Delph contract worry

[Dave]

It's all relative. If you're comparing it to the profit that Spurs made on Bale or Man Utd made on Ronaldo then it wasn't huge.

If you're comparing it to 97% of transfers made then all four were pretty good.

In financial terms at least, it doesn't even bear thinking about what we did with the monies we received.

I'm more concerned about not making anything on transfers since 2011.

If we sold players on for profit, wouldn't we be accused of being a selling club?

Accused by whom? And who would really care if we were accused of that?

If N'Zogbia, Hutton, Okore and Cissokho had turned into amazing players and we sold them for three times what we paid then I'd be absolutely over the moon.

[Clampy]

It's all relative. If you're comparing it to the profit that Spurs made on Bale or Man Utd made on Ronaldo then it wasn't huge.

If you're comparing it to 97% of transfers made then all four were pretty good.

In financial terms at least, it doesn't even bear thinking about what we did with the monies we received.

I'm more concerned about not making anything on transfers since 2011.

If we sold players on for profit, wouldn't we be accused of being a selling club?

Possibly, but even some of our mid-range players we probably should have sold for more (or in some cases anything).
Trouble is if you're not Chelsea or Man City, and possibly Utd you're basically a selling club.
Sometimes you have to shift someone on whilst they're sellable, and use it to try and further your squad. Sometimes it works (Southampton) and sometimes it just turns out badly (Spurs).

It's all retrospect but had we sold Benteke in 2013 we could probably have bought 3-4 good players for what we'd have got. Whether we could trust Lambert to get adequate replacements is another argument though (of which the correct answer is no).

I hate to think what this site would have been like had we sold Benteke after one season.

[silhillvilla]

The one that always gives me a cold sweat is Cahill sold for £3m and Curtis Davies coming in for £10m.

[LeeB]

The one that always gives me a cold sweat is Cahill sold for £3m and Curtis Davies coming in for £10m.

Didn't Cahill go for £5m?

It's still a shit deal mind.

[not3bad]

The one that always gives me a cold sweat is Cahill sold for £3m and Curtis Davies coming in for £10m.

Didn't Cahill go for £5m?

It's still a shit deal mind.

Really shit. Mind you I did have Curtis Davis in my dream team up until this week.

[eamonn]

Cahill, we never thought of a sell-on? We never do, although maybe it's more of a ''small club'' thing to do.

[Matt C]

Davies being sold for a small fee also looks a bit daft now too.

[pauliewalnuts]

MON was mental when it came to defenders.

Bought pretty much an entire defence one season, then the next season, bought another entire defence.

He must have spent over £30m on defenders.

Knight
Friedel
Collins
Dunne
Warnock
Beye (remember him?)
Shorey (or him?)
Luke Young
Cuellar
Curtis Davies

... all in the space of two seasons. Insane.

EDIT I make that just under 50m.

[eamonn]

All on very high wages (average of £50k a week?) due to the premium you pay on paying players who are already British-based and therefore on a lot more money than players of equivalent talent on the continent. But O'Neill and buying from abroad did not make easy bedfellows. We have his successor GHou to thank for signing Carew.

[Malandro]

back on topic, I'm really worried about Delph's contract. I hope somebody gives him enough money to buy Jay Lloyd's shoe collection.

[LeeB]

back on topic, I'm really worried about Delph's contract. I hope somebody gives him enough money to buy Jay Lloyd's shoe collection.

I wouldn't bother if I were him, Jay Lloyd apparently took to playing in said shoes after an excellent breakthrough season for the rest of his career.

[curlytailavfc]

typical footy money rules bye

[Matt Collins]

as opposed to the rest of us who would turn down a big salary increase to move jobs, especially if we had a 15 year career and no qualifications

I don't think I'd stay if I were him - but I really hope he does

[silhillvilla]

The stupid thing is we could be selling him for £25m instead it looks like he will go for the square root of fook all

[Dante Lavelli]

My strategy with Delph would be to convince him that after one more season playing at his current level with Villa and (importantly) England then he'd have a much higher profile.  He could still go to a big club but be considered first team player rather than a 'free' who will help comply with the homegrown rule.  If he went this summer he'd be on "Arsenal's" bench and lose his England place.  To persuade him that this is a good deal we'd probably have to agree a (low) fee for a future sale, but at least we'd get something.

In the meantime we get bought out and buy players that would convince him to commit beyond one more season.