Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine

Heroes & Villains => Heroes Discussion => Topic started by: chrisw1 on September 30, 2022, 10:43:06 AM

Title: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on September 30, 2022, 10:43:06 AM
Ashley Preece has done an article on Purslow's meeting with the supports trust, you can read here https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/aston-villa-news-meeting-fans-25143927 and I've also pasted below (no idea how they shoehorn 'shock' into the headline):

Latest Aston Villa news via BirminghamLive brings you a detailed look at last night’s all-important Aston Villa Supporters’ Trust meeting with Christian Purslow

Aston Villa’s chief executive officer Christian Purslow was on hand to answer questions last night at the latest supporters’ trust meeting. It’s the first time this season that the man in charge of running Villa on a day-to-day basis sat down with the club’s fans at Villa Park.

According to those in attendance, Purslow admitted that the club didn’t see the Bournemouth result - or performance - coming on the opening day, while the start to the season had been a little bit disappointing given Villa’s two wins, a draw and four defeats from their first seven Premier League matches. Here’s the main takeaways from last night’s Villa supporters’ trust meeting…

STADIUM PLANS
The North Stand redevelopment dominated much of the discussion last night with Villa hopeful of being given the green light from Birmingham City Council “pretty soon” to begin construction work at the end of the current season. Purslow, meanwhile, had been in Downing Street on Thursday speaking to government officials to help seek support and much-needed improvement to rail and road networks around the vicinity of Villa Park. Improving train stations and travel for supporters remains “crucial” to Villa’s grand stadium plans given capacity is set to rise by almost 7,500 once work is complete on the new North Stand.

Elsewhere, Purslow provided a glimpse at what’s planned for the Holte End with the club looking at introducing ‘safe standing’ - or rail seating - to help take capacity upto 60,000 later down the line. It was detailed that rail seating would allow 1.8 people in the Holte for every 1 supporter currently.

NEW BADGE
According to Purslow, Villa are now down to “the last few” designs as the club looks set to release a new crest as we edge closer to Villa’s 150th anniversary in 2024. It’s understood that the ‘AV’ will be replaced by ‘Aston Villa’ with fans set to vote on their preferred badge when the final few designs are whittled down. Having seen the designs, Trust members said Purslow “loves all of them”.

RECRUITMENT
Those in attendance yesterday evening also said that, despite a “stuttering” start to the campaign, Purslow believes Villa will start to pick up some form across the next nine games. As well as Villa’s style of play being very much a work in progress, it was also detailed that Purslow was happy with how the summer transfer window played out despite struggling to offload some of those on the fringes. The injuries to Diego Carlos and Boubacar Kamara have, of course, been unfortunate, while the remit moving forward will be one in, one out with a real emphasis on quality signings that will instantly improve the first XI.

On Diego Carlos, it was revealed that Villa had actually struck a deal in Sevilla on the day of their 1-1 draw with Burnley on May 19 which, in turn, allowed them to "get ahead of the game" with Champions League clubs left behind as Villa wrapped up that £26million transfer.

Elsewhere, the £20million sale of Carney Chukwuemeka came to light, with Purslow telling fans that the club “moved heaven and earth” to keep the England youth star but, ultimately, he wanted out. The CEO also said that he remains "very hopeful" Douglas Luiz will sign a new deal given the uncertainty around his future.

A Villa fan at last night’s meeting told us: “The overriding message was that Villa need to become self-funding and a bigger stadium will help us achieve that. Purslow stressed that the owners, Wes and Nassef, remain massively all in.”



Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Bad English on September 30, 2022, 11:36:12 AM
Nothing about the manager?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on September 30, 2022, 12:45:24 PM
Nothing about the manager?
The invisible elephant in the room!
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on September 30, 2022, 12:51:38 PM
Nothing about the manager?
Gerrard barely got a mention all night. I think there was a mutual understanding that there wasn't a lot that could be said about how things were going at the moment, other than we've had a disappointing start and that we hope we've turned a corner. Not particularly satisfactory, but I don't know what else I was hoping for. Managers tend to be backed until they are sacked. He did mention, not specifically to do with Gerrard, that his job was to step in when we weren't seeing "continual improvement".

The Carney situation seemed a bit more complex than in the article above - Purslow all but said that there was a lot of outside influence at work there. It wasn't about money or playing time, I think there were just a lot of people that wanted to cash in on Carney and he was swept along with it.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on September 30, 2022, 01:37:24 PM
Nothing about the manager?
Gerrard barely got a mention all night. I think there was a mutual understanding that there wasn't a lot that could be said about how things were going at the moment, other than we've had a disappointing start and that we hope we've turned a corner. Not particularly satisfactory, but I don't know what else I was hoping for. Managers tend to be backed until they are sacked. He did mention, not specifically to do with Gerrard, that his job was to step in when we weren't seeing "continual improvement".

The Carney situation seemed a bit more complex than in the article above - Purslow all but said that there was a lot of outside influence at work there. It wasn't about money or playing time, I think there were just a lot of people that wanted to cash in on Carney and he was swept along with it.

I agree with the bold bit, I never thought him going was about wages or game time but rather that there was a bit of a'jam today' mentality where people around him didn't want to risk him failing before they'd had their big payday. I don't think anyone advising him has had his interests at heart at any point in the process, which is both really sad but also risks ruining one of the potential superstars of English football going forward.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on September 30, 2022, 03:25:16 PM
Agree paul e, These are very impressionable Young Men with very little real world experience. I met an ex agent a few months ago. He was telling me how the Agents will pretty much say anything to win a new client and their stomping grounds are the academies. They out compete each other by name dropping, promising the earth and fully focus on getting the most money they can in the shortest possible timescales. He was saying that rarely do they consider or even care about what is best for the player. Interestingly he told me the Agents are always striping each other up by nicking each others clients. Its a real shit show.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dcdavecollett on October 01, 2022, 01:39:15 AM
That came across strongly in the recent series on Kestrel Palace.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 01, 2022, 02:34:39 AM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 03, 2022, 11:01:14 AM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 03, 2022, 11:31:37 AM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.

I appreciate that, but as a founder and life member it might be nice to be told about their AGM.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 03, 2022, 11:56:32 AM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.

I appreciate that, but as a founder and life member it might be nice to be told about their AGM.

Yeah, that's a pretty big failing. I know emails got sent out because I got one, but I'm not sure how good the membership system is that they use (presumably awful as they're updating at the moment). They haven't got any social media presence or any other way of communicating with members, which is no way to run an organisation.

Hopefully things improve now, with more people getting involved. I felt sorry for Mo the other night, he's trying his best but just has too much to do.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Drummond on October 03, 2022, 12:22:04 PM
Even the homepage doesn't work and many other pages though some are still there.

It's a mess.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Stu on October 03, 2022, 12:30:08 PM
I remember going to the first ST meeting at VP. I asked if there was was any chance of a star on the badge to commemorate the EC win (I was a much younger man at this time) and some card a few seats up in front sarcastically replied that perhaps we could have a crown on it instead as Prince William is a fan, trying to get a laugh going. I just thought it was unnecessary and never went again. And anyway, said bloke went on to start poncing on about “The M5 corridor” and asking why Villa weren’t taking advantage of a potential fanbase in Bristol lmao. Clown.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Drummond on October 03, 2022, 01:52:47 PM
I like the Crown idea...

We could have one of those Royal Warrant things..

Aston Villa FC
by Appointment to HM the King/Prince of Wales.
Purveyors of Association Football.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Bad English on October 03, 2022, 06:27:22 PM
No thank you. He can be a fan if he likes but I would not like us to be a kowtowing to "royalty" club.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: pauliewalnuts on October 03, 2022, 07:46:22 PM
No thank you. He can be a fan if he likes but I would not like us to be a kowtowing to "royalty" club.

I'd go further.

Let's have a guillotine on the badge.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: olaftab on October 04, 2022, 09:09:21 PM
Nothing about the manager?
No but Purslow said we have the 7th most valuable squad in the Premier League. At nearly £400 million. He repeated that about 5 times so I expect him to be aware that our Steven is wasting our assets.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 04, 2022, 09:14:20 PM
7th highest wage-payers too?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Steve67 on October 04, 2022, 10:09:21 PM
Nothing about the manager?
No but Purslow said we have the 7th most valuable squad in the Premier League. At nearly £400 million. He repeated that about 5 times so I expect him to be aware that our Steven is wasting our assets.

So, he is saying that we are massively underperforming then and Gerrard needs to sort it. Sharpish!
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: DaveK on October 04, 2022, 11:34:36 PM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.

I appreciate that, but as a founder and life member it might be nice to be told about their AGM.

Are you not on the mailing list Dave? I had a notice and even a reminder emailed to me a few days before.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 04, 2022, 11:41:06 PM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.

I appreciate that, but as a founder and life member it might be nice to be told about their AGM.

Are you not on the mailing list Dave? I had a notice and even a reminder emailed to me a few days before.

I got it sorted - they were using an old email address and hadn't updated their records.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Rory on October 05, 2022, 12:28:23 AM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.

I appreciate that, but as a founder and life member it might be nice to be told about their AGM.

Are you not on the mailing list Dave? I had a notice and even a reminder emailed to me a few days before.

I got it sorted - they were using an old email address and hadn't updated their records.

I think they were deliberately excluding you, Dave. Negative influence and all that.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: amfy on October 05, 2022, 09:12:11 AM
Nice to know that this meeting happened. It would have been nicer to be told in advance, but you can't have everything. 

One of the things that was discussed at length at the Trust AGM part of the evening was that they are seriously under-resourced. Mo has been running it pretty much by himself for months, which is unsustainable, and he admitted himself that things are starting to slip - he needs help. Quite a few have volunteered to help him out, so hopefully things will improve soon.

I appreciate that, but as a founder and life member it might be nice to be told about their AGM.

Are you not on the mailing list Dave? I had a notice and even a reminder emailed to me a few days before.

