreno etc, and yet we get more potential deadwood of Lindehof on a reported £112k a week and Sancho on considerably more.
Indeed.
3/10 for the window as a whole, and that's prob being generous.
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2.5/10. Very few positives and my love for the game has taken a hit too
Our squads weaker, and more unsettled then at end of last season, and everyone of our "peers" bar Newcastle has significantly strengthened Dont really see any player as an upgrade on what we had before, bar Bizot.
Elliot and Guessard may turn out to be great signings (pretty excited by Elliot), and combined with Sancho they give Unai something to work with.
But equally, we have lost Bailey and Ramsey, who are both proven at this level (if inconsitent) and sent back the Chelsea CB, Asceniso and Rashford. Similarly we didnt really generate enough money to "sort" anything for the long term. I thought we would flog Bailey for some serious money to Saudi, and then one of Ramsay or Emi too.
I hope the club have spent what little money we could wisely. We need some players to really step up - and if anyone can support them than Uani can.
It feels like we have well and truley been put back in our place, but I am still over the moon with the setup we have, and dont think the club could have done much else. We've been put in an artifical "desperate to sell" situationm and this is what will happen.
So in short - fuck modern football and UTV
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Could have been better but it could also have been a lot lot worse.
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Elliot will be our best signing since Rogers.
Sancho will be better than Bailey was last season.
Lindelof is ok backup
Bizot is ok backup
Guessand will need time to settle, possibly impact from the bench
Window, 4 out of 10. Still no real competition up front or at right back, and we've got a large slab of Argentine beef that needs taming.
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I'm happier than I was a few days ago and would give a 6 out of 10. Against the backdrop of us fucking up the SCR compliance which led to the UEFA sanctions we're now under, I'd suspect the club hierarchy is reasonably happy with how its turned out as they have shifted some deadwood (Coutinho etc). I think there will probably be a debrief and some words will be had with Sawiris/Edens but hopefully that will settle down quickly.
I think the biggest issue for Monchi/Vidagnay and to an extent Emery in the immediate term is relations with the playing squad. McGinn and Mings as our longest serving and most senior players have raised a few doubts about how this has been approached and Watkins and Rogers haven't looked happy either. The forced sale of Ramsey and then Martinez being a fucking idiot has really shown some cracks in squad unity. I'm sure that can be sorted out but it needs to be quick once everyone's back from international duty, one of those clear the air team meetings where all the frustrations and annoyance can come out and be put to bed.
The squad looks ok but not as good as it did on February the 1st.
GK: Martinez, Bizot (Bizot>Olsen)
RB: Cash, Garcia
RCB: Konsa, Lindelof (Disasi=Lindelof)
LCB: Torres, Mings
LB: Digne, Maatsen
CM: Onana, Kamara, McGinn, Tielemans, Barkley, Bogarde
AM: Sancho, Rogers, Buendia, Elliott (Sancho=Bailey, Elliott<Asensio, Buendia<ramsey)
ST: Watkins, Malen, Guessand (Guessand<Rashford)
1 upgrade, 2 like for likes and 4 downgrades at this stage.
23 players for the UEFA A List, I assume we can put them all on there.
Unai, do your thing.
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Assuming Elliott and Sancho have signed, 5/10. Which is about 3/10 higher than I expected yesterday.
Exactly where I'm at. I couldn't possibly give it more than 5. Hopefully Sancho can prove us all wrong.
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It could have been worse. We haven't had our squad cherry-picked by clubs in the Champions League, we haven't lost any of our big stars, we've signed some cover and a potential name. Given the situation I don't know how much more we could have done.
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It will drop again if Martinez continues to act the twat and doesn’t play. Which, I'd say, is unlikely. But you can't entirely rule it out based on his mad personality.
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I think we’ve probably done as well as we could have expected given the circumstances.
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It could have been worse. We haven't had our squad cherry-picked by clubs in the Champions League, we haven't lost any of our big stars, we've signed some cover and a potential name. Given the situation I don't know how much more we could have done.
The last sentence made everything massively complex. It started at Old Trafford. The limp way in which we played and then the salt of the disallowed goal blew up all our summer plans. It made it impossible to really push on. The window has been ok but could be a lot better. What’s affected how we feel about the window is how we’ve started the season. That’s shaken all of us.
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Where has it come from that Lindelof is on £120k a week? He was without a club and as far as I can tell not a huge amount of competition for his signature. I’d be surprised if he is on much more than half that, especially given that one of our first choice CBs has just agreed to a pay cut.
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I'm glad it's over and hopeful Unai can work his magic with what he's got now.
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No chance we're paying Lindelof close to what he was on at ManU imo. My guess would be a million signing on fee and 50k a week.
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Under the prevailing circumstances this is a good window. We ned to consolidate and push on forward.
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I feel better today than I did last night, thinking it was Lindelof in and Emi out.
Elliot I feel will be good business, don’t know a lot about him other than player of the tournament for the U21’s. But my Scouse mate reckons he’ll be brilliant for us and we have a cracking player on our hands, I’ll take it.
