Darren Bent

[eastie]

The distraction is not good for the club or the manager, these stories will continue and we can nip it in the bud by clearing up the situation with a simple statement .

Lambert has already said that he didn't pick Bent because he picked a team to win the game.
There's your statement, Lambert doesn't think having Bent in the team will win games.

But it seems no one wants to believe that so there's no real point in the club saying anything else because until they say what you want to hear you'll ignore it anyway!

So lambert thinks Bowery is more useful to the club than bent? How can that possibly be conceived to be in the best interests of aston villa?

We all know bents goal scoring record and its ridiculous to suggest bent is not good enough to be in a squad containing an untried striker from a lower league- maybe lambert is toeing the party line and covering up the real reason but no way can he seriously put Bowery ahead of bent for footballing reasons!

[pauliewalnuts]

And also, if true about the contract situation just shows how short term and narrow minded we have become, £6m saving now, £40m potential loss at the end of the season.  Also, if true, it shows Lambert to be a yes man in my opinion seeing as he has 'no problem with Darren'.

If there is a financial clause re 50 appearances, why is everyone assuming it will be 6m? That sounds unlikely for a milestone like that. It could be a lot less than that. Which makes it more worrying if that really is the reason he is not getting used.

If the reason for selling him is he doesn't, and won't, fit in with the way we play, then I don't mind them selling him in January so long as the cash gets re-invested. The problem is, I think they'd flog him then go out and buy someone like Charlie Austin, or another lower leagues player who'll be on low wages when what we need are more experienced players.

If the reason for selling him is that we want him off the wage bill / we owe Sunderland some more money on 50 appearances then that's deeply worrying in terms of the way the club is being run.

[He wears a magic hat]

But no one apparently knows how good Bowery is, maybe he's superb in training and proving that he's the man to replace Benteke up front if we need to sub him for any reason.

There could well be an element of truth in this.

Its quite clear that in the current system that PL is employing that DB is surplus to requirement. It may also be that in this current system he cannot see DB filling the roll that Benteke is doing and that should there be a problem with Benteke then Bowery may well be showing in training that he is more suited to that roll.

I also don't find it to difficult to imagine DB throwing a strop about this and making PL' decision even easier by his lack of effort in training.

PL' comment 'Football is easy play well, train well' could well point to something like this.

If this is the case that its almost impossible not to back the manager.

The trouble is non of us know what is going on but its good fun listening to all the different opinions.

I like DB for what he is good at and in an ideal world I would like him to stay equally I won't lose too much sleep over his departure if it happen.

[Chris Smith]

The distraction is not good for the club or the manager, these stories will continue and we can nip it in the bud by clearing up the situation with a simple statement .

Lambert has already said that he didn't pick Bent because he picked a team to win the game.
There's your statement, Lambert doesn't think having Bent in the team will win games.

But it seems no one wants to believe that so there's no real point in the club saying anything else because until they say what you want to hear you'll ignore it anyway!

So lambert thinks Bowery is more useful to the club than bent? How can that possibly be conceived to be in the best interests of aston villa?

We all know bents goal scoring record and its ridiculous to suggest bent is not good enough to be in a squad containing an untried striker from a lower league- maybe lambert is toeing the party line and covering up the real reason but no way can he seriously put Bowery ahead of bent for footballing reasons!

Bent's scoring record is 2 league goals from 9 PL games (2 as sub) this season. If he's building for the future and Bent isn't in his plans it makes sense to give Bowery some experience of being around the first team. 

[Drummond]

Indeed Dave.  We'd still have won the game if Bent was on the bench on Tuesday, as obviously Bowery had nothing to do with the result.  Lambert wouldn't have looked half as smug if it had been 0-0 though.

The essence of your post reads as if you're criticising Lambert for being smug that we won.

On your other point, we'd still have won the game if Doug Ellis (and his overhead kick) had been on the bench. Lambert wouldn't have picked him either.

[itbrvilla]

The distraction is not good for the club or the manager, these stories will continue and we can nip it in the bud by clearing up the situation with a simple statement .

Lambert has already said that he didn't pick Bent because he picked a team to win the game.
There's your statement, Lambert doesn't think having Bent in the team will win games.

But it seems no one wants to believe that so there's no real point in the club saying anything else because until they say what you want to hear you'll ignore it anyway!

So lambert thinks Bowery is more useful to the club than bent? How can that possibly be conceived to be in the best interests of aston villa?

We all know bents goal scoring record and its ridiculous to suggest bent is not good enough to be in a squad containing an untried striker from a lower league- maybe lambert is toeing the party line and covering up the real reason but no way can he seriously put Bowery ahead of bent for footballing reasons!

Spot on.

[PaulWinch again]

And also, if true about the contract situation just shows how short term and narrow minded we have become, £6m saving now, £40m potential loss at the end of the season.  Also, if true, it shows Lambert to be a yes man in my opinion seeing as he has 'no problem with Darren'.

If there is a financial clause re 50 appearances, why is everyone assuming it will be 6m? That sounds unlikely for a milestone like that. It could be a lot less than that. Which makes it more worrying if that really is the reason he is not getting used.

If the reason for selling him is he doesn't, and won't, fit in with the way we play, then I don't mind them selling him in January so long as the cash gets re-invested. The problem is, I think they'd flog him then go out and buy someone like Charlie Austin, or another lower leagues player who'll be on low wages when what we need are more experienced players.

If the reason for selling him is that we want him off the wage bill / we owe Sunderland some more money on 50 appearances then that's deeply worrying in terms of the way the club is being run.