I got 3 emails at every stage. I got 3 sets of minutes today!
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 05, 2022, 09:12:52 AM
So did I.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: olaftab on October 05, 2022, 11:56:59 AM
As has been said Trust are struggling at the moment. Is there anything we can do via the power of this forum to propagate their work and grow membership and therefore more active contributors?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 05, 2022, 12:16:39 PM
Surely they suffer enough without miserable bastids from H&V joining their ranks?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 05, 2022, 03:55:43 PM
Surely they suffer enough without miserable bastids from H&V joining their ranks?

It was the miserable bastards from H&V who virtually started it.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 05, 2022, 04:30:14 PM
Wasn't everybody's favourite self-publicist HH involved with it at some point?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Clampy on October 05, 2022, 04:36:42 PM
Wasn't everybody's favourite self-publicist HH involved with it at some point?

He blocked me on Twitter a few years back.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 05, 2022, 04:59:20 PM
Wasn't everybody's favourite self-publicist HH involved with it at some point?

He blocked me on Twitter a few years back.

Stick it on your cv.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 05, 2022, 05:20:35 PM
I'm sure I joined the trust as a life member many years ago, was sent a badge, then never heard from them again.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Clampy on October 05, 2022, 05:21:36 PM
I'm still waiting for my Chipper Club badge.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 05, 2022, 05:23:42 PM
I'm sure I joined the trust as a life member many years ago, was sent a badge, then never heard from them again.
Same (I think)  Can't even remember the badge.

Tbh, the trust seems entirely irrelevant now.  I'm not sure they represent the fans at all. Just the thoughts of the handful still involved.  Surely the FSG groups have more input now?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: villadelph on October 05, 2022, 05:29:03 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."

Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 05, 2022, 05:30:47 PM
I'm sure I joined the trust as a life member many years ago, was sent a badge, then never heard from them again.
Same (I think)  Can't even remember the badge.

Tbh, the trust seems entirely irrelevant now.  I'm not sure they represent the fans at all. Just the thoughts of the handful still involved.  Surely the FSG groups have more input now?

I agree. They had laudable aims of supporter representation, but I think in the Premier League era that's not a realistic target. The club seem to be doing the right thing with regular meetings with people like Dave from H&V and the other supporter sites, which is about as much as we can probably expect.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 05, 2022, 05:43:30 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."



This is exactly as it should be, the alternative is to turn into Chelsea/ManCity/PSG and just be a plaything unti lthe owners get bored. Self-sustainability has to be the goal for all clubs.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 05, 2022, 06:53:30 PM
Yeah but we all want to see Villa win something before we die so could we not turn into those clubs just for a bit?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: DeKuip on October 05, 2022, 07:33:28 PM
Yeah but we all want to see Villa win something before we die so could we not turn into those clubs just for a bit?
What’s the matter with you, we won a game the other week didn’t we?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 05, 2022, 07:48:06 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."



This is exactly as it should be, the alternative is to turn into Chelsea/ManCity/PSG and just be a plaything unti lthe owners get bored. Self-sustainability has to be the goal for all clubs.
To be honest I was hoping our owners were up for a bit more of a punt than that.

It may be possible to sustain and elite team once you are there, in all the competitions and filling a 60k stadium, but to bridge that gap whilst balancing the books will be almost impossible.  I think we can say goodye to dreams of Poch and keeping up with Newcastle's progress if thats the philosophy already.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: mrfuse on October 05, 2022, 08:00:02 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."



This is exactly as it should be, the alternative is to turn into Chelsea/ManCity/PSG and just be a plaything unti lthe owners get bored. Self-sustainability has to be the goal for all clubs.
To be honest I was hoping our owners were up for a bit more of a punt than that.

It may be possible to sustain and elite team once you are there, in all the competitions and filling a 60k stadium, but to bridge that gap whilst balancing the books will be almost impossible.  I think we can say goodye to dreams of Poch and keeping up with Newcastle's progress if thats the philosophy already.

I agree it doesn't shout breaking into the top 7 does it?

I'd be quite happy to be some rich owners plaything. As we have seen with a lot of these Clubs when the owner does get bored theirs always another that wants to do the same again.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 05, 2022, 08:01:30 PM
We just need to get better at cashing in on players who really won't improve us that much more.

Case point was just hanging onto El Ghazi needlessly after his double figures season in 20/21. Surely could've got 10-15m for him, instead he goes for peanuts.

Luiz could've gone for 20m this summer but bizarrely we seemed to casually assume he'd just sign a new deal. Perhaps we can still get 15m for him in January from Arsenal.

McGinn is someone with every passing week of a player we should've sold 12 months ago. As he nears 30 his value will start to drop (cue him signing a new 5 year deal next week).

Think if Gerrard had got all his targets we'd have sold Mings for 30m to someone like Leicester or West Ham. Can't afford to do that now.

Ollie is also in McGinn category of two years in we know what he can and can't do at prem level so optimum time to cash in rather than hand him new deal.

Rather that than having to sell our best academy prospect every summer. Won't be breaking the top bracket anytime soon if we sell Ramsey for 50m + next summer.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 05, 2022, 08:56:03 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."



This is exactly as it should be, the alternative is to turn into Chelsea/ManCity/PSG and just be a plaything unti lthe owners get bored. Self-sustainability has to be the goal for all clubs.
To be honest I was hoping our owners were up for a bit more of a punt than that.

It may be possible to sustain and elite team once you are there, in all the competitions and filling a 60k stadium, but to bridge that gap whilst balancing the books will be almost impossible.  I think we can say goodye to dreams of Poch and keeping up with Newcastle's progress if thats the philosophy already.

I agree it doesn't shout breaking into the top 7 does it?

I'd be quite happy to be some rich owners plaything. As we have seen with a lot of these Clubs when the owner does get bored theirs always another that wants to do the same again.

Like Xia?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: villadelph on October 05, 2022, 09:14:02 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."

This is exactly as it should be, the alternative is to turn into Chelsea/ManCity/PSG and just be a plaything unti lthe owners get bored. Self-sustainability has to be the goal for all clubs.

Unfortunately, self-sufficiency doesn't come easy at our current stature. First and foremost, if you have a dream of competing in Europe (and advertised as such when you took over the club) it will take significant investment until consistent success is achieved. Recently, we seem to swing and miss on players who are teetering on club record transfer fees, and have them coached up by a self-obsessed scouser who has no business managing at this level.

Self-sufficiency is very dependent on commercial revenue and we aren't even close to the market share that 5-6 clubs in this country have internationally. I think we could get there, but again, it would take consistent success and an increasingly plastic fanbase to accommodate it. Beyond that, I don't think the stadium renovations will draw any new supporters, but it will get applause from those who are already there week in and week out.

Self-sufficiency also depends on outgoing transfers.. which, for whatever reason, we seem to get right more often with our academy players but never our past purchases.

If true, for something like this to even be talked about 3½ - 4 years after the takeover is pretty underwhelming.. considering the Milwaukee Bucks annual 22/23 payroll is $185M. Milwaukee, WI isn't exactly a basketball mecca or a destination city. If a championship can be won there, than the league (or top four) can be won in Birmingham.

Personally, if we are going to force our way into the European elite or even the top 6 domestically then we will need a much better recruitment policy, continual transfer spending and infrastructure investment.

We better not revert back to a sell to buy policy. Self-sufficiency doesn't guarantee anything - look at Manure. A club that only uses funds generated from the club, until whiny fans force ownerships hand. None of us want that.

Again, to the current owners and potential future owners, move us forward or move along.

Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Beard82 on October 05, 2022, 09:21:53 PM
The thing is smart spending and appointments are needed to progress if we are to take a pragmatic approach to spending.  Unfortunately, we haven't achieved that. 

The strategy is completely opposite to what we are doing - we've appointed a "cheque book" manager, who bomb squads players who have value and replaces young talent with also rans in the squad

doesn't massively add up
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 06, 2022, 12:12:47 AM
The next step is obviously to appoint a manager who is proven at overachieving with what he inherits and skillfully builds on that when signing 2-3 players in the following summers.

Pochettino at Southampton and Spurs is pretty much the perfect premier league example of this. Gerrard is about as far away as possible from it so it's up to the board now, get the right manager and we can accelerate back up the league after stalled progress of last year.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Scott Nielsen on October 06, 2022, 04:29:31 AM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."



This is exactly as it should be, the alternative is to turn into Chelsea/ManCity/PSG and just be a plaything unti lthe owners get bored. Self-sustainability has to be the goal for all clubs.
To be honest I was hoping our owners were up for a bit more of a punt than that.

It may be possible to sustain and elite team once you are there, in all the competitions and filling a 60k stadium, but to bridge that gap whilst balancing the books will be almost impossible.  I think we can say goodye to dreams of Poch and keeping up with Newcastle's progress if thats the philosophy already.

I agree it doesn't shout breaking into the top 7 does it?

I'd be quite happy to be some rich owners plaything. As we have seen with a lot of these Clubs when the owner does get bored theirs always another that wants to do the same again.

Like Xia?

No, because he wasn't rich.

Self-sufficiency is a laudable sentiment though, Paul, I agree. But we are unlikely to win anything again given how the rest of the football world works. I doubt we'll even get to play in Europe again under a self-sufficiency strategy. Disappointing but maybe not so surprising given the low net spend in our recent windows.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Rory on October 06, 2022, 04:42:35 AM
Personally, I'd rather never win, or compete to win, anything ever again than follow the Chelsea/Man City model.

The modern, money-based industry that football has become has killed any semblance of competition, and I'd prefer that we go to the wall rather than become part of the cancer that is eating the game alive.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: sid1964 on October 06, 2022, 06:37:37 AM
If the idea of the club owners is to sell to buy, then I would think that each summer that we will need to sell 1 or 2 of our stars! to be able to buy a couple of players - you are not going to be able to buy many players by selling our squad fillers.

