Transfer Speculation / Gossip

[olaftab]

I don't get where people are so convinced we'll be doomed this coming year. After all, we weren't actually close to being relegated last year – and that was with the awful run-in.

No you are right. We have been unassailable last 3 seasons with 38,41 and 38 points. I would obviously love a proper last day relegation fight!

[bobdylan]

Just thinking of Agbonlahor being on the bench and the rapturous reception from the fans when he comes on annoys me. It's Agbonlahor, not Messi FFS.

Anyway, I think he should leave. Never going to improve here now.

And yet he remains one of our better players. Until or if we can replace him with better then he needs to stay.

Quite, he's dipped markedly over the last few years, but the club has dipped even more alarmingly.

[BoskoDjembaSalifou]

Nah let's make sure nobody gets a rapturous welcome. Let's boo the claret and blue bastards.

His form doesn't merit that kind of reaction.

It's quite embarrassing actually. I don't know why a lot of our fans (not necessarily those on here) think Agbonlahor is gonna be our saviour.

[KevinGage]

For Gabby, I wonder if the general malaise at the club is the key to it.  We, as fans, have all been a bit battered by events from the last 4 years, in general nothing has gone our way.  Gabby is a fan as well, I wonder if he's struggling with the same apathy but amplified by the knowledge that he should be able to do something about it but all too often it hasn't worked out for him. 

He doesn't play like a fan.

What does that even mean?  He is a fan, that's 100% undeniable so yes he does play like a fan because that's what he is, he doesn't run himself into the ground (which is what I suspect you mean) because that's just not his game.  His game should be to wander across the line and look for chances to use his pace in behind.  That's exactly what he did when he got into the side but since then he's had mon try to rturn him into a target man, Houllier and McLeish try to make him a winger and Lambert trying to either carry that on or make him a 10.  it's been about 5 1/2 years (about the time we obught Heskey) since he was given a prolonged run in a role where he was looking to break in behind with his pace.  There are comments that his pace hasn't been so effective as he's got older, that's largely because he's breaking from the wrong areas now, defenders usually have a 3-4 yard headstart on him, that he often either gets there or at least forces a panicked clearance is testament to the fact that he's still fast as fuck.

He was never particularly into watching football as a kid, but if he had a team, it was Arsenal.

After scoring the equaliser against Everton at home in O'Neill's first season, Central News were interviewing him and said "It must have been great, scoring at the Holte End where you cheered the team as a boy."

Gabby:  "No.   I never went to games."

That side of things doesn't particularly bother me. If he was doing it on the pitch, I wouldn't care if he was tattoo'd and bollock-chained up like Robert Hopkins.

But Gabby has trotted through the last few seasons. 

I'm not sure I'd be at the point of selling him, but he shouldn't be a guaranteed pick.  And if dropping him meant that he spat his dummy and demanded a move, I wouldn't exactly be heartbroken.

[eamonn]

I'd love to know what happened with Helenius.

It's a Mathieu Berson level mystery. So highly thought of, so much potential, looked decent in the cup game where he scored, pretty much never seen again. It's all well and good a manager having biases, but not when it becomes a grudge to the detriment of the team.

I don't think there's much mystery. Lambert clearly thought he wasn't yet ready after his cameos in the first few weeks of the season. He picked-up an injury mid-season which probably ruled-out any loan move and once he came back with Kozak and Benteke both being crocked I guess he was a kind of back-up even if Lambert didn't have any great intention of blooding him too much (hence the Holt signing).

He should really go out on loan as soon as the new season kicks off to be honest so we can see what he's made of.

[PeterWithesShin]

It's a mystery how Holt, Gabby and Weimann were always picked ahead of him. Could The Gladiator really have been any worse, or even as bad, as they were the last 6 months of the season?

[usav]

It's all well and good a manager having biases, but not when it becomes a grudge to the detriment of the team.

Do we suffer more than other clubs from this?  Is it a Celtic thing?

[citizenDJ]

It's a mystery how Holt, Gabby and Weimann were always picked ahead of him. Could The Gladiator really have been any worse, or even as bad, as they were the last 6 months of the season?

My thoughts exactly, PWS. Given how very, very poor those three were (ah, well, Holt didn't do too much wrong I suppose), Helenius would have to be utterly abysmal to not be considered as an alternative, and I don't believe he is.

