Idrissa Gueye - now gone

[Villafirst]

That's what you get with shite managers and a shite owner without a single clue how to run a football club. Gana is decent with a good manager in Koeman. Pity he didn't stay under this new regime.

[avfcpg]

I think I have seen him go further forward tonight than at his entire time combined with Villa.  He is definitely a decent player in a decent side.

I reckon that could be said about a few of our players from last season.

Yep..always thought he was a player..ditto Vertoute and Gil..play them the right way (granted with better players around them) and they look decent.

[Keeno]

I think I have seen him go further forward tonight than at his entire time combined with Villa.  He is definitely a decent player in a decent side.

I reckon that could be said about a few of our players from last season.

Yep..always thought he was a player..ditto Vertoute and Gil..play them the right way (granted with better players around them) and they look decent.

Exactly this. They'd look decent Premier League players in the right side. Its even more of a punch in the gut to see a player like Gana perform at such a level tonight.

[kippaxvilla2]

So Reillys recruitment was correct then?

[Dave]

So Reillys recruitment was correct then?

Not really, but that doesn't mean that the players that he bought were bad players.

[Dante Lavelli]

So Reillys recruitment was correct then?

I've always thought that the players selected by Reilly were decent or at least decent value for money.  They were not however necessarily the players we needed.  If they had been introduced to a solid team then I think they could have flourished (Gueye is a good example actually) however the solidity of last year's squad was provided by players like Richards and Gabby.

[pauliewalnuts]

So Reillys recruitment was correct then?

I've always thought that the players selected by Reilly were decent or at least decent value for money.  They were not however necessarily the players we needed.  If they had been introduced to a solid team then I think they could have flourished (Gueye is a good example actually) however the solidity of last year's squad was provided by players like Richards and Gabby.

Indeed.

[Dave]

So Reillys recruitment was correct then?

I've always thought that the players selected by Reilly were decent or at least decent value for money.  They were not however necessarily the players we needed.  If they had been introduced to a solid team then I think they could have flourished (Gueye is a good example actually) however the solidity of last year's squad was provided by players like Richards and Gabby.

And they were the wrong players for the direction that we'd (for some stupid reason) decided on.

If in some insane moment you decide to hire Tim Sherwood, you buy him Aaron Lennon and Andros Townsend to kick balls in the general direction of Rudy Gestede or Peter Crouch. You don't buy him a multi-lingual, multi-cultural bunch of decent prospects to blend into a creative whole.

The players we bought under a different manager would probably have been fine (fine, relative to what we actually got). The manager we had with different players would probably have been fine as well (fine, relative to what we actually got).

So while he may have approached things with admirable intentions - no, obviously it wasn't correct.

[kippaxvilla2]

History now of course.  But how ludicrous was it for Fox to have his 'list of one' in Sherwood decide to keep him on, then allow someone else to recruit the players we recruited when, as you indicate Sherwoods limits stretched to 'gwarn lads pamp it ap to the big bloke' type tactics. 

[SoccerHQ]

Thought Gana's motivation was a big problem here. He has ability but he didn't half down tools when we went 1 down. Be interested to see what he's like when Everton go on a bad run and lose a couple.

[Risso]

Fox should really have been tarred and feathered and then put in the stocks outside the ground, such were his crimes against Villa humanity.

[kippaxvilla2]

He really was feckin awful.  Just awful.  Remember him saying how being bottom wasn't the only indicator of success and pointed to increased shirt sales.  I knew we were fcuked from that day forward.

[Dante Lavelli]

True Dave.  Sherwood compounded matters by changing tactics and formations pretty much every match, making the scouts job of identifying players that fit into the club's system largely impossible.  There was clearly no joined up thinking at the club.  In fact - and I know this will not be popular - Reilly's 'thinking' was probably more detailed/honest than most, however defining the club's transfer philosophy was clearly a few levels above his pay-grade.

[SoccerHQ]

To me last summer transfer window simply came down to comically thinking Gestede could replace Benteke just because he scored on his debut once Adebayor didn't want to know.

If we'd got in a proven premier league striker like Loic Remy or Demba Ba or someone like that it's possibly we could've still survived as the midfield players would've been more confident playing balls to a decent striker knowing he could nick a goal at any stage like Benteke could which of course change games.

As much as people saying we were hopeless last season and this season is much better in terms of competitiveness....it was only around February the team really gave up.

First half of last season we had many narrow 1 goal defeats. Indeed when Garde took over a lot on here said we still had a good chance of staying up given the narrow defeats. A decent striker would've gone a long way to solving that. Not having any sort of back up plan for Adebayor cost us our premier league status there and then.

[Clampy]

Back to Gana, I didn't think he was that bad. He didn't want to hang around though and we got the majority of our money back so other than this thread, I'd more or less forgotten about him.