You start to sell your better players you are only heading one way, and that is the annual struggle to survive

No top manager is going to come to our club with that policy.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: markeeeebeeee2005 on October 06, 2022, 08:43:50 AM
Sell to buy is fine if you have anything decent to sell. We currently have depreciating assets, I’d say largely down to the coaching.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: simboy on October 06, 2022, 08:56:28 AM
Surely the key to a “sell to buy” policy has to be underpinned by a strong youth development policy.

We seemed to have cornered the market in local (midlands) talent a few years ago. Not so much now.

Grealish and Chuck (£125 mill for an outlay on Chucky of very little) would appear to be the way, even if it left a bitter taste.

Having identified the potential (I suspect with Grealish) we got the best local scouts in and took in the best young talent from across Europe.

  I’m not sure we have the same drive as we had under Smith/Delaney to do this now. There appears to be a policy shift of buying established peaking (or waning in the case of Courtinho) stars under this regime.

Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Abbeyfealeavfc on October 06, 2022, 08:59:56 AM
Sell to buy is fine if you have anything decent to sell. We currently have depreciating assets, I’d say largely down to the coaching.

I wouldn't say that Emi Martinez was a depreciating asset. He's exactly the type of player our current ceo would have in mind with what appears to be a new transfer model. This wouldn't fill me with confidence of continual progress.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 06, 2022, 09:05:06 AM
Personally, I'd rather never win, or compete to win, anything ever again than follow the Chelsea/Man City model.

The modern, money-based industry that football has become has killed any semblance of competition, and I'd prefer that we go to the wall rather than become part of the cancer that is eating the game alive.
You don't have to go quite to City levels, although Newcastle will and that's another hurdle tp overcome.

But we won't get to filling a 60k stadium and doing it more the Spurs Arsenal or Liverpool way with a one in one out policy.  You need to get there before you can try and be sustainable or close to susrtainable at the top.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: sid1964 on October 06, 2022, 09:14:11 AM
Will we have to wait to August 31st to see how much money we have raised through transfers out of the club to see who we can afford to buy?

If the current academy youngsters is the way forward, we may be waiting quite a few seasons before we see most of them in the first team

I agree there is not a chance of us filling a 50,000 seat stadium regularly if we are in the bottom half of the league.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 06, 2022, 09:14:44 AM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..

"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."
That sounds like they have thrown the towel in.
Since the new  owners we have had 2 opportunities to push for the Top end of the Table.
1.Build a team around Greasy.
2. Use the Greasy money to build the base of a team to compete for European places.

We blew the Greasy Money, hired Gerrard and now its survival football.


Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: cdbearsfan on October 06, 2022, 09:22:59 AM
Surely the key to a “sell to buy” policy has to be underpinned by a strong youth development policy.

We seemed to have cornered the market in local (midlands) talent a few years ago. Not so much now.

Grealish and Chuck (£125 mill for an outlay on Chucky of very little) would appear to be the way, even if it left a bitter taste.

Having identified the potential (I suspect with Grealish) we got the best local scouts in and took in the best young talent from across Europe.

  I’m not sure we have the same drive as we had under Smith/Delaney to do this now. There appears to be a policy shift of buying established peaking (or waning in the case of Courtinho) stars under this regime.

We've still kept on bringing in loads of young talent. You can't bring in under-18s from outside the UK any more but we have been nicking players from "Rangers", Chelsea, Hearts and Albion, off the top of my head.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Meanwood Villa on October 06, 2022, 09:36:41 AM
Personally, I'd rather never win, or compete to win, anything ever again than follow the Chelsea/Man City model.

The modern, money-based industry that football has become has killed any semblance of competition, and I'd prefer that we go to the wall rather than become part of the cancer that is eating the game alive.

To be honest it sounds like you need to find another sport to follow. I want Villa to be successful. Not by any means necessary, for example on reflection I think I would walk away if we were taken over by Saudi government or similar, but to be successful we need to spend shitloads of money. To me this is like Lerner again, they've come in and chucked comparatively large amounts of money around, seen it didn't get them where they wanted and jacked it in. If that quote from the trust is true then we are condemned to lower half finishes, at best, for the foreseeable. Grim.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: The Edge on October 06, 2022, 10:08:11 AM
The one in one out to balance the books policy will only work once we've established ourselves back amongst the very elite of football. Man City bought in Haaland relatatively cheap and sold Gabrielle Jesus in the process. They can be self sustained now but only because the huge investment was made previously to put them in that position. If our owners invest massively in the stadium at the expense of squad investment they should know that we will get 35k crowds in a 50/60k stadium. The 20k waiting list will disappear if we're constantly in the lower half of the table. The massive waiting list only came about because Villa fans everywhere we're excited at the prospect of us finally being able to compete for honours. Hopefully Purslow was talking about after we've established ourselves atte level. It needs clarifying by Mr Purslow.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 06, 2022, 10:16:20 AM
Good luck on getting someone like Poch to come when there's only self generated cash to spend. They've been great owners and obviously saved us from a huge mess, but it does look to me like their initial enthusiasm is on the wane. The summer transfer window after a bright start wasn't a good one, and wasn't nearly enough for us to kick on.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 06, 2022, 10:18:40 AM
The way I interpreted Purslow's comment about 'outs for ins' was more to do with the number of players in our squad than the cost. He did go on to say about we couldn't rely on the owners to pump in hundreds of millions indefinitely, but that doesn't necessarily mean that we can only buy players with the money we use from player sales - the club will hopefully be making money from plenty of other sources to become self sufficient to top that up.

None of that marries up with what we've been seeing under Gerrard though. We have been buying players (with the exception of Kamara) that will decrease in value purely based on their age, let alone their performances for us. We have not been giving any of our younger players game time, so there is little hope of increasing the value of any of them, and the players that would have increased in value have been underperforming recently. I think we missed a trick with Cash - if there was genuine interest in him we could have made a handsome profit there, and as good as he was for a period last season, he certainly wasn't irreplaceable. He hasn't started this season well, and I wouldn't imagine we would be able to get as big a price for him. One of my biggest problems with Gerrard is that none (or at least hardly any) of our players have played their best football under him. Everyone has got worse, and as such, decreased in value.

The more I think about it, the Gerrard appointment just feels at odds with everything we have been trying to do with the club. I just don't understand the thinking behind it.

I wouldn't worry too much about the academy - that is still a huge priority for the club. We've opened sites in Egypt and Senegal to attract talent from that part of the world as Brexit has made Europe almost impossible to work in for us. If the aim is to bring on players and then sell them for a big price to fund the first team, stretching the net into Africa seems a sensible tactic. Purslow was very proud of the fact that we have so many players out on loan at the moment - presumably each of those players could demand a transfer fee next summer if they're not going to be good enough for our first team.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: tony scott on October 06, 2022, 10:28:28 AM
The buy to sell policy is crazy, why did we the sanction the purchase of players who will have very little sell on value by the end of their contracts.  If this is the new reality, the appointment of Sean Dyce would be sensible.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: pauliewalnuts on October 06, 2022, 10:43:33 AM
I understand the sentiment around we can't just expect the owners to pour in money ad infinitum, revenue needs to be grown etc etc. All sensible, as is managing the squad properly.

But if it is that last point Purslow has hinted at, why is he persisting with a manager who has not improved a single member of that squad in his time here?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 06, 2022, 11:07:36 AM
Good luck on getting someone like Poch to come when there's only self generated cash to spend. They've been great owners and obviously saved us from a huge mess, but it does look to me like their initial enthusiasm is on the wane. The summer transfer window after a bright start wasn't a good one, and wasn't nearly enough for us to kick on.
It was the same message under Lerner, although it looks like we are now a more professionally run outfit than back then.
Its very difficult to tread water in business and football and that looks like what we will be attempting now.
Lets face it the transfer activity since we came up has been pretty meh. The rot set in dicking around at the Lensbury club and we have not recovered from that.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 06, 2022, 11:08:31 AM
It all seems a bit mundane. When we realised on that glorious day in 2018 that we'd won the New Owners Lottery, was sell to buy and hoping to finish eighth really what we expected five years on?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 06, 2022, 11:31:42 AM
It all seems a bit mundane. When we realised on that glorious day in 2018 that we'd won the New Owners Lottery, was sell to buy and hoping to finish eighth really what we expected five years on?
No, and I genuinely believe that was not their thoughts or motivation either.

If hanging around mid-table and trying to avoid a relegation scrap is it, then I would rather be in the Championship with lots more traditional Kick off times, less chance of humiliating defeats and more fun generally.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 06, 2022, 11:38:02 AM
To go back to the original topic, I think this is why it is important the Trust exists. There seem to be a few more decisions that the club is making at the moment that are starting to annoy some of us. We still seem to be heading in broadly the right direction, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't starting to become slightly concerned. And I say that as a huge fan of the owners.

I don't think the Trust has any actual power or sway over what the club does, but I sort of see them as like those pictures of police officers that you sometimes see in the window of petrol stations. If anything major happened they would be powerless to stop it, but maybe just the fact that they are there might prevent it from happening in the first place? The more members it has, and the more active they are, maybe the more the club will consider the impact on fans? I dunno - maybe I'm being naïve.

We have certainly hit a bit of a rut recently. Apathy seems to be creeping in everywhere, and it's becoming all too reminiscent of the last 25 years... I want some excitement back.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Nev on October 06, 2022, 11:47:52 AM
It all seems a bit mundane. When we realised on that glorious day in 2018 that we'd won the New Owners Lottery, was sell to buy and hoping to finish eighth really what we expected five years on?
No, and I genuinely believe that was not their thoughts or motivation either.

If hanging around mid-table and trying to avoid a relegation scrap is it, then I would rather be in the Championship with lots more traditional Kick off times, less chance of humiliating defeats and more fun generally.

Same here, my enthusiasm has plummeted this season. It has a lot to do with the fact that I can't see where we're going and the fact that "existing" has appeared to replace "progressing". I'm pinning my hopes on the fact that this is restricted to the abilities of the Manager rather than any intention from the owners. So we're reliant on the Managers ethos and methods suddenly clicking into place or him being replaced, the evidence would suggest the former is unlikely so that leads many to hope for the latter.

