Summer transfer, gossip, speculation and the usual butter ollocks thread

[oldhill_avfc]

Just wondering if we get £80m for Jack how we'll spend it.  When you look at our record in black and white, it's easy to see why we are where we are.  It's so easy to get it wrong.  And yeah, I know we got McGinn for peanuts and I know a few may be decent assets next season.  And yes, I thought some were pretty good buys at the time and yes I know every club buys some turkeys.  Even so, bloody hell...

McCormack - £13m
Kodjia - £11.5m
Hogan - £9.5m
Tshibola - £5m
Gollini - £5m
Kalinic - £5.4m
Wesley - £22.5m
Targett - £14m
Konsa - £12m
Nakamba - £11m
Samatta - £9.5m
Trezuget - £9m
El Ghazi - £8.1m
Engels £7.2m

McCormack and Hogan are absolute stinkers but were not bought by the current regime.

The rest are mainly decent buys for what they cost.  Ok they’ve proved not good enough for the premier league but that mainly proves you just need a bigger budget. 

I expect them to look good in the championship if that’s what it comes to.

[Toronto Villa]

Then a lot of people liked that flavour. Look on here when he arrived, the reception he got in his first game. Yes of course the Villa connection helped but I think it would be unfair to suggest he was an opportunistic appointment.

No, you're absolutely right - he was a very popular appointment, although not with me.  Brentford beating us a few times, doing pretty well at a club with low expectations, and being a Villa fan weren't my criteria.

Fair enough. I think given where we were at the time, all a bit glum and dire staring once again at another season in the Championship as they Bruce wheels had fallen off, getting in a manager proven to play a certain brand of football was understandably appealing for the owners. It would have been great to get someone of a more significant standing in the game but in truth we had just fired one. All in all I felt at the time it was a good appointment.

[Mister E]

How much of that was the 'anyone but Bruce' aspect though? If you look at the poll for the new manager he wasn't a universal choice, I think he had a quarter of the votes. Once it was confirmed most people were happy but you'd be hard pressed to find many times where that isn't true. Even with McLeish most people accepted it and started talking about him at least making us hard to beat, etc.

Not how I remember it. McLeish's managerial record was indifferent at best at the highest level, and many were perplexed that Randy had been so dogged in his effort to bring him to VP.

[paul_e]

How much of that was the 'anyone but Bruce' aspect though? If you look at the poll for the new manager he wasn't a universal choice, I think he had a quarter of the votes. Once it was confirmed most people were happy but you'd be hard pressed to find many times where that isn't true. Even with McLeish most people accepted it and started talking about him at least making us hard to beat, etc.

Not how I remember it. McLeish's managerial record was indifferent at best at the highest level, and many were perplexed that Randy had been so dogged in his effort to bring him to VP.

What i mean is once he was in the job. I was talking about the reception at the first game and the general attitude towards him. As I say I think most people we're willing to get behind him for a few months and it was around the infamous Tottenham game when that started to change.

What I was getting at is that fans getting behind the manager once he's in the job isn't all that unusual but that Smith was only one of a group of 4-5 that got pretty strong backing from people on here and elsewhere in the week after Bruce went. Almost every reservation raised by anyone was about his lack of experience at a big club or in a top league and thast has proven to be the problem, it doesn't mean he was a bad choice or unwanted, just that many people worried it was too big a step up and that does seem to be the case.

[CT Villan]

I wanted Bielsa, but was not against Smith. In reality I didn't know a lot about him but he seemed well respected at Brentford. The front-foot football was alluring for sure.

If we go down we will absolutely have to add quality to what is left after our better players leave. There are a number of potential problems though, not least how will FFP look and even though we may have lots of money to spend, the selling clubs will try to hold out for big money which typically pushes any purchases to the end of the transfer window and reduces the impact of a full pre-season with the squad. This also risks not getting the players you want, though Villa would never do anything like that [rolls eyes].

[mr underhill]

the inevitable re-build starts with a new management team.

[aev]

We have some good players, but I guess they have been thrown together and it has been sink or swim.