Agree with all that. I don't mind selling him if it's all reinvested in the team, and in experienced quality players. However I don't want us selling him to a direct rival and I'd hate to think he's not playing due to penny pinching. If that's the case it's a disgrace.

[Irish villain]

It's one thing to sell Bent, it's quite another to consider selling him to a relegation rival - surely they wouldn't consider that option.

You just know he will become that player who always score against us if we sell him.

[Clampy]

The one possible problem i forsee is if we pick up a couple of defeats in the next few games (which is possible) and Bent is still sat in the stand on his mobile then you can expect a few Darren Bent reminder chants toward Lambert and it's not what we need really.

[Risso]

And also, if true about the contract situation just shows how short term and narrow minded we have become, £6m saving now, £40m potential loss at the end of the season.  Also, if true, it shows Lambert to be a yes man in my opinion seeing as he has 'no problem with Darren'.

If there is a financial clause re 50 appearances, why is everyone assuming it will be 6m? That sounds unlikely for a milestone like that. It could be a lot less than that. Which makes it more worrying if that really is the reason he is not getting used.

If the reason for selling him is he doesn't, and won't, fit in with the way we play, then I don't mind them selling him in January so long as the cash gets re-invested. The problem is, I think they'd flog him then go out and buy someone like Charlie Austin, or another lower leagues player who'll be on low wages when what we need are more experienced players.

If the reason for selling him is that we want him off the wage bill / we owe Sunderland some more money on 50 appearances then that's deeply worrying in terms of the way the club is being run.

As I've pointed out, it can't be £6m.  There wasn't that much owing at the end of May 2011 for all players with clauses like that.

[Mazrim]

There might be some appearance trigger. But it could be the case that Lambert has already decided that Bent isnt going to fit in with his plans, in which case why throw millions away giving Bent the odd cameo when he has somebody lined up in a month who will fit in? It could mean an extra player or two.

I must add though, that I'm a big fan of Bent, I've made no secret of that and I find it confusing and frustrating that he's not even figuring on the bench. But I also like Lambert and I have to accept that he has his reasons for doing what he's doing and that he'll either suffer for it or be vindicated but its his prerogative as manager.

I can at least understand the footballing reasons for playing Benteke instead of Bent at the moment but unless there's been something going on behind the scenes, I see no reason to drop Bent from the team altogether.
Which tells me that whatever he says, and he's a players manager and wont air his dirty linen in public for anything, there is a problem behind the scenes. Maybe Bent feels he's entitled to a place without trying and is mugging us off in training (a few things I get from Lambert's comments suggest this to me), maybe there are personal problems or maybe it's something nobody has considered.

It's a bit of a mess though and it's possibly distracting to the team so hopefully it will be resolved one way or another soon.

[dave.woodhall]

There might be some appearance trigger. But it could be the case that Lambert has already decided that Bent isnt going to fit in with his plans, in which case why throw millions away giving Bent the odd cameo when he has somebody lined up in a month who will fit in? It could mean an extra player or two.

The one thing I don't understand about that is that it doesn't make financial sense. Apart from the 'more goals therefore higher up the table' argument, if he was playing we could say we want to keep him and drive the price higher. As it is, he's seen as surplus to requirements and it's now a buyer's market. 

[supertommykN'iba]

There might be some appearance trigger. But it could be the case that Lambert has already decided that Bent isnt going to fit in with his plans, in which case why throw millions away giving Bent the odd cameo when he has somebody lined up in a month who will fit in? It could mean an extra player or two.

The one thing I don't understand about that is that it doesn't make financial sense. Apart from the 'more goals therefore higher up the table' argument, if he was playing we could say we want to keep him and drive the price higher. As it is, he's seen as surplus to requirements and it's now a buyer's market. 

However, we could be playing him and he could be playing badly, not scoring, rising his record to say, 2 in 15 this season. He's clearly not wanted so it's better this way IMO

[dave.woodhall]

There might be some appearance trigger. But it could be the case that Lambert has already decided that Bent isnt going to fit in with his plans, in which case why throw millions away giving Bent the odd cameo when he has somebody lined up in a month who will fit in? It could mean an extra player or two.

The one thing I don't understand about that is that it doesn't make financial sense. Apart from the 'more goals therefore higher up the table' argument, if he was playing we could say we want to keep him and drive the price higher. As it is, he's seen as surplus to requirements and it's now a buyer's market. 

However, we could be playing him and he could be playing badly, not scoring, rising his record to say, 2 in 15 this season. He's clearly not wanted so it's better this way IMO

He'd still be in the team and playing, though.

[Risso]

There might be some appearance trigger. But it could be the case that Lambert has already decided that Bent isnt going to fit in with his plans, in which case why throw millions away giving Bent the odd cameo when he has somebody lined up in a month who will fit in? It could mean an extra player or two.

The one thing I don't understand about that is that it doesn't make financial sense. Apart from the 'more goals therefore higher up the table' argument, if he was playing we could say we want to keep him and drive the price higher. As it is, he's seen as surplus to requirements and it's now a buyer's market. 

I agree.  It also doesn't make any sort of footballing sense, because it's always possible that Bent will nick a goal when you're up against it.  If we were comfortably mid table, I'd say fine, Lambert has a plan and if that doesn't include Bent, then we're safe enough and now's the time to build for next season.  When we're in and out of the bottom three as we are, we need all of our better players available.  Lambert needs to get this sorted out.