N'Zogbia

[Mister E]

...  Look at all our inward transfers after Bent. Benteke was arguably the only success at a mere 7 million and a scoring return of 1 in 2 playing in the worst Villa team ever. Bent played in arguably our best team in years with a return of 1 in 3 but I'm open to correction. Don't forget the massive transfer fee we received for Bent, what was it?? NIL. Again my opinion but a massive loss. Finally, why are you trying to change history with the MON years. Give me those days now rather than the state we are in today

Allan, I can't let go the comment in bold!

I understand you're getting excited about the Bent debate but Benteke was not in the worst Villa team ever: he isn't playing for us this season!! THIS season's friggin' team ranks much worse than last, and in my 50 years of watching it is probably the worst.

[Villa in Denmark]

Completely missing the point with the Bent v Benteke value for money thing.

We paid top whack for Bent to buy guaranteed goals to keep up us, which he did.  In the 2 half seasons he was fit he won us enough games to keep us safe 2 seasons running.  Worth every penny of the £18M  And whatever Allan C says, he was scoring at not much over 1 in 2 up to the point he was injured.  That his overall record ended up closer to 1 ion 3 just shows how much that injury f¤¤ked him.

We paid a hefty fee for Benteke in what was either a one of piece of scouting brilliance from Lamber and the brains trust, or we got lucky.  £7M for a relatively unknown youngster from a minor European league was a huge gamble.  It didn't even pan out the way Lambert thought it would.  Go back and listen to some of the interviews when he's getting it in the neck about not playing Bent.

He'd bought Benteke to be the target man / foil for Bent.  He was Heskey's replacement, not Bent's, but it was soon obvious, even in the ca, 200 minutes they played together that that wasn't going to work, but that Benteke could do the lot on his own and open up for a different approach all together.  At that point Bent was consigned to keeping Hutton company and any chance of getting a fee disappeared to a pipe dream.

And yes Mr E. Anyone who thinks Lambert's first 2 years were the worst Villa team ever should maybe have a look around.  There's one thing in bending the facts, or taking an obtuse view of statistics to support an argument.  Completely ignoring the biggest steaming pile of shit to fall on B6 in 30 years to score a point is something else.

[Allan C]

...  Look at all our inward transfers after Bent. Benteke was arguably the only success at a mere 7 million and a scoring return of 1 in 2 playing in the worst Villa team ever. Bent played in arguably our best team in years with a return of 1 in 3 but I'm open to correction. Don't forget the massive transfer fee we received for Bent, what was it?? NIL. Again my opinion but a massive loss. Finally, why are you trying to change history with the MON years. Give me those days now rather than the state we are in today

Allan, I can't let go the comment in bold!

I understand you're getting excited about the Bent debate but Benteke was not in the worst Villa team ever: he isn't playing for us this season!! THIS season's friggin' team ranks much worse than last, and in my 50 years of watching it is probably the worst.

That's a fair point Mister E. I totally agree. This team is definitely the worst I've seen since my dad took me down for my first game in 1969

[Ian.]

McCleish and Lambert's teams were poles apart from this seasons shambles. However all are part of what we are today, Randy and his sidekicks included.

[john e]

IMO, N'Zogbia together with Bent was the start of the decline. I didn't rate either of them and the policy of buying worse then your selling began there. I can't believe he's still here, a complete and utter waste of money

You didn't rate a player who kept us up, scored a goal every other game and was better than anyone we'd had in his position for over a decade?

this whole debate started here, Alan didn't rate Bent, and so it begins

I don't dispute his goal record, I admit he scored the goals to keep us up, and I don't have any bad feelings for him at all and have always wished him well

But I never rated him before and still don't, although stats are important and many can have there say on how great he was by producing them
I just saw a limited footballer who we payed a lot of money for and sold for nothing
I know he scored us a few goals which I cheered and enjoyed every one,

But I still don't rate him very highly and that's the top and bottom of it,
 you can keep showing me his goal record but it won't change my mind I know what I saw and don't think he was that good as a top level striker
Everyone to there own I suppose

[Allan C]

Completely missing the point with the Bent v Benteke value for money thing.

We paid top whack for Bent to buy guaranteed goals to keep up us, which he did.  In the 2 half seasons he was fit he won us enough games to keep us safe 2 seasons running.  Worth every penny of the £18M  And whatever Allan C says, he was scoring at not much over 1 in 2 up to the point he was injured.  That his overall record ended up closer to 1 ion 3 just shows how much that injury f¤¤ked him.

We paid a hefty fee for Benteke in what was either a one of piece of scouting brilliance from Lamber and the brains trust, or we got lucky.  £7M for a relatively unknown youngster from a minor European league was a huge gamble.  It didn't even pan out the way Lambert thought it would.  Go back and listen to some of the interviews when he's getting it in the neck about not playing Bent.

