John Terry - Gone

[kippaxvilla2]

Look S'rAlex has now weighed in and said he would've signed Terry if he had still been at Manure.  Now given his sage advice about hiring one of our most successful managers of the last 7 years that's good enough for me.

[Matt Collins]

It's a bit like saying he'd have bought Steven gerrard tho isn't it. Of course he would, he was one of the best centre backs in Europe

[Chico Hamilton III]

It's a bit like saying he'd have bought Steven gerrard tho isn't it. Of course he would, he was one of the best centre backs in Europe

Nonsense. I reckon I'm a better centre half than Gerrard

[darren woolley]

I still think he will do a good job for us and hopefully be fully fit all season.

[London Villan]

Will he be able to play more than half of our games?

2015/16 he played 24 league games
2016/17 he played 9 league games

[Pete3206]

Will he be able to play more than half of our games?

Yes

[Clark W Griswold]

Collymore signed after the 96/97 season, 95/96 was 4th and the cup semi. We'd still finished a 'disappointing' 5th though.

'Fun' fact, that is the only time we have finished top 5 in consecutive seasons since the early 30's.

isn't that what I said ? Win cup in 1996, thought we signed Stanley  that summer so 1996-97 season ?

Yes, travelling to Leicester away for the opening day of the 97-98 season was the last time I felt proper confident as a Villa fan, that we were going to challenge for the league, and we were a big deal. We lost 1-0, Collymore was crap and all the pre match optimism looked like folly. We lost the next few, Collymore fell out with Savo, the morale ebbed away and by the following Feb, Little was gone and we were well into the lower half. Gregory got us back on track but then when Yorke left that summer the game was up. We felt like an also ran.

[Nelly]

We have been ever since, I think.

[Duncan Shaw]

We have been ever since, I think.

i think we had a spell under MON where we looked like more than that....poor decisions at critical times stopped us making the final step, as is well documented on here.

[Dave]

It's not unusual in Italy for defenders to play at the highest level into their late 30s - Baresi, Bergomi, Costacurta, Maldini, Cannavaro. That said, Terry is nowhere near that class of player.

That's some list of great defenders including my favourite of all time Gianfranco Baresi.

That's not his name. He's Franchino Baresi, shortened to Franco.

[Hopadop]

We have been ever since, I think.

i think we had a spell under MON where we looked like more than that....poor decisions at critical times stopped us making the final step, as is well documented on here.

Poor decisions undoubtedly, but I reckon all teams make those. I suspect it was a combination of Lerner's lack of savvy, divorce, the stock market crash (so Gordon Brown, obvs) and Man City. I don't think he was ever rich enough to properly transform us.

But you're right - I remember seeing the first Nike kits in the big Oxford St store, alongside Arsenal and Barcelona. It was heady for a time.

[paul_e]

Mon had 2 problems.

He couldn't find a decent striker to offer an alternative to Gabby and Carew  If you look at how he spent the money he was given the spending on defence and midfield was totally out of line with the lack of spending up front and it showed, we were defensively sound but just didn't have the options up front if Gabby and Carew weren't doing it and neither of them was quite good enough to turn games on their own.

[itbrvilla]

We have been ever since, I think.

i think we had a spell under MON where we looked like more than that....poor decisions at critical times stopped us making the final step, as is well documented on here.

We looked like a team spunking money on shite and achieving less than others with less resources.

[kippaxvilla2]

He bought two brand new defences two seasons running didn't he?  Including paying £4m for Zat Knight, three months after he could have got him on a Bosman.

[Edvard Remberg]

He must play 30 games - part of the agreement.