I've passed on the trip to Newton Heath but would've gone in January had we taken a larger allocation. Back then I was optimistic but now watching us feels a chore and not one to persuade me to put myself out on a school night.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Billy Walker on October 06, 2022, 11:56:14 AM
In terms of on-pitch matters, it feels like the Club has massively taken its eye off the ball over the past year or so (for the men's team, at least). Maybe this is because a lot of Purslow's focus has been on the new North Stand?  Whatever the reason, this is pretty disappointing and it feels we are steadily losing the momentum we built up over the past few years.  We don't seem to have any discernible strategy in terms of building a top class football team and the fact that we can't convince our best players to stay (JG, Chuk) is another disappointing indicator of a lack of desire to genuinely compete at the top. 

It's surprising because, looking at the way Wes Edens approaches things with the Bucks, at least, it is clear he is extremely competitive and driven to win.  Maybe the two owners have looked at the way football is structured with the glass ceiling of Champs League qualification and the unfair skewing of finances towards a six club cartel, and simply come to the conclusion that bobbing about in the top flight offers them the best bang for their buck?  Hopefully not.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 06, 2022, 12:00:19 PM
I agree to a point with Boozey. The need for supporter groups is as great as it's ever been. The big battles might not happen now but there is still a fight on for the soul of clubs like Villa. The people in charge might dream of fifty thousand customers, a heady mix of corporates and happy, smiling families clapping along merrily to the club song and saying prices rises are necessary for success, but there's still plenty of us mardyarses turning up. We can't poke our heads round the door at the AGM anymore but we can still speak up when something ain't right.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 06, 2022, 01:36:00 PM
I think there's 2 seperate points being smashed together fairly inelegantly on here.

Sell-to-buy is about not having 'waste' in the squad. We can't keep bringing in players and letting the people they've reaplaced hang around training on their own and providing nothing. I can't see how anyone would have a problem with that. It means a senior squad of 22-23 players with 5-6 talented kids making up the numbers as they get introduced. After a year or 2 the kids are either good enough to replace a senior squad player or we sell them for as much as we can and bring through the next in line. That means when you buy it's because that next in line isn't there and there's a need for an immediate injection of quality. I've said many times that signing 6-7 players every window is a shit way to run a club, if we're doing things properly it should be 2-3 players in and out from the main squad, supplemented with kids both ways as well.

Self-sustaining doesn't mean that we only spend what we make in transfers though, it means we try to only spend money we make from all revenue sources. In that model money in from the owners is targeted at growing revenue rather than supplementing the playing squad, so things like the work on the ground but also improving the facilities and scouting to ensure we're getting as much as possible from the players we have and the youth system. More importantly it means not skirting around FFP all the time and having to find excuses to get away with huge cash injections.

In both cases what Gerrard is doing doesn't really fit, which is why I can't see him lasting much longer, I like the idea of running the club properly, but it relies heavily on having good coaches at all levels.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: villadelph on October 06, 2022, 01:53:39 PM
I think there's 2 seperate points being smashed together fairly inelegantly on here.

Sell-to-buy is about not having 'waste' in the squad. We can't keep bringing in players and letting the people they've replaced hang around training on their own and providing nothing. I can't see how anyone would have a problem with that. It means a senior squad of 22-23 players with 5-6 talented kids making up the numbers as they get introduced. After a year or 2 the kids are either good enough to replace a senior squad player or we sell them for as much as we can and bring through the next in line. That means when you buy it's because that next in line isn't there and there's a need for an immediate injection of quality. I've said many times that signing 6-7 players every window is a shit way to run a club, if we're doing things properly it should be 2-3 players in and out from the main squad, supplemented with kids both ways as well.

Self-sustaining doesn't mean that we only spend what we make in transfers though, it means we try to only spend money we make from all revenue sources. In that model money in from the owners is targeted at growing revenue rather than supplementing the playing squad, so things like the work on the ground but also improving the facilities and scouting to ensure we're getting as much as possible from the players we have and the youth system. More importantly it means not skirting around FFP all the time and having to find excuses to get away with huge cash injections.

In both cases what Gerrard is doing doesn't really fit, which is why I can't see him lasting much longer, I like the idea of running the club properly, but it relies heavily on having good coaches at all levels.

I don't think anyone at the club is sanctioning incoming transfers with the intention of bringing waste into the squad. Herein lies the problem. We spent "big" on Carlos, Digne, Ollie, Buendia, Bailey, Ings etc over the last two years.. and none of them are lighting the world on fire. At this point, its hard to believe that we will be able to sell any for a profit. How can we implement a self-sufficiency strategy when we're buying high and selling low? I think we're all fine with injecting some homegrown youth into the squad, but first and foremost, we have to WIN.

This brings up our biggest issue. If we are going to be using revenue flows from throughout the club's different ventures, we will need to be a successful team in Europe. You can't get there by panic buying Dendoncker and marching on with Gerrard, who has clearly stalled without Beale.

Commercial revenue doesn't grow for teams finishing in the bottom 7 or 8. There's no appeal for the consumer in that. We must be on an upward trajectory to entice the international football community to take notice. When we set out to target Kamara and paint a picture of a pretty future, and he buys in.. the supporters of Marseille shouldn't be raising an eyebrow thinking "wtf, aston villa..?!" If he would've gone to a club like Spurs, Atletico, Napoli etc.. they wouldn't have had the same reaction.

We can get there.. but it is going to take significantly more investment from the owners before we stabilize at a high level of play and become "self-sufficient". I'm not sure this group of players is only a manager away from getting there. We aren't successful enough at this point in time to woo new supporters, to pickup television contracts internationally or sell merchandise to casual football fans. The commercial aspect has a long way to go.. because in truth I think they are selling tickets and shirts to the same 50,000 people every year. If you want to grow, you've got to win.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Mister E on October 06, 2022, 01:57:25 PM
Surely they suffer enough without miserable bastids from H&V joining their ranks?
It was the miserable bastards from H&V who virtually started it.
Oi! no need to be offensive!



I agree to a point with Boozey. The need for supporter groups is as great as it's ever been. The big battles might not happen now but there is still a fight on for the soul of clubs like Villa. The people in charge might dream of fifty thousand customers, a heady mix of corporates and happy, smiling families clapping along merrily to the club song and saying prices rises are necessary for success, but there's still plenty of us mardyarses turning up. We can't poke our heads round the door at the AGM anymore but we can still speak up when something ain't right.
Hear, hear
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Mister E on October 06, 2022, 02:04:58 PM
Preece published this on the Brum Mail this morning..
"A spokesman for the Villa Trust commented: “The club’s policy would be more focused on outs for ins with transfers being more self-financing as the club could not rely on the owners - Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens - to continually fund transfers from their own pockets."
Before melting down over this comment, I'd want to know who the 'spokesman' is and what part of what was said confirmed his interpretation.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: markeeeebeeee2005 on October 06, 2022, 02:19:08 PM
We’re only really going on what Purslow is saying, which may or may not be the full picture.

If you were the owners would you be giving Purslow a tonne more cash to burn with his recent decision making seriously in question. No, you’d tell him he’s on a sell to buy policy unless he shows some serious progress against the milestones set out.

I’m possibly reading too much into this, but it could be that Nas and Wes’ trust in Purslow and his star boy Gerrard is what is currently under the microscope not their ambitions for Villa or their commitment to supporting that financially.

If I’m right, then fair play. If they’re settling for A Purslow/ Gerrard combo with a sell to buy policy then that’d be pretty disappointing as scraping by in the Prem would be about our level with the odd relegation and promotion thrown in.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 06, 2022, 02:21:13 PM
Those signings represent such a range that conflating them all into 'buy high and sell low' is just silly. What does link them all as that, right now, we haven't seen them perform to the level that we know they have in them.

Everything else in your post comes back to that same point, we're not getting value from the squad and if we don't do that everything falls apart, that's why Gerrard is doing such a poor job right now.

I agree completely with the last line:

If you want to grow, you've got to win.

I just don't agree with the idea that the only way we can do that is by letting Gerrard spaff money up the wall over and over again. The solution has to be that we get the coach right, see that they're doing the job and then gve them the money to make targeted key improvements to the squad and back them to move on the players they don't think fit. Kamara was a great signing and hit every mark on how to do business properly in this model. I think Carlos might've been another and Olsen made sense for the cost given we desperately needed a reliable backup and he was already familiar with the squad. Despite not disliking Dendoncker as much as many on here the rest of the window felt a lot less planned and I suspect that's because Gerrard doesn't know how he wants to play.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 06, 2022, 02:32:03 PM
We’re only really going on what Purslow is saying, which may or may not be the full picture.

If you were the owners would you be giving Purslow a tonne more cash to burn with his recent decision making seriously in question. No, you’d tell him he’s on a sell to buy policy unless he shows some serious progress against the milestones set out.

I’m possibly reading too much into this, but it could be that Nas and Wes’ trust in Purslow and his star boy Gerrard is what is currently under the microscope not their ambitions for Villa or there commitment to supporting that financially.

If I’m right, then fair play. If they’re settling for A Purslow/ Gerrard combo with a sell to buy policy then that’d be pretty disappointing as scraping by in the Prem would be about our level with the odd relegation and promotion thrown in.

The thing that I can't quite get my head around is the 'other' stuff. The ground expansion, the investment in the academy, the possible links up with other clubs/Vegas Villains. None of that seems to suggest that they are happy with bobbing around the lower half of the league like we have been doing for the last 18 months - but maybe it has been a big distraction? Or maybe they banking on the popularity of the league in general to sustain us? That seems incredibly short-sighted. But the problem with long-term planning is that this league moves very quickly. This time last season, Newcastle were a laughing stock and Leicester were seen as the main rival to the top 6. Lerner learned the hard way that gradual progression will only last so long before you are overtaken by someone new.