If you consider 3 of our midfield are likely to have suitors, it is pretty depressing. Our attacking options haven’t been good enough - too much emphasis has been put on 2 flakey widemen and we were overly reliant on a Brazilian from a pretty average league who got injured at the wrong time.

[supertom]

We need a manager and a director of football (or whatever they call the bloke who makes the signings these days) that are on the same page. We need a clear idea of what we want to play. System, style of football etc. We need to sign accordingly. If we want to play out from the back, we need players who can do that. If we want a back four, we need more resolute fullbacks. If we want wing backs, they need to be better in attack and more athletic (to be fair I think Freddy is dynamic enough, he just needs a shit load of coaching defensively). We need a head coach who actually has the nous to be a head coach. We've had managers up until now, and that's a dying system.

Our attacking system needs the right players to fit and we need a front man that fits that system. Dean has never really had an idea of how he wants to play in the final third, or at least a way of implementing it. It's negligence of the highest order too, that we have such a lack of pace in our side. You need pace in this league and we're painfully slow, particularly in the final third. This was something even someone as shite as Lambert tried to instil in our play, that we had a quick front three. It's painful watching Trezeguet trying to beat a fullback. He looks like my gran running for a bus. El Ghazi is a bit fleeter of foot, but is never going to get by a premier league full back.

Again, I sense a lack of consistency between the players our transfer team pinpointed, and those which Deano wanted to bring in. It's Sherwood/Reilly again. Will we ever learn? Sick in your mouth a bit, but lets follow what Wolves have done.

[CT]

We need a manager and a director of football (or whatever they call the bloke who makes the signings these days) that are on the same page. We need a clear idea of what we want to play. System, style of football etc. We need to sign accordingly. If we want to play out from the back, we need players who can do that. If we want a back four, we need more resolute fullbacks. If we want wing backs, they need to be better in attack and more athletic (to be fair I think Freddy is dynamic enough, he just needs a shit load of coaching defensively). We need a head coach who actually has the nous to be a head coach. We've had managers up until now, and that's a dying system.

Our attacking system needs the right players to fit and we need a front man that fits that system. Dean has never really had an idea of how he wants to play in the final third, or at least a way of implementing it. It's negligence of the highest order too, that we have such a lack of pace in our side. You need pace in this league and we're painfully slow, particularly in the final third. This was something even someone as shite as Lambert tried to instil in our play, that we had a quick front three. It's painful watching Trezeguet trying to beat a fullback. He looks like my gran running for a bus. El Ghazi is a bit fleeter of foot, but is never going to get by a premier league full back.

Again, I sense a lack of consistency between the players our transfer team pinpointed, and those which Deano wanted to bring in. It's Sherwood/Reilly again. Will we ever learn? Sick in your mouth a bit, but lets follow what Wolves have done.

Wolves is exactly the blueprint we should be following. Unfortunately we’ve put the circus music on again and got it all wrong.

[Dante Lavelli]

The Wolves route being to rely on one super agent to feed his players through the club?

[dave.woodhall]

And how many times did Wolves get it wrong? They've just had half a century where mediocrity usually looked a hopeless ambition.

[AsTallAsLions]

The Wolves route being to rely on one super agent to feed his players through the club?

Not that I'm a fan of that strategy, but you can hardly argue it hasn't worked out swimmingly for that lot.

[charlatan]

The Wolves route being to rely on one super agent to feed his players through the club?

Knowing us we would choose a clown with a catchphrase like 'monster, monster'.

[hilts_coolerking]

The Wolves route being to rely on one super agent to feed his players through the club?

Not that I'm a fan of that strategy, but you can hardly argue it hasn't worked out swimmingly for that lot.

It's a much better idea than putting on a hair shirt and buying mediocre players for more than they're worth.

[Dante Lavelli]

The Wolves route being to rely on one super agent to feed his players through the club?

Not that I'm a fan of that strategy, but you can hardly argue it hasn't worked out swimmingly for that lot.

It definitely has.  But I’m not sure it would be easy to replicate.  The agent must be getting something out of it, so either an illegal share in the club (or chairman’s companies) or will be able to sell the players cheaply when he decides.  There must be a catch.