Sancho could be great or a disaster, let’s see what Unai can instil in him.
5/10 I guess.
That's how I feel too. The financial restrictions were probably tighter than we realised, and the necessary sales didn't happen as quickly as they would have liked, even if we did get rid of some dead wood. Just glad it's over.
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Did we actually sign Fletcher Boyd in the end? Be mad if we signed a 17-year-old and haven't immediately loaned him out.
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A mate of mine just told me that as the window closes, Unai's net spend since he joined us is just £40m - which is frankly incredible across six transfer windows. Obviously we're doing what we can within the financial restrictions we're stuck with, but I think if someone had told me when he joined he'd spend £60m net over six windows, I wouldn't have expected a squad of this quality. It's pretty incredible all things considered.
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Did we actually sign Fletcher Boyd in the end? Be mad if we signed a 17-year-old and haven't immediately loaned him out.
Yes, pretty sure I got a notification about it.
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Ta.
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Not sure where to stick this so I’ll plonk it here:
https://archive.is/2025.09.01-215420/https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-15055389/Aston-Villa-transfer-news-Emiliano-Martinez.html
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Elliot will be our best signing since Rogers.
Sancho will be better than Bailey was last season.
Lindelof is ok backup
Bizot is ok backup
Guessand will need time to settle, possibly impact from the bench
Window, 4 out of 10. Still no real competition up front or at right back, and we've got a large slab of Argentine beef that needs taming.
I love Argentine beef, best in the world. Other than that, as usual, spot on, Ozz. We've kept the band together despite the ridiculous financial limitations. 6/10 from me. Obviously I'm ignoring all those players we signed who'll never get to play for us. Why?
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Glad it's over and the dust can settle. Time for a reset and the game at Everton will hopefully feel like the first game of the season.
Feels like very much a short-term fix rather than part of a longer-term plan though and that the can has been kicked down the road for another season. We've seen one of the problems that strategy brings though with having to try and replace Rashford, Asensio and Disasi in this window.
As for who has come in today, Lindelof is an experienced back-up who should fine in the Europa League, Elliott should bring a bit of energy and goodness knows what we can expect from Sancho. It's not an inspiring cohort to be perfectly honest and I think expectations will have to be adjusted accordingly. The fact that we have emerged from another transfer window not addressing the glaring issue at RB is astounding really though.
So it's over to Unai Emery to do what he can with what he now has. As I say, I think expectations have to be adjusted given the way the summer has gone and the Europa League has taken on added importance now.
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I’m a 6.5. Mainly because we did it with with one hand tied behind our back. We came out of it ok in the end. The Martinez thing is worrying me though. If he’s been agitating for a move or even just acting the big bollocks around the place you can see why things might have tense. And why harmony in the square might be impacted and especially in defence. Everyone can see he hasn’t been at his sharpest. That needs to change fast if we are to get back on track.
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Nobody knows exactly what the score was with Martinez. The one thing for sure is that Manchester United will be painted in the best possible light and we'll be the bad/incompetent guys.*
*That's two things.
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(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GzxRpB_bAAAZ24B?format=jpg&name=4096x4096)
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GzxRqkXa4AE9d3x?format=jpg&name=4096x4096)
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Our low net spend is a bit of a red herring. We loaned in two top-class* players in January and have done the same today. Three of them on higher wages than most players transferred to PL clubs this summer.
*on paper
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So, if we are in profit there's no reason why our new players can't be included in the UEFA squad.
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Most other clubs loan players. We also loaned them in January in part because we couldn’t go and buy players.
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So, if we are in profit there's no reason why our new players can't be included in the UEFA squad.
Oh I’m sure UEFA will find a way to make sure that’s not the case. Watch that poor fucker Malen miss out.
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I’m trying to be balanced but am certainly not as generous as some have been.
Clubs that finished on a high last season have had problems with recruitment: Tottenham, Palace and Newcastle. All clubs trying to improve. So we’ve not been alone in some of the problems that we’ve been facing.
But this summer is definitely the first time we’ve been reactive rather proactive; trimming the fat and waiting on what some of our players may or may not do in terms of moving seems to be the modus operandi. I don’t think that has helped with morale at all and it also means that we’re in that position of buying, clubs know what we have because we’re selling first.
Obviously the financial rules are the main restriction but what I don’t understand is the club not drawing a line in the sand at a certain point and saying ,’if after X date a move hasn’t materialized, then you’re staying put’. Let’s not forget, the bulk of the squad is one which has got us to, and then almost got us champions league football two seasons in a row but it is an ageing, largely one paced side as well which we’ve not started to alter.
To me it seems clear that the biggest problem is that since signing Kamara, we have failed to strategically sign a player that has improved the first 11 as a defacto starter. I’m factoring Tielemans in as being Dougie’s replacement and Rodgers being a signing who’s major rise surprised everyone and that he wasn’t a strategic signing for the first 11; he just quickly emerged to become a starter. The previous missteps are coming back to haunt us now.