This is what gives me hope that we will continue to progress. We made a bad managerial appointment last year, which happens. What we can't do is let that force us to reassess our ambition as a club. We dust ourselves off and get back on track with someone that kows what they are doing.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: villadelph on October 06, 2022, 02:33:50 PM
I just don't agree with the idea that the only way we can do that is by letting Gerrard spaff money up the wall over and over again. The solution has to be that we get the coach right, see that they're doing the job and then give them the money to make targeted key improvements to the squad and back them to move on the players they don't think fit.

It must be noted, that the club allowed for Gerrard to create a hierarchy where he isn't really the coach. He gave Beale the reigns to comes up with the tactics and take training. Martinez told us all we needed to know when he spilled the beans that SG doesnt really.. do.. anything..? It's not Gerrard's fault that he is seemingly a bit incompetent.. it is, in fact, the club that facilitated and co-signed this structure and seeing as Critchley has done F all since his arrival, there's plenty of blame to go around.

Personally, I would rather the club stick with a DOF or Sporting Director to recruit and identify talent. I certainly wouldn't allow a manager with so little experience to pull the strings.



Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 06, 2022, 02:38:46 PM
We’re only really going on what Purslow is saying, which may or may not be the full picture.

If you were the owners would you be giving Purslow a tonne more cash to burn with his recent decision making seriously in question. No, you’d tell him he’s on a sell to buy policy unless he shows some serious progress against the milestones set out.

I’m possibly reading too much into this, but it could be that Nas and Wes’ trust in Purslow and his star boy Gerrard is what is currently under the microscope not their ambitions for Villa or there commitment to supporting that financially.

If I’m right, then fair play. If they’re settling for A Purslow/ Gerrard combo with a sell to buy policy then that’d be pretty disappointing as scraping by in the Prem would be about our level with the odd relegation and promotion thrown in.

The thing that I can't quite get my head around is the 'other' stuff. The ground expansion, the investment in the academy, the possible links up with other clubs/Vegas Villains. None of that seems to suggest that they are happy with bobbing around the lower half of the league like we have been doing for the last 18 months - but maybe it has been a big distraction? Or maybe they banking on the popularity of the league in general to sustain us? That seems incredibly short-sighted. But the problem with long-term planning is that this league moves very quickly. This time last season, Newcastle were a laughing stock and Leicester were seen as the main rival to the top 6. Lerner learned the hard way that gradual progression will only last so long before you are overtaken by someone new.

This is what gives me hope that we will continue to progress. We made a bad managerial appointment last year, which happens. What we can't do is let that force us to reassess our ambition as a club. We dust ourselves off and get back on track with someone that kows what they are doing.

As I said, cash injections by the woners to grow the club/brand (I know) make sense, that's effecitvely investing in the club unfrastructure which just adds value and commercial growth, relying on external funding for internal club costs (like wages, transfers, etc) is just a endless moneypit. That's not to say that targeted spending like that isn't needed but you need to get others things right first or you run the risk of doing what we did under Lerner or what Everton have done.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 06, 2022, 02:58:53 PM
We’re only really going on what Purslow is saying, which may or may not be the full picture.

If you were the owners would you be giving Purslow a tonne more cash to burn with his recent decision making seriously in question. No, you’d tell him he’s on a sell to buy policy unless he shows some serious progress against the milestones set out.

I’m possibly reading too much into this, but it could be that Nas and Wes’ trust in Purslow and his star boy Gerrard is what is currently under the microscope not their ambitions for Villa or there commitment to supporting that financially.

If I’m right, then fair play. If they’re settling for A Purslow/ Gerrard combo with a sell to buy policy then that’d be pretty disappointing as scraping by in the Prem would be about our level with the odd relegation and promotion thrown in.

The thing that I can't quite get my head around is the 'other' stuff. The ground expansion, the investment in the academy, the possible links up with other clubs/Vegas Villains. None of that seems to suggest that they are happy with bobbing around the lower half of the league like we have been doing for the last 18 months - but maybe it has been a big distraction? Or maybe they banking on the popularity of the league in general to sustain us? That seems incredibly short-sighted. But the problem with long-term planning is that this league moves very quickly. This time last season, Newcastle were a laughing stock and Leicester were seen as the main rival to the top 6. Lerner learned the hard way that gradual progression will only last so long before you are overtaken by someone new.

This is what gives me hope that we will continue to progress. We made a bad managerial appointment last year, which happens. What we can't do is let that force us to reassess our ambition as a club. We dust ourselves off and get back on track with someone that kows what they are doing.

As I said, cash injections by the woners to grow the club/brand (I know) make sense, that's effecitvely investing in the club unfrastructure which just adds value and commercial growth, relying on external funding for internal club costs (like wages, transfers, etc) is just a endless moneypit. That's not to say that targeted spending like that isn't needed but you need to get others things right first or you run the risk of doing what we did under Lerner or what Everton have done.

Yeah, sorry, I probably wasn't clear. What doesn't marry up for me is the forward thinking of all of those 'other' things with the Gerrard appointment and subsequent transfer policy. I love all of those investments - it's a progressive way to grow the 'brand' (yuck), while generating potential revenue streams. But at the same time we seem to be incredibly short term on the first team front, and really not very good at it. If the plan was to keep all of these other things bubbling away in the background for the future while being more short term on the first team front (not an awful strategy), then we have got it badly wrong, and put far too much faith in the wrong guy. And the fact he's still here suggests that we might not know what to do next. Which is pretty uninspiring.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: villadelph on October 06, 2022, 03:09:08 PM
Yeah, sorry, I probably wasn't clear. What doesn't marry up for me is the forward thinking of all of those 'other' things with the Gerrard appointment and subsequent transfer policy. I love all of those investments - it's a progressive way to grow the 'brand' (yuck), while generating potential revenue streams. But at the same time we seem to be incredibly short term on the first team front, and really not very good at it. If the plan was to keep all of these other things bubbling away in the background for the future while being more short term on the first team front (not an awful strategy), then we have got it badly wrong, and put far too much faith in the wrong guy. And the fact he's still here suggests that we might not know what to do next. Which is pretty uninspiring.

Especially when you consider we spent the better part of 90 million on Digne, Carlos, Coutinho and Ings who will all be 30+ within the next what, 6 months? That is a "success now" type of transfer policy.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 06, 2022, 04:09:54 PM
Yeah, sorry, I probably wasn't clear. What doesn't marry up for me is the forward thinking of all of those 'other' things with the Gerrard appointment and subsequent transfer policy. I love all of those investments - it's a progressive way to grow the 'brand' (yuck), while generating potential revenue streams. But at the same time we seem to be incredibly short term on the first team front, and really not very good at it. If the plan was to keep all of these other things bubbling away in the background for the future while being more short term on the first team front (not an awful strategy), then we have got it badly wrong, and put far too much faith in the wrong guy. And the fact he's still here suggests that we might not know what to do next. Which is pretty uninspiring.

Especially when you consider we spent the better part of 90 million on Digne, Carlos, Coutinho and Ings who will all be 30+ within the next what, 6 months? That is a "success now" type of transfer policy.


I agree, I suspect the idea was to bump the first team up a level and into the mix for Europe as a way convincing more Kamara-style players that we're the right place for them to be as well as being able to talk to the very best 14-16 year olds and show them we offer a pathway and are on the up. It all falls down on the manager just not delivering in part of his side of the bargain, that's why the Bruceball stuff pisses me off so much, it has the potential to ruin everything that the club is trying to achieve.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 06, 2022, 04:13:14 PM
Well Ings has been a disaster of a signing, and the responsibility for that is firmly on Purslow/Lange for wanting an immediate 'name' to soften the blow of Grealish leaving. It's nobody's fault that Carlos got injured second game, and Digne seems fairly injury prone too.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 06, 2022, 04:19:35 PM
You look at the impact Trippier has had at Newcastle.  That's the sort of lift you're looking for when signing experienced players.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 06, 2022, 04:27:00 PM
Well Ings has been a disaster of a signing, and the responsibility for that is firmly on Purslow/Lange for wanting an immediate 'name' to soften the blow of Grealish leaving. It's nobody's fault that Carlos got injured second game, and Digne seems fairly injury prone too.
The Grealish money has been poorly invested. I do wonder to what extent Smith was involved in those signings.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: boozey182 on October 06, 2022, 04:27:55 PM
You look at the impact Trippier has had at Newcastle.  That's the sort of lift you're looking for when signing experienced players.

We nearly had it with Coutinho. In the first couple of months, he really did look like the player we were expecting - goals and assists. I still think there is a much better player in there than we have been seeing, and he has shown little glimpses in the last couple of matches, but I suspect some pretty basic, risk-adverse tactics will never bring out the best in him. For all Dean's faults (and there were many), when he had a world class talent, he got the best out of him. Coutinho should be to us what Grealish was, but I don't think the manager knows how to use him.

Purslow also said last week that there was no way we would have been able to sign Kamara and Carlos if it hadn't have ben for Coutinho signing. Coutinho should have been the springboard to launch a serious European challenge this year, but he's looked as bad as anyone else for the most part.

As paul-e said, that's what makes it all so annoying at the moment - we have players that should be exciting to watch and yet we are such a boring side.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 06, 2022, 04:50:49 PM
Well Ings has been a disaster of a signing, and the responsibility for that is firmly on Purslow/Lange for wanting an immediate 'name' to soften the blow of Grealish leaving. It's nobody's fault that Carlos got injured second game, and Digne seems fairly injury prone too.
The Grealish money has been poorly invested. I do wonder to what extent Smith was involved in those signings.

It's impossible to know for sure, but I think the club takes the "head coach" thing seriously, and leaves most of the recruitment to Lange. Obviously Coutinho is here because of Gerrard though.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: villadelph on October 06, 2022, 05:25:58 PM
Well Ings has been a disaster of a signing, and the responsibility for that is firmly on Purslow/Lange for wanting an immediate 'name' to soften the blow of Grealish leaving. It's nobody's fault that Carlos got injured second game, and Digne seems fairly injury prone too.
The Grealish money has been poorly invested. I do wonder to what extent Smith was involved in those signings.