He'd bought Benteke to be the target man / foil for Bent.  He was Heskey's replacement, not Bent's, but it was soon obvious, even in the ca, 200 minutes they played together that that wasn't going to work, but that Benteke could do the lot on his own and open up for a different approach all together.  At that point Bent was consigned to keeping Hutton company and any chance of getting a fee disappeared to a pipe dream.

And yes Mr E. Anyone who thinks Lambert's first 2 years were the worst Villa team ever should maybe have a look around.  There's one thing in bending the facts, or taking an obtuse view of statistics to support an argument.  Completely ignoring the biggest steaming pile of shit to fall on B6 in 30 years to score a point is something else.

Villa in Denmark, a simple question, given the choice, would you choose Bent or Benteke?? All other managers since Bent' s transfer have suffered because of it IMO. The 18 million plus should have been spent better IMO

[old man villa fan]

Completely missing the point with the Bent v Benteke value for money thing.

We paid top whack for Bent to buy guaranteed goals to keep up us, which he did.  In the 2 half seasons he was fit he won us enough games to keep us safe 2 seasons running.  Worth every penny of the £18M  And whatever Allan C says, he was scoring at not much over 1 in 2 up to the point he was injured.  That his overall record ended up closer to 1 ion 3 just shows how much that injury f¤¤ked him.

We paid a hefty fee for Benteke in what was either a one of piece of scouting brilliance from Lamber and the brains trust, or we got lucky.  £7M for a relatively unknown youngster from a minor European league was a huge gamble.  It didn't even pan out the way Lambert thought it would.  Go back and listen to some of the interviews when he's getting it in the neck about not playing Bent.

He'd bought Benteke to be the target man / foil for Bent.  He was Heskey's replacement, not Bent's, but it was soon obvious, even in the ca, 200 minutes they played together that that wasn't going to work, but that Benteke could do the lot on his own and open up for a different approach all together.  At that point Bent was consigned to keeping Hutton company and any chance of getting a fee disappeared to a pipe dream.

And yes Mr E. Anyone who thinks Lambert's first 2 years were the worst Villa team ever should maybe have a look around.  There's one thing in bending the facts, or taking an obtuse view of statistics to support an argument.  Completely ignoring the biggest steaming pile of shit to fall on B6 in 30 years to score a point is something else.

Villa in Denmark, a simple question, given the choice, would you choose Bent or Benteke?? All other managers since Bent' s transfer have suffered because of it IMO. The 18 million plus should have been spent better IMO

Who else was available that was guaranteed to score goals.  We needed someone to get the goals and had to pay that amount.  £18m was ok but I thought the rising to £25m was a bit over the top.  If he had not had that injury, we could have got the bext part of what we paid for him at the end of McLeish's season.

Bent was never a top class international but he was effective in a team creating chances.

[Toronto Villa]

Completely missing the point with the Bent v Benteke value for money thing.

We paid top whack for Bent to buy guaranteed goals to keep up us, which he did.  In the 2 half seasons he was fit he won us enough games to keep us safe 2 seasons running.  Worth every penny of the £18M  And whatever Allan C says, he was scoring at not much over 1 in 2 up to the point he was injured.  That his overall record ended up closer to 1 ion 3 just shows how much that injury f¤¤ked him.

We paid a hefty fee for Benteke in what was either a one of piece of scouting brilliance from Lamber and the brains trust, or we got lucky.  £7M for a relatively unknown youngster from a minor European league was a huge gamble.  It didn't even pan out the way Lambert thought it would.  Go back and listen to some of the interviews when he's getting it in the neck about not playing Bent.

He'd bought Benteke to be the target man / foil for Bent.  He was Heskey's replacement, not Bent's, but it was soon obvious, even in the ca, 200 minutes they played together that that wasn't going to work, but that Benteke could do the lot on his own and open up for a different approach all together.  At that point Bent was consigned to keeping Hutton company and any chance of getting a fee disappeared to a pipe dream.

And yes Mr E. Anyone who thinks Lambert's first 2 years were the worst Villa team ever should maybe have a look around.  There's one thing in bending the facts, or taking an obtuse view of statistics to support an argument.  Completely ignoring the biggest steaming pile of shit to fall on B6 in 30 years to score a point is something else.

Villa in Denmark, a simple question, given the choice, would you choose Bent or Benteke?? All other managers since Bent' s transfer have suffered because of it IMO. The 18 million plus should have been spent better IMO

That argument isn't apples to apples in the slightest. Benteke was a relatively unknown player coming from one of Europe's smaller leagues bought in the summer. Darren Bent was an established player, with international caps, who had been transferred previously for many millions of pounds at PL level, and scored at that time close to 100 goals as a PL player. We bought him in the January window from a rival team in the division and one that was in a similar position to us. We paid a premium but Darren Bent paid for himself many times over.