It’s clear that once you hit a certain point in your progress, the type of signing to take you to the next level can become difficult and that’s definitely a contributing factor. But the real problem, is that with the financial restrictions being what they are, we have been quite wasteful.
We simply cannot afford to being spending £50m on Onana and him not instantly improving our first 11. To be just an option for certain games or one for the future once he’s learnt Emery’s system, is failed recruitment for our current needs. Same with Maatsen, Malen. Sancho could well fall into that camp. Even as a loanee he is very expensive and it’s bizarre we’re doing Man Utd a favour at 80% of his wages right near the end of the window. Elliott I’ve no idea on. Lindelof is the type of signing that no matter what, we should have moved away from now and reeks of desperation. Bizot is a smart pickup and improvement on Olsen.
1/10.
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Sancho did apparently turn down other clubs and we were desperate for an attacking option so I can see why Yanited drove a hard bargain.
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I’m trying to be balanced but am certainly not as generous as some have been.
Clubs that finished on a high last season have had problems with recruitment: Tottenham, Palace and Newcastle. All clubs trying to improve. So we’ve not been alone in some of the problems that we’ve been facing.
But this summer is definitely the first time we’ve been reactive rather proactive; trimming the fat and waiting on what some of our players may or may not do in terms of moving seems to be the modus operandi. I don’t think that has helped with morale at all and it also means that we’re in that position of buying, clubs know what we have because we’re selling first.
Obviously the financial rules are the main restriction but what I don’t understand is the club not drawing a line in the sand at a certain point and saying ,’if after X date a move hasn’t materialized, then you’re staying put’. Let’s not forget, the bulk of the squad is one which has got us to, and then almost got us champions league football two seasons in a row but it is an ageing, largely one paced side as well which we’ve not started to alter.
To me it seems clear that the biggest problem is that since signing Kamara, we have failed to strategically sign a player that has improved the first 11 as a defacto starter. I’m factoring Tielemans in as being Dougie’s replacement and Rodgers being a signing who’s major rise surprised everyone and that he wasn’t a strategic signing for the first 11; he just quickly emerged to become a starter. The previous missteps are coming back to haunt us now.
It’s clear that once you hit a certain point in your progress, the type of signing to take you to the next level can become difficult and that’s definitely a contributing factor. But the real problem, is that with the financial restrictions being what they are, we have been quite wasteful.
We simply cannot afford to being spending £50m on Onana and him not instantly improving our first 11. To be just an option for certain games or one for the future once he’s learnt Emery’s system, is failed recruitment for our current needs. Same with Maatsen, Malen. Sancho could well fall into that camp. Even as a loanee he is very expensive and it’s bizarre we’re doing Man Utd a favour at 80% of his wages right near the end of the window. Elliott I’ve no idea on. Lindelof is the type of signing that no matter what, we should have moved away from now and reeks of desperation. Bizot is a smart pickup and improvement on Olsen.
1/10.
Agreewith a lot of this. We all know about the tight financial situation, but that means when you spend a significant amount of money when you are in that situation, you need those players to really make an impact. The likes of Onana and Malen just haven't done that.
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(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GzxRpB_bAAAZ24B?format=jpg&name=4096x4096)
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GzxRqkXa4AE9d3x?format=jpg&name=4096x4096)
Chelsea with the sorcery. Impressive transfer operation, although I'm still not sure they have the defensive signings to challenge for the title.
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I'm happier than I was a few days ago and would give a 6 out of 10. Against the backdrop of us fucking up the SCR compliance which led to the UEFA sanctions we're now under, I'd suspect the club hierarchy is reasonably happy with how its turned out as they have shifted some deadwood (Coutinho etc). I think there will probably be a debrief and some words will be had with Sawiris/Edens but hopefully that will settle down quickly.
I think the biggest issue for Monchi/Vidagnay and to an extent Emery in the immediate term is relations with the playing squad. McGinn and Mings as our longest serving and most senior players have raised a few doubts about how this has been approached and Watkins and Rogers haven't looked happy either. The forced sale of Ramsey and then Martinez being a fucking idiot has really shown some cracks in squad unity. I'm sure that can be sorted out but it needs to be quick once everyone's back from international duty, one of those clear the air team meetings where all the frustrations and annoyance can come out and be put to bed.
The squad looks ok but not as good as it did on February the 1st.
GK: Martinez, Bizot (Bizot>Olsen)
RB: Cash, Garcia
RCB: Konsa, Lindelof (Disasi=Lindelof)
LCB: Torres, Mings
LB: Digne, Maatsen
CM: Onana, Kamara, McGinn, Tielemans, Barkley, Bogarde
AM: Sancho, Rogers, Buendia, Elliott (Sancho=Bailey, Elliott<Asensio, Buendia<ramsey)
ST: Watkins, Malen, Guessand (Guessand<Rashford)
1 upgrade, 2 like for likes and 4 downgrades at this stage.
23 players for the UEFA A List, I assume we can put them all on there.
Unai, do your thing.
23 for the A List? Who are the two homegrowns?