It's impossible to know for sure, but I think the club takes the "head coach" thing seriously, and leaves most of the recruitment to Lange. Obviously Coutinho is here because of Gerrard though.

In lieu of our all out pursuit of Buendia..
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Scott Nielsen on October 07, 2022, 08:50:20 AM
Yeah, sorry, I probably wasn't clear. What doesn't marry up for me is the forward thinking of all of those 'other' things with the Gerrard appointment and subsequent transfer policy. I love all of those investments - it's a progressive way to grow the 'brand' (yuck), while generating potential revenue streams. But at the same time we seem to be incredibly short term on the first team front, and really not very good at it. If the plan was to keep all of these other things bubbling away in the background for the future while being more short term on the first team front (not an awful strategy), then we have got it badly wrong, and put far too much faith in the wrong guy. And the fact he's still here suggests that we might not know what to do next. Which is pretty uninspiring.

Maybe Purslow is our root problem. He seems to be both CEO and DoF.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 07, 2022, 09:30:30 AM
Yeah, sorry, I probably wasn't clear. What doesn't marry up for me is the forward thinking of all of those 'other' things with the Gerrard appointment and subsequent transfer policy. I love all of those investments - it's a progressive way to grow the 'brand' (yuck), while generating potential revenue streams. But at the same time we seem to be incredibly short term on the first team front, and really not very good at it. If the plan was to keep all of these other things bubbling away in the background for the future while being more short term on the first team front (not an awful strategy), then we have got it badly wrong, and put far too much faith in the wrong guy. And the fact he's still here suggests that we might not know what to do next. Which is pretty uninspiring.

Maybe Purslow is our root problem. He seems to be both CEO and DoF.
What has happened since the Greasy debacle is definitely down to Purslow.
We have spent a lot of money, hired a new manager completely changed the strategy and ended up no further forward.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 07, 2022, 11:16:20 AM
You look at the impact Trippier has had at Newcastle.  That's the sort of lift you're looking for when signing experienced players.

I know they have endless money but Newcastle transfer policy has really shown us up in last 12 months. Pope-Botman-Bruno Guimaraes- Isak all guys in early to mid 20s (O.k Pope is older but still pretty young for a keeper), all improving them fairly quickly and can take them into europa league.

They have a clear plan, ours seems to be very muddled and that will probably be reflected in league position in six months time.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 07, 2022, 11:17:44 AM
Well Ings has been a disaster of a signing, and the responsibility for that is firmly on Purslow/Lange for wanting an immediate 'name' to soften the blow of Grealish leaving. It's nobody's fault that Carlos got injured second game, and Digne seems fairly injury prone too.
The Grealish money has been poorly invested. I do wonder to what extent Smith was involved in those signings.

It's impossible to know for sure, but I think the club takes the "head coach" thing seriously, and leaves most of the recruitment to Lange. Obviously Coutinho is here because of Gerrard though.

Targett being written off and Digne signed is all down to Lange? I very much doubt it.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Drummond on October 07, 2022, 12:31:35 PM
You look at the impact Trippier has had at Newcastle.  That's the sort of lift you're looking for when signing experienced players.

We nearly had it with Coutinho. In the first couple of months, he really did look like the player we were expecting - goals and assists. I still think there is a much better player in there than we have been seeing, and he has shown little glimpses in the last couple of matches, but I suspect some pretty basic, risk-adverse tactics will never bring out the best in him. For all Dean's faults (and there were many), when he had a world class talent, he got the best out of him. Coutinho should be to us what Grealish was, but I don't think the manager knows how to use him.

Purslow also said last week that there was no way we would have been able to sign Kamara and Carlos if it hadn't have ben for Coutinho signing. Coutinho should have been the springboard to launch a serious European challenge this year, but he's looked as bad as anyone else for the most part.

As paul-e said, that's what makes it all so annoying at the moment - we have players that should be exciting to watch and yet we are such a boring side.

I think Coutinho is a great player but our strikers don't fit with his style of play. Ings to my mind is the cleverer of the two (and I reckon Archer could be even better as a fit) but Watkins is better getting on the end of crosses rather than through balls. Grealish could be a winger or 10 and played well with Watkins, plus he had pace, which Coutinho doesn't have.

Bailey is inconsistent too so we don't get the best out of Watkins at all. The whole thing is dysfunctional.

Grealish had so many facets for us that it took 3 signings (Ings, Buendia and Bailey) to replace him, the problem is that the managers haven't been able to work out how to play them all in an effective manner for any period of time.

I still think Coutinho is a great player and signing, but he needs more guile around him. I'd rather he played with Buendia and Ramsey as a front three, than what we have right now. The system is all wrong as it is.

And getting back on topic, buying players approaching 30 is not a problem for me at all, providing they are adding something.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Dante Lavelli on October 08, 2022, 10:30:02 AM
You look at the impact Trippier has had at Newcastle.  That's the sort of lift you're looking for when signing experienced players.

I know they have endless money but Newcastle transfer policy has really shown us up in last 12 months. Pope-Botman-Bruno Guimaraes- Isak all guys in early to mid 20s (O.k Pope is older but still pretty young for a keeper), all improving them fairly quickly and can take them into europa league.

They have a clear plan, ours seems to be very muddled and that will probably be reflected in league position in six months time.

Those signings do seem very coherent compared to our approach where we buy ‘names’ in positions where we are already well covered.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 08, 2022, 10:42:13 AM
You look at the impact Trippier has had at Newcastle.  That's the sort of lift you're looking for when signing experienced players.

I know they have endless money but Newcastle transfer policy has really shown us up in last 12 months. Pope-Botman-Bruno Guimaraes- Isak all guys in early to mid 20s (O.k Pope is older but still pretty young for a keeper), all improving them fairly quickly and can take them into europa league.

They have a clear plan, ours seems to be very muddled and that will probably be reflected in league position in six months time.

Those signings do seem very coherent compared to our approach where we buy ‘names’ in positions where we are already well covered.
Agree when you look at what we really needed and then where we spent the money, there is not much logic to it. Now we are getting in squad fillers .
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Beard82 on October 09, 2022, 05:59:24 PM
Yeah, sorry, I probably wasn't clear. What doesn't marry up for me is the forward thinking of all of those 'other' things with the Gerrard appointment and subsequent transfer policy. I love all of those investments - it's a progressive way to grow the 'brand' (yuck), while generating potential revenue streams. But at the same time we seem to be incredibly short term on the first team front, and really not very good at it. If the plan was to keep all of these other things bubbling away in the background for the future while being more short term on the first team front (not an awful strategy), then we have got it badly wrong, and put far too much faith in the wrong guy. And the fact he's still here suggests that we might not know what to do next. Which is pretty uninspiring.

Maybe Purslow is our root problem. He seems to be both CEO and DoF.
What has happened since the Greasy debacle is definitely down to Purslow.
We have spent a lot of money, hired a new manager completely changed the strategy and ended up no further forward.
I think this is probably a fair summary - we have got virtually everything wrong since JG left - and it seems to stem from one man decisions
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 09, 2022, 07:25:22 PM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Holte L2 on October 09, 2022, 07:56:31 PM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.

That's how I felt t the time to be honest. I didn't have faith in Lange to spend the £100m wisely either.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: olaftab on October 09, 2022, 08:15:31 PM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.
I think we, the Club that is, must have been ready for Grealish leaving as it was obvious once a release clause was  agreed so I don't think it was same as O'Neill's shit show.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: colin69 on October 09, 2022, 08:22:53 PM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.
I think we, the Club that is, must have been ready for Grealish leaving as it was obvious once a release clause was  agreed so I don't think it was same as O'Neill's shit show.
However if the club was ready for Grealish leaving, the money we received for him was completely wasted and although I hate to admit it we ain’t been the same since he left.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 09, 2022, 08:25:19 PM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.
I think we, the Club that is, must have been ready for Grealish leaving as it was obvious once a release clause was  agreed so I don't think it was same as O'Neill's shit show.
The parallels are obvious, it was the catalyst that caused our owner to lose interest and what followed was poor decision making.
Of course we should have been better prepared but we obviously were not.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Ads on October 09, 2022, 08:30:05 PM
Wasn't his divorce and his sister saying "STOP SPENDING OUR LIMITED TRUST FORTUNE ON THAT CLUB YOU BIG FUCKING MAN BABY!" likely more significant?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: tony scott on October 09, 2022, 09:14:14 PM
J G constantly created spacefor our players, as well as drawing lots of free kicks which constantly gave us possession plus the magic element. 15 months on not one of his three replacements have shown consistent good form, that is a sad indictment of our recruiting policy.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Sexual Ealing on October 10, 2022, 12:31:58 AM
J G constantly created spacefor our players, as well as drawing lots of free kicks which constantly gave us possession plus the magic element. 15 months on not one of his three replacements have shown consistent good form, that is a sad indictment of our recruiting policy.

I don't necessarily disagree with the thrust of your argument, but 'go and find another Jack Grealish' is a big ask of the recruitment team.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 10, 2022, 12:40:02 AM
Think the owners were expecting a few of the younger players to have broken through by now like Ramsey has done in last 18 months.

Certainly I imagine they were seeing Archer score every other week for Preston and England under 21s and expecting him to get more than 20 minutes this season.

Below that you probably have Tim, Aaron Ramsey and KHH who probably aren't quite ready but they're all getting excellent experience at championship clubs, two who are in top 3 so that's exciting.

Not sure how much Philogene-Bidace is playing at Cardiff but he's another who could come into contention with a manager who actually wants wide players in the team.

I think we've stalled for a year but with some smart signings we can rise up the league again and adding 2-3 of those into the matchday 20.

Let's just hope we don't go full circle as under Lerner and suddenly start signing half of league 1-2 and proclaiming these as ready made prem players as we attempted a decade ago.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 10, 2022, 12:45:20 AM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.