[paul_e]

Completely missing the point with the Bent v Benteke value for money thing.

We paid top whack for Bent to buy guaranteed goals to keep up us, which he did.  In the 2 half seasons he was fit he won us enough games to keep us safe 2 seasons running.  Worth every penny of the £18M  And whatever Allan C says, he was scoring at not much over 1 in 2 up to the point he was injured.  That his overall record ended up closer to 1 ion 3 just shows how much that injury f¤¤ked him.

We paid a hefty fee for Benteke in what was either a one of piece of scouting brilliance from Lamber and the brains trust, or we got lucky.  £7M for a relatively unknown youngster from a minor European league was a huge gamble.  It didn't even pan out the way Lambert thought it would.  Go back and listen to some of the interviews when he's getting it in the neck about not playing Bent.

He'd bought Benteke to be the target man / foil for Bent.  He was Heskey's replacement, not Bent's, but it was soon obvious, even in the ca, 200 minutes they played together that that wasn't going to work, but that Benteke could do the lot on his own and open up for a different approach all together.  At that point Bent was consigned to keeping Hutton company and any chance of getting a fee disappeared to a pipe dream.

And yes Mr E. Anyone who thinks Lambert's first 2 years were the worst Villa team ever should maybe have a look around.  There's one thing in bending the facts, or taking an obtuse view of statistics to support an argument.  Completely ignoring the biggest steaming pile of shit to fall on B6 in 30 years to score a point is something else.

Villa in Denmark, a simple question, given the choice, would you choose Bent or Benteke?? All other managers since Bent' s transfer have suffered because of it IMO. The 18 million plus should have been spent better IMO

That's really not fair, they're totally different players who were bought at different times and even then the latter was a lucky gamble, I thought he looked good in the videos we saw but I didn't expect him to be pushing on a goal every other game.  Bent was what we needed when we signed him and it's incredibly unlucky that we only got 1 season of value from him before he picked up a career defining injury, for all the limitations to his game I did fully expect a goal every other game from him, and that's pretty much what we got for 12 months.  His sell on value is irrelevant because at the time we weren't buying him to sell on, we were buying him to get us back into the top half of the league.

[steffo]

Bent scored goals because he was fed by width. TSM1 & TSM2 believed fullbacks should provide width.

Take creative players, Young, Albrighton, Downing, Milner to supply Bent.

Then replace them with Hutton, Bennett, Luna, Baccuna, Cissokko, & Lowton.

That is why we are where we are and ironically where Albrighton is. Negative, negative TSM managers.

Food for thought. Benteke would score 30 + per season when Young and Downing were supplying width.

[Steve R]

The justification for buying Bent was that he enabled us to avoid relegation.  Through no fault of his own he has now become a waste of money - we eventually got relegated anyways.

You could argue that we would have been better off getting relegated during Houllier's season. It's not got any easier to get promoted to the PL and hopefully we'd have been back up by now.

In the last 5 years we have spent a shedload of money, seen maybe half a dozen really good games and have stunk the PL out with increasing degrees of pungency. Does it really make any difference how good Darren Bent was ?

[PaulWinch again]

The justification for buying Bent was that he enabled us to avoid relegation.  Through no fault of his own he has now become a waste of money - we eventually got relegated anyways.

You could argue that we would have been better off getting relegated during Houllier's season. It's not got any easier to get promoted to the PL and hopefully we'd have been back up by now.

In the last 5 years we have spent a shedload of money, seen maybe half a dozen really good games and have stunk the PL out with increasing degrees of pungency. Does it really make any difference how good Darren Bent was ?

Well when you're debating how good a player he was it does.

[brian green]

Benteke was so good he could score from hoofball.  He was his own provider.

[Mister E]

I like what Darren Bent did for us, and the fact that Blunderland were so pissed off when he left supports the view that he was a match winner (look at Defoe now for a similar effect).
Benteke is a far better player, despite what is currently happening for him.

[Steve R]

The justification for buying Bent was that he enabled us to avoid relegation.  Through no fault of his own he has now become a waste of money - we eventually got relegated anyways.

You could argue that we would have been better off getting relegated during Houllier's season. It's not got any easier to get promoted to the PL and hopefully we'd have been back up by now.

In the last 5 years we have spent a shedload of money, seen maybe half a dozen really good games and have stunk the PL out with increasing degrees of pungency. Does it really make any difference how good Darren Bent was ?

Well when you're debating how good a player he was it does.

Fair enough. Bent was fkin useless. Is that any better?