Concrete Ron deal done

[wozwebs]

'There's no other way' to say this but my love for Villa is back fully after it was slipping away from me last year.

I'm off to see Blur in Wolverhampton Sunday, can't wait.

[The Man With A Stick]

I'm off to see Blur in Wolverhampton Sunday, can't wait.

Me too and neither can I!

[gabbythelegend]

To the tune of 'Cars'

He is Ron Vlaar
He is safest of all
He's f***ing great at football
And there's no way through him
Ron Vlaar
De new new new

[eamonn]

my view of things at Villa: Rosie

I think we'll struggle without Collins' zeal.

Sterling work gentlemen!

If TSM hadn't have been sacked would he have Resigned? We should be Coping just fine once Lambert gets his squad finalised in the next month and who knows, come the New Year Sky could have us on Sunday Sunday if we're flying high.

TheManWithAStick, check out their BBC6Music live gig from yesterday.

[KRS]

Time to resurrect my song for Concrete Ron from page one...

Yeaaah...his name is Vlaar
Yeaaah...he's a fuckin star
Yeaaah...we all love Villa
We do Ron Ron Ron, We do Ron Ron

[Reuben]

We love
Ron Vlaar
Give thanks and praise to McGrath
We're gonna be alright

[markeeeebeeee2005]

Pleased about this and good to see the positivity on here. But must confess I don't know much about him. Are there any experts in dutch football on here who can tell me how good he actually is.

[Chipsticks]

Pleased about this and good to see the positivity on here. But must confess I don't know much about him. Are there any experts in dutch football on here who can tell me how good he actually is.

A guy I vaguely know who supports Feyenoord gave the following scout report on him, having seen him play for a fair few years:

- Pretty good header

- Pretty good long pass

- Very strong (could be a MMA fighter)

- Bit of a fighter (in the good sense)/leader on the pitch and a popular player at the club Feyenoord.

- Was deemed to be the next Jaap Stam but never fulfilled that promise (also due to injury)

- Was with Clasie, El Ahmadi (yours also), Bakkal and Guidetti the carrying player of the team this last season for Feyenoord.

- Has suffered his fair share of injuries. Quite some actually, but is to full fitness, also thanks a specially designed regime for himself.

- Had a mixed, maybe even bad first part of the season (Groningen away was the absolute low), but second part was pretty good. Good enough for a Dutch NT squad spot and ultimately a starting spot against Portugal over Heitinga.

- IMO he turns slow around his own axis, meaning an agile player that easily twists and turns can leave him in the dust.

- Though he is not slow. Vlaar has proper speed.

- He is a bit stiff, also from all the working out he has done I guess.

- Overall is a decent defender. Made for EPL if he was ever going abroad. I think he must be scaled into the category useful club player if he comes to Villa and plays in EPL. I think de Vrij at Feyenoord has a higher ceiling (was really the stand out in the last U21 game for Holland) and the same goes for BMI probably (not sure about him though). In the short term this is going to hurt Feyenoord, but if both named CD develop well and build a good understanding (something de Vrij and Vlaar had) then they could be good and use the money for a striker. Or not, as Vlaar was in a talent share construction IIRC and so I guess they have some pay back to do. But that's another story.

[markeeeebeeee2005]

Cheers Chipsticks he sounds like a more natural partner for Clarke than Dunne.

[paul_e]

From the highlights I've watched and everything I've read about him he'll be the more aggressive ball winner, allowing Clark to sweep behind him, this is usually effective in the prem (vidic and ferdinand being a good example who play the same way) so they could make a very good pairing.  Dunne and Baker both seem more comfortable in the more aggressive role so I'm not sure we've got a natural replacement for Clark, which is where I think we'll look to bring in another defender.

Going off on a tangent, looking at the way we've paired defenders recently got me thinking, Luke Young and Cuellar both liked to sweep behind from fullback and did it very well so I wonder if the main reason for the defence working under Mon is that we always had 1 of the full backs covering that role, which allowed Collins and Dunne to be more aggressive.  After mon left we never saw the fullbacks used in that way and suddenly the previous solid looking partnership showed it was a lot more fragile than we thought.

[glasses]

Going off on a tangent, looking at the way we've paired defenders recently got me thinking, Luke Young and Cuellar both liked to sweep behind from fullback and did it very well so I wonder if the main reason for the defence working under Mon is that we always had 1 of the full backs covering that role, which allowed Collins and Dunne to be more aggressive.  After mon left we never saw the fullbacks used in that way and suddenly the previous solid looking partnership showed it was a lot more fragile than we thought.

I fully agree with you there.

[Matt Collins]

Interesting if the Douglas rumours are true. I don't know anything about him, but the fact he is a Brazilian 6 foot 3 centre back suggests he should be good in the air and reasonably quick  (is it racist to think that a black man is very unlikely to be slow?)

It's only a rumour at present so unwise to read too much into this. I was initally both quite intrigued and a bit disappointed for Clark. But we know Lambert likes to rotate (although I'm less sure he does that with centre backs so much). But it might be that he thinks Clark is ideally suited to some games (at home, and against ball playing sides) but would prefer a different combination in other games (eg against the likes of Andy Carroll he might want a Vlaar type warrior?)

Anyway, idol speculation really.

[Matt Collins]

Going off on a tangent, looking at the way we've paired defenders recently got me thinking, Luke Young and Cuellar both liked to sweep behind from fullback and did it very well so I wonder if the main reason for the defence working under Mon is that we always had 1 of the full backs covering that role, which allowed Collins and Dunne to be more aggressive.  After mon left we never saw the fullbacks used in that way and suddenly the previous solid looking partnership showed it was a lot more fragile than we thought.

I fully agree with you there.

I agree too. That, and defending less deeply. Plus both players have always been inconsistent throughout their careers. We shouldn't forget quite how fantastic Collins and Dunne were for the majority of that first season though. Laursen will always be loved for his commitment, but both were a step ahead of Laursen for that period (as evidenced by our vastly better goals against record when they joined compared to the Laursen era)

[glasses]

Interesting if the Douglas rumours are true. I don't know anything about him, but the fact he is a Brazilian 6 foot 3 centre back suggests he should be good in the air and reasonably quick  (is it racist to think that a black man is very unlikely to be slow?)
It's only a rumour at present so unwise to read too much into this. I was initally both quite intrigued and a bit disappointed for Clark. But we know Lambert likes to rotate (although I'm less sure he does that with centre backs so much). But it might be that he thinks Clark is ideally suited to some games (at home, and against ball playing sides) but would prefer a different combination in other games (eg against the likes of Andy Carroll he might want a Vlaar type warrior?)

Anyway, idol speculation really.

Heskey, Emile

[Matt Collins]

Exception, rule