Mr. Lerner: Aston Villa and/or the Cleveland Browns?

[Malandro]

Everybody was happy that we'd bought Darren Bent.  I don't think that's the same thing as "everyone was happy with Randy".

I think rather than being unhappy with Randy this time last year, people were thinking something along the lines of "O'Neill's dropped us in the shit."

The people who thought that, can surely see the bigger picture now.

[cheltenhamlion]

I had a nose at that Cleveland board. They fucking hate Randy over there.

[LeeB]

Everybody was happy that we'd bought Darren Bent.  I don't think that's the same thing as "everyone was happy with Randy".

I think rather than being unhappy with Randy this time last year, people were thinking something along the lines of "O'Neill's dropped us in the shit."

The people who thought that, can surely see the bigger picture now.

Yes, O'Neill is a ******, and dropped us in the shit.

[dave.woodhall]

Everybody was happy that we'd bought Darren Bent.  I don't think that's the same thing as "everyone was happy with Randy".

I think rather than being unhappy with Randy this time last year, people were thinking something along the lines of "O'Neill's dropped us in the shit."

The people who thought that, can surely see the bigger picture now.

Yes, O'Neill is a c***, and dropped us in the shit.

I'd go more along the lines of O'Neill couldn't get his own way for once so behaved like a spoilt brat and dropped us in the shit.

[Risso]

Andyh you're inadvertently supporting my point. Results good under MON so Randy s great, then we are a dip so he's crap, sign Bent and he's great again, appoint McLeish and he's rubbish. In the end it's mostly about money - if he sounds more of it people will love him.

The Bent signing was clearly an emergency measure to keep us in the Premier League.  The cost of the player would have been nothing compared to the money Lerner would have lost if we'd been relegated.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

When MON left I remember 20,000 fans singing "one Randy Lerner etc" against West Ham.  That, considering how popular a manager O'Neill was, was pretty amazing. How many other owners of football clubs can say they have ever been so outwardly loved? 

I find it staggering that in the space of 18 months so many of us are so anti-Lerner.  Where has all that good will gone? 

There is an obvious sucking in of the belly on planet Lerner.  Not sure he can oversee any real significant strides forward as is the state of the modern game as it is, without encouraging massive investment from elsewhere and therefore selling at least some of the club, but let's not forget all the ace stuff he's done.  To throw our toys out of the pram because he just aint rich enough anymore leaves us open to use of the f-word and, frankly, it would be deserved on some.

The only thing I could really criticise him for would be a lack of attendance so far this season, but he's not the only one is he?

Well said mate

Indeed. Randy Lerner has plenty of credit in the (Villa) bank in my book.

[LeeB]

Same goes for me.

[Risso]

All Lerner has really done is lend the club lots of money that he has spent on paying some very average players ridiculous amount of money.  The end result of this is that we owe loads, are still making losses and don't really have anything to show for it.  He now clearly doesn't have the spare cash or any other sort of plan to get us out of the situation, other than selling our best players and replacing them with kids.  I think he is is looking to sell, but who honestly would want to pay £200m to buy Villa?

[Greg N'Ash]

hope he does sell if i'm honest. we had 30 odd years of a millionaire running the club like a cornershop, can't say i want another  20 years of a billionaire doing the same

[pauliewalnuts]

Andyh you're inadvertently supporting my point. Results good under MON so Randy s great, then we are a dip so he's crap, sign Bent and he's great again, appoint McLeish and he's rubbish. In the end it's mostly about money - if he sounds more of it people will love him.

The Bent signing was clearly an emergency measure to keep us in the Premier League.  The cost of the player would have been nothing compared to the money Lerner would have lost if we'd been relegated.

There are plenty of things Randy deserves criticism but I don't see how buying Bent when we needed goals is one of them.

If he hadn't bought us the goals that kept us up, he'd have been slaughtered for it.

So he did buy them - and he still gets stick for it.

That's what you call a lose-lose situation, and i think giving him stick for that, as well as being unfair, detracts attention from things for which he really does deserve criticism.

[The Laughing Policeman]

hope he does sell if i'm honest. we had 30 odd years of a millionaire running the club like a cornershop, can't say i want another  20 years of a billionaire doing the same

So a bunch of oil billionaires running it like a petrol station will be ok?
It's taken time but  football is slowly but surely coming into the real financial world.  I'm sure that if Randy wanted to sell and if the economic situation was more stable there would be a queue of potential investors looking to buy a club with the pedigree of Aston Villa.
It wont happen in the near future simply because the silly money isn't there any more. Thank God.

[Clampy]

Everybody was happy that we'd bought Darren Bent.  I don't think that's the same thing as "everyone was happy with Randy".

But everybody WAS happy with Randy.  Go back to the time Bent signed and the general concensus was "how could we have doubted Randy, the bloke's a diamond".

Yes, there were a lot of 'Thanks Randy' posts and even a few 'well done Paul Faulkner'  ones as well.

Randy has made mistakes but we also have a lot to appreciate him for.

[Risso]

Andyh you're inadvertently supporting my point. Results good under MON so Randy s great, then we are a dip so he's crap, sign Bent and he's great again, appoint McLeish and he's rubbish. In the end it's mostly about money - if he sounds more of it people will love him.

The Bent signing was clearly an emergency measure to keep us in the Premier League.  The cost of the player would have been nothing compared to the money Lerner would have lost if we'd been relegated.

There are plenty of things Randy deserves criticism but I don't see how buying Bent when we needed goals is one of them.

If he hadn't bought us the goals that kept us up, he'd have been slaughtered for it.

So he did buy them - and he still gets stick for it.

That's what you call a lose-lose situation, and i think giving him stick for that, as well as being unfair, detracts attention from things for which he really does deserve criticism.

I wasn't giving him stick for buying Bent, not sure where you get that idea from.  I was merely pointing out the reality of the situation, ie that Lerner didn't buy Bent as part of an ongoing investment in the side for the future.  We'd already pretty well stopped spending by then, but needed to buy Bent to keep us up.  It was obviously the right decision, but to be honest we shouldn't have been in that position in the first place.

[pauliewalnuts]

OK, then not "giving him stick" but making light of the fact that he spent a huge amount of money to buy us exactly the player we needed when we needed goals.

I don't really care if it was part of an ongoing plan, if it was reactive or proactive or whatever, I just know that we had a problem scoring goals, and he went and bought the most expensive player we've ever bought - by a long way - and one of the most proven goalscorers in the league.

You're right, we shouldn't have been in that position in the first place, but the fact is, we were, and he got us out of it. He could have thrown 5m at Houllier and told him to try to buy Kevin Doyle instead.

As I said, I've got quite a few things in the negative column for Randy, but where the Bent purchase is concerned, there's only positives.

[Clampy]

OK, then not "giving him stick" but making light of the fact that he spent a huge amount of money to buy us exactly the player we needed when we needed goals.

I don't really care if it was part of an ongoing plan, if it was reactive or proactive or whatever, I just know that we had a problem scoring goals, and he went and bought the most expensive player we've ever bought - by a long way - and one of the most proven goalscorers in the league.

You're right, we shouldn't have been in that position in the first place, but the fact is, we were, and he got us out of it. He could have thrown 5m at Houllier and told him to try to buy Kevin Doyle instead.

As I said, I've got quite a few things in the negative column for Randy, but where the Bent purchase is concerned, there's only positives.

This.