I do think we were sort of prepared (if romantically hoping he'd give us one more year) as bidding for Smith Rowe who had a very similar style of play was a big hint.

I'd love to know if we genuinely believed we could get him and Ward Prowse, seems strange to keep in putting bids for both if players intentions were only to sign new deals at their present clubs.

Ironically we could probably sign both if we wanted to next summer with one well down the pecking order at Arsenal and I think Southampton will get relegated and JWP will have a release clause in his deal and is a better player than I thought when we were linked.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: dave.woodhall on October 10, 2022, 01:08:54 AM
Ratboy leaving is worryingly reminding me of O'Neill's walkout. We weren't ready for it, it knocked us onto the back foot and although we knew he was important, we didn't know just how important he was.
I think we, the Club that is, must have been ready for Grealish leaving as it was obvious once a release clause was  agreed so I don't think it was same as O'Neill's shit show.

We knew it was happening but weren't ready for it.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 10, 2022, 01:56:38 AM
I think getting Buendia in early was an attempt to try and be ready for Grealish leaving. With him, Ings and Bailey, you had a good balance of experience in the PL, a promising player from abroad and room for growth. In typical Villa fashion though, they've all stalled with us.

Also, the Purslow verdict to the fans in August 2021 that all three would directly replace Grealish ignored the obvious point that we could only field 11 players at once so surely we would lose-out further by having to compensate for Jack with two extra players?!
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: PeterWithesShin on October 10, 2022, 02:51:19 AM
The basic principle is creating Grealish in the aggregate.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Scott Nielsen on October 10, 2022, 04:36:45 AM
Also, the Purslow verdict to the fans in August 2021 that all three would directly replace Grealish ignored the obvious point that we could only field 11 players at once so surely we would lose-out further by having to compensate for Jack with two extra players?!

Yeah, this never made sense.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: LeeB on October 10, 2022, 09:32:00 AM
The basic principle is creating Grealish in the aggregate.

Yes, and as was pointed out at the time you can't play 13 men.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 10, 2022, 09:32:39 AM
I think the Buendia signing was excellent, and probably as close to replacing Grealish's flair as we could have hoped.  Bailey was a bit of a punt that on papaer looked very exciting.  In reality it looked like we massively overpaid for him.

Ings was clearly a panic buy.  On the face of it it was exciting, we definitely needed more firepower up front and the excitiment on here and elsewhere was tangible that we'd signed him.  Ultimately though he was signed with no plan.  Trying to appease him and Watkins cost Smith his job and Gerrard hasn't made it work either.  We needed a striker to compete with Watkins, not necessarily to play along side him, although in theory I would have expected Watkins to make a better fist of playing wide whereas instead if felt like he just sulked.  Missing out on Tammy was the huge mistake that summer.   
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 10, 2022, 09:34:40 AM
All we have done is replace Bert with Bailey with no discernible benifit.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 10, 2022, 10:04:33 AM
I think the Buendia signing was excellent, and probably as close to replacing Grealish's flair as we could have hoped.  Bailey was a bit of a punt that on papaer looked very exciting.  In reality it looked like we massively overpaid for him.

Ings was clearly a panic buy.  On the face of it it was exciting, we definitely needed more firepower up front and the excitiment on here and elsewhere was tangible that we'd signed him.  Ultimately though he was signed with no plan.  Trying to appease him and Watkins cost Smith his job and Gerrard hasn't made it work either.  We needed a striker to compete with Watkins, not necessarily to play along side him, although in theory I would have expected Watkins to make a better fist of playing wide whereas instead if felt like he just sulked.  Missing out on Tammy was the huge mistake that summer.   

I can't agree on the Buendia thing, I think on here there is a bit of a habit to overstate how well Buendia does when he plays because people want him to start more games. He is the best option in the squad to pick passes through gaps around the box but he also gets caught in possession too easily and, certainly recently, he looks better coming on aainst tired defenders than when he starts. None of this is to say he's a bad player but he offers nothing like what Grealish did, even just in terms of chance creation.

I'm also not sure I agree with the idea that Watkins sulked out wide, I don't think he did but rather just wasn't sure what was expected of him out there.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 10, 2022, 10:21:58 AM
Nobody could replace what Grealish offered us.  Buendia has been our most creative player since he joind and was as close as we were going to get.  If we'd built the team around him like we did with Jack I'm sure you'd see a lot more from him.  Not Jack levels, but better than anybody else offers us.

Watkins sulking was almost palpable.  He played several seasons as a winger so not knowing what to do is hardly an excuse.  He just didn't want to do it.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 10, 2022, 10:53:36 AM
Nobody could replace what Grealish offered us.  Buendia has been our most creative player since he joind and was as close as we were going to get.  If we'd built the team around him like we did with Jack I'm sure you'd see a lot more from him.  Not Jack levels, but better than anybody else offers us.

Watkins sulking was almost palpable.  He played several seasons as a winger so not knowing what to do is hardly an excuse.  He just didn't want to do it.

I think Coutinho at his best has been far more creative than Buendia at his best. You might be right that building the team around him would help but it's odd that you'd say Watkins sulked when asked to adapt for the team but make an excuse for Buendia not doing the same.

I'd also question whether Buendia is the closest we could get to replacing Grealish, the best thing Grealish gave us by a long, long way was his ability to move defenders out of position and create space as a result. Of anyone in the squad the player who comes closest to giving us that is Ramsey and when he was being backed to make those runs regualrly Coutinho used the space superbly.

On Watkins, it's not an excuse, my point is that if you watch them when they've played together neither Watkins or Ings seem comfortable with what they're supposed to do to get the best out of each other, they just don't naturally work as a pairing, and that's ok, we never should've tried to play them as one.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 10, 2022, 11:02:13 AM
The thing is, Coutinho has been given the gametime and we've seen him at his best twice, maybe three times?  Buendia hasn't had the same opportunity, but we've seen some incredible performances off the bench.

Ramsey is good at running straight and direct, but he can't pass or link up play like Jack could.  IMO Buendia is the closest in terms of skill, passing and vision, he's decent at dribbling too.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: PeterWithesShin on October 10, 2022, 11:08:24 AM
The basic principle is creating Grealish in the aggregate.

Yes, and as was pointed out at the time you can't play 13 men.

You don't create the aggregate with 13 players.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 10, 2022, 11:24:41 AM
I think the Buendia signing was excellent, and probably as close to replacing Grealish's flair as we could have hoped.  Bailey was a bit of a punt that on papaer looked very exciting.  In reality it looked like we massively overpaid for him.

Ings was clearly a panic buy.  On the face of it it was exciting, we definitely needed more firepower up front and the excitiment on here and elsewhere was tangible that we'd signed him.  Ultimately though he was signed with no plan.  Trying to appease him and Watkins cost Smith his job and Gerrard hasn't made it work either.  We needed a striker to compete with Watkins, not necessarily to play along side him, although in theory I would have expected Watkins to make a better fist of playing wide whereas instead if felt like he just sulked.  Missing out on Tammy was the huge mistake that summer.   

I don't think we massively overpaid for Bailey. He was hitting double figures in Bundesliga for top 6 club and had decent stats in europa league aswell so given his age I'd actually say under 30m in these times is actually a bargain, Buendia cost more and he had far less top level experience.

Ings was the signing that made little sense, age and totally the wrong profile for forward we needed. We were tentatively linked with Alvarez who went to Man. City so that was type we needed, someone who could play out left or also CF if required. Most of the top teams have that sort of versatile forward.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: chrisw1 on October 10, 2022, 11:30:53 AM
Buendia had already performed well in the PL though, which adds a premium. 
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 10, 2022, 11:35:58 AM
I think the Buendia signing was excellent, and probably as close to replacing Grealish's flair as we could have hoped.  Bailey was a bit of a punt that on papaer looked very exciting.  In reality it looked like we massively overpaid for him.

Ings was clearly a panic buy.  On the face of it it was exciting, we definitely needed more firepower up front and the excitiment on here and elsewhere was tangible that we'd signed him.  Ultimately though he was signed with no plan.  Trying to appease him and Watkins cost Smith his job and Gerrard hasn't made it work either.  We needed a striker to compete with Watkins, not necessarily to play along side him, although in theory I would have expected Watkins to make a better fist of playing wide whereas instead if felt like he just sulked.  Missing out on Tammy was the huge mistake that summer.   

I don't think we massively overpaid for Bailey. He was hitting double figures in Bundesliga for top 6 club and had decent stats in europa league aswell so given his age I'd actually say under 30m in these times is actually a bargain, Buendia cost more and he had far less top level experience.

Ings was the signing that made little sense, age and totally the wrong profile for forward we needed. We were tentatively linked with Alvarez who went to Man. City so that was type we needed, someone who could play out left or also CF if required. Most of the top teams have that sort of versatile forward.

I agree, I was saying all along that summer (even when the hope was that Grealish was staying) that I wanted someone who could primarily play out wide but would be an option upfront if needed (Amine Gouiri and Marcus Thuram were my 2 picks at the time).
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 10, 2022, 11:42:42 AM
Buendia had already performed well in the PL though, which adds a premium. 

He had one season at Norwich where he did fine but then so did Todd Cantwell.

Think part of the issue is going back to 90s we've liked going to championship/bottom end of prem for star players in relegated teams and they've never been able to replicate that form for us.

Curcic obviously who was a basketcase. Alan Thompson was excellent for Bolton in 97/98 and he played o.k first few months here before reverting to expensive squad player, amusing reading one of Merse's books as apparently after every training session he was apologizing to our internationals for not being good enough!

And in recent times we decided it was a good idea to replace Benteke with Rudy Gestede with all the consequences that followed.

Perhaps we should've refreshed central midfield more with ball players rather than trying to replace Grealish directly. Someone like Bruno Guimaraes would've been ideal for where we are very weak currently, transformed Newcastle since he joined.