I still reckon he'll end up playing for Real Madrid one day.

[Toronto Villa]

Helenius will become the next Peter Crouch where we should have played him more and not sold him. We'll likely watch him score lots of goals for everyone else.

[PeterWithesShin]

All I can think of is attitude and/or off the field problems as he's looked good the few times I saw him (including pre-season). But in interviews I saw with him his attitude seemed spot on. It's a strange 'un.

[old man villa fan]

  Fuck off, if Ince was that good why is he even looking at Hull.  He made a huge impact last season, didn't he?  That's why all these massive clubs are fighting tooth and nail to get his autograph.  We are in the shit, there is no denying it.  Unless a sale happens by the end of July we are probably going to be in a proper relegation battle.  However shitting myself over missing out on the signings of massive stars such as Tom Ince isn't what will give me nightmares.

I don't get where people are so convinced we'll be doomed this coming year. After all, we weren't actually close to being relegated last year – and that was with the awful run-in.

I guess that's a judgement that depends on how happy you are to be finishing 15th in the league. That's a lot closer to relegation than we'd like to be, even with our new down-scaled expectations.

As for stability, I think we have got all the stablity Lerner cares about - 16th, 15th, 15th over three years. Still in the top flight, no threat whatsoever of doing anything else, but that doesn't really matter, the club's up for sale (new catch-all excuse for the total lack of ambition).

The sooner these people sell up and move on, the better.

I can see the point you are trying to make about staying in the top division but Lerner cannot be happy with the diluting of the playing strength of the squad over that period as it affects drastically how much the club is worth and how much he will get for us.

[Rodders]

Was there not a story - most likely apocryphal, admittedly - about Helenius having a massive hissy fit and storming off during training?

[Mister E]

Was there not a story - most likely apocryphal, admittedly - about Helenius having a massive hissy fit and storming off during training?

The Helenius mystery is one of the more bizarre happenings of last season.
There's an untold story there.

[brian green]

You are right Mr E.   Even the name Helenius has a Hercule Poirot ring about it.   You imagine the answer to the riddle is buried somewhere under the lava of Pompeii or carved into the wall of a Roman bath house.

[adrenachrome]

For Gabby, I wonder if the general malaise at the club is the key to it.  We, as fans, have all been a bit battered by events from the last 4 years, in general nothing has gone our way.  Gabby is a fan as well, I wonder if he's struggling with the same apathy but amplified by the knowledge that he should be able to do something about it but all too often it hasn't worked out for him. 

He doesn't play like a fan.

What does that even mean?  He is a fan, that's 100% undeniable so yes he does play like a fan because that's what he is, he doesn't run himself into the ground (which is what I suspect you mean) because that's just not his game.  His game should be to wander across the line and look for chances to use his pace in behind.  That's exactly what he did when he got into the side but since then he's had mon try to rturn him into a target man, Houllier and McLeish try to make him a winger and Lambert trying to either carry that on or make him a 10.  it's been about 5 1/2 years (about the time we obught Heskey) since he was given a prolonged run in a role where he was looking to break in behind with his pace.  There are comments that his pace hasn't been so effective as he's got older, that's largely because he's breaking from the wrong areas now, defenders usually have a 3-4 yard headstart on him, that he often either gets there or at least forces a panicked clearance is testament to the fact that he's still fast as fuck.

He was never particularly into watching football as a kid, but if he had a team, it was Arsenal.

After scoring the equaliser against Everton at home in O'Neill's first season, Central News were interviewing him and said "It must have been great, scoring at the Holte End where you cheered the team as a boy."

Gabby:  "No.   I never went to games."

That side of things doesn't particularly bother me. If he was doing it on the pitch, I wouldn't care if he was tattoo'd and bollock-chained up like Robert Hopkins.

But Gabby has trotted through the last few seasons. 

I'm not sure I'd be at the point of selling him, but he shouldn't be a guaranteed pick.  And if dropping him meant that he spat his dummy and demanded a move, I wouldn't exactly be heartbroken.

I remember that interview and others around that time. In one for Sky, he said that he wasn't  even very interested in football when he was younger, and was more into athletics. He seemed quite embarrassed that the interviewer was trying to push that angle and I thought fair play to him, he is being honest.

Of course he is a Villa as he came through as a youth, but he was not a fan.