He was playing for Lyon when we signed Traore.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: SoccerHQ on October 10, 2022, 11:44:58 AM
I think the Buendia signing was excellent, and probably as close to replacing Grealish's flair as we could have hoped.  Bailey was a bit of a punt that on papaer looked very exciting.  In reality it looked like we massively overpaid for him.

Ings was clearly a panic buy.  On the face of it it was exciting, we definitely needed more firepower up front and the excitiment on here and elsewhere was tangible that we'd signed him.  Ultimately though he was signed with no plan.  Trying to appease him and Watkins cost Smith his job and Gerrard hasn't made it work either.  We needed a striker to compete with Watkins, not necessarily to play along side him, although in theory I would have expected Watkins to make a better fist of playing wide whereas instead if felt like he just sulked.  Missing out on Tammy was the huge mistake that summer.   

I don't think we massively overpaid for Bailey. He was hitting double figures in Bundesliga for top 6 club and had decent stats in europa league aswell so given his age I'd actually say under 30m in these times is actually a bargain, Buendia cost more and he had far less top level experience.

Ings was the signing that made little sense, age and totally the wrong profile for forward we needed. We were tentatively linked with Alvarez who went to Man. City so that was type we needed, someone who could play out left or also CF if required. Most of the top teams have that sort of versatile forward.

I agree, I was saying all along that summer (even when the hope was that Grealish was staying) that I wanted someone who could primarily play out wide but would be an option upfront if needed (Amine Gouiri and Marcus Thuram were my 2 picks at the time).

Gone off the Donall Malen hype train I see (wink).

Bemuses me we never signed Bowen in summer 2019 given our transfer policy that summer. Although I suspect DS would've just looked at his goal record and constantly played him at CF so he may not have been as effective for us as he has been for West Ham.

That's exactly the type of final third forward we need in the squad eventually.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 10, 2022, 12:12:34 PM
Buendia is nowhere near as good as Grealish. He’s great at through balls and he’s got quick feet in terms of getting a shot off, but he has no pace at all and struggles to impose himself on games when he starts.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: pauliewalnuts on October 10, 2022, 12:31:24 PM
TBF that's probably why Grealish cost 3 times as much as Buendia did.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 10, 2022, 12:45:02 PM
I think the Buendia signing was excellent, and probably as close to replacing Grealish's flair as we could have hoped.  Bailey was a bit of a punt that on papaer looked very exciting.  In reality it looked like we massively overpaid for him.

Ings was clearly a panic buy.  On the face of it it was exciting, we definitely needed more firepower up front and the excitiment on here and elsewhere was tangible that we'd signed him.  Ultimately though he was signed with no plan.  Trying to appease him and Watkins cost Smith his job and Gerrard hasn't made it work either.  We needed a striker to compete with Watkins, not necessarily to play along side him, although in theory I would have expected Watkins to make a better fist of playing wide whereas instead if felt like he just sulked.  Missing out on Tammy was the huge mistake that summer.   

I don't think we massively overpaid for Bailey. He was hitting double figures in Bundesliga for top 6 club and had decent stats in europa league aswell so given his age I'd actually say under 30m in these times is actually a bargain, Buendia cost more and he had far less top level experience.

Ings was the signing that made little sense, age and totally the wrong profile for forward we needed. We were tentatively linked with Alvarez who went to Man. City so that was type we needed, someone who could play out left or also CF if required. Most of the top teams have that sort of versatile forward.

I agree, I was saying all along that summer (even when the hope was that Grealish was staying) that I wanted someone who could primarily play out wide but would be an option upfront if needed (Amine Gouiri and Marcus Thuram were my 2 picks at the time).

Gone off the Donall Malen hype train I see (wink).

Bemuses me we never signed Bowen in summer 2019 given our transfer policy that summer. Although I suspect DS would've just looked at his goal record and constantly played him at CF so he may not have been as effective for us as he has been for West Ham.

That's exactly the type of final third forward we need in the squad eventually.

I couldn't remember his name if I'm honest, I did know there was another one at the time though.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 10, 2022, 03:08:02 PM
The basic principle is creating Grealish in the aggregate.

Yes, and as was pointed out at the time you can't play 13 men.

You don't create the aggregate with 13 players.

Can you explain your point dumbed-down, without using the word aggregate?
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: PeterWithesShin on October 10, 2022, 03:46:18 PM
It's a principle used in baseball, it's mentioned in Moneyball. I think it's a shit one when applied to football and doesn't work but it's what Purslow was talking about.
The basic idea is you don't replace just Grealish, you try and replicate his goals and assists across, in this case, 3 players. Player 1 replacing Grealish will obviously be a downgrade, players 2 and 3 replace two players that were starting the previous season, and are upgrades on those 2 players. Thus creating the aggregate. The 3 new players give you the same, or more, goals and assists than Grealish and the 2 previous players did.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Toronto Villa on October 10, 2022, 03:59:14 PM
It’s something Southampton did quite well for a bit, as did Leicester. Really well. You buy smartly and sell for a fortune and build from there. The money from Maguire, Kante, Mahrez etc for the most part has been really well spent. But in the PL you have to keep investing. It has to be a mix of real established talent and the aforementioned approach. That’s what I think he wants for us to achieve. We are certainly not there yet.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 10, 2022, 04:13:23 PM
It's a principle used in baseball, it's mentioned in Moneyball. I think it's a shit one when applied to football and doesn't work but it's what Purslow was talking about.
The basic idea is you don't replace just Grealish, you try and replicate his goals and assists across, in this case, 3 players. Player 1 replacing Grealish will obviously be a downgrade, players 2 and 3 replace two players that were starting the previous season, and are upgrades on those 2 players. Thus creating the aggregate. The 3 new players give you the same, or more, goals and assists than Grealish and the 2 previous players did.

I don't think it's a shit idea, at it's core you get a big fee in for a player and then use the money to make 3-4 improvements to the team that make you better overall. The problem is that it's a really difficult thing to get right, particularly if you haven't planned for it well in advance. With 4-5 months of scouting and talking to agents, etc maybe you can work out all the weaknesses in the squad and get half a dozen players that you've looked at as options to fill those gaps but because we were still hoping he'd stay right up until the last week or 2 we ended up rushing things and making a mess of it.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: PeterWithesShin on October 10, 2022, 04:19:32 PM
The reason I think it's a shit idea, maybe a strong term, is that you get definites in baseball, every single game. 27 outs, a minimum of 27 at bats, it never changes, 162 games a season. The idea was to recreate Giambi by taking the aggregate OBP of him and 2 other players that left. You don't get those definites in football. The improving the team thing is just what every club does anyway, or at least tries to do. I think trying to recreate Grealish in the aggregate is a 'shit' idea because of that, and because Grealish gave us much more than just the number of goals/assists.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: paul_e on October 10, 2022, 04:30:30 PM
The reason I think it's a shit idea, maybe a strong term, is that you get definites in baseball, every single game. 27 outs, a minimum of 27 at bats, it never changes, 162 games a season. The idea was to recreate Giambi by taking the aggregate OBP of him and 2 other players that left. You don't get those definites in football. The improving the team thing is just what every club does anyway, or at least tries to do. I think trying to recreate Grealish in the aggregate is a 'shit' idea because of that, and because Grealish gave us much more than just the number of goals/assists.

His explanation was shit but the idea of using a big incoming fee to improve the squad overall despite losing your best player is, as you say, what every club tries to do, it's pretty much the only thing you can do unless your model is to make profit on player trading.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Clark W Griswold on October 10, 2022, 04:35:41 PM
Going off 'stats' is bollocks though. You sell your best player for a fortune, replace him and then strengthen the team in the areas that you most need it with the rest of the money.

A great example for us was in 1991. We sold David Platt for £5m, and bought in Garry Parker to replace him and also bought Atkinson, Staunton, Richardson, Teale, Kubicki and Paul Mortimer with the proceeds. 7 new players and only 1 was shit, some of them were 90's icons for us. We added a few freebies as well and then spent a bit more over the following 12 months and had a team challenging for the league a year or so later. I suspect our scouting network was a bit better then!
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: eamonn on October 10, 2022, 04:36:52 PM
It's a principle used in baseball, it's mentioned in Moneyball. I think it's a shit one when applied to football and doesn't work but it's what Purslow was talking about.
The basic idea is you don't replace just Grealish, you try and replicate his goals and assists across, in this case, 3 players. Player 1 replacing Grealish will obviously be a downgrade, players 2 and 3 replace two players that were starting the previous season, and are upgrades on those 2 players. Thus creating the aggregate. The 3 new players give you the same, or more, goals and assists than Grealish and the 2 previous players did.

Gotcha, ta.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Risso on October 10, 2022, 04:54:11 PM
I agree with PWS, a lot of what made Grealish so valuable to us wasn’t just measured in goals and assists, it was how he seemingly made everyone around him look better. Even in just getting three players in who could slot in and improve the team without replacing Grealish the recruitment team did a woeful job and we haven’t recovered from it yet.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: Mister E on October 11, 2022, 09:29:02 AM
I agree with PWS, a lot of what made Grealish so valuable to us wasn’t just measured in goals and assists, it was how he seemingly made everyone around him look better. Even in just getting three players in who could slot in and improve the team without replacing Grealish the recruitment team did a woeful job and we haven’t recovered from it yet.
Grealish's best attribute for us was in his role as the out-ball - our defenders (yes, Mings, I'm looking at you) could hack the ball away knowing that JG would hold, then turn, pass or continue to hold. This gave everyone the time to provide support and the confidence of knowing that they might still retain possession of the ball.
Last night was a masterclass in what happens without a player like that.
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: PaulTheVillan on October 11, 2022, 09:36:14 AM
Rename the thread to Supporters lack of trust in Purslow
Title: Re: Supporters Trust & Purslow
Post by: ChicagoLion on October 11, 2022, 09:42:48 AM
Rename the thread to Supporters lack of trust in Purslow
Gets my vote.
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