January Transfer Window

[KevinGage]

Aye, I'm not sure the Portuguese league is that much better than the Belgian one. Good record there won't necessarily translate here.

Jovetic I'd consider, if the deal was right.  He won't need to get around the pitch as much as Drinkwater needed to. And obviously couldn't.

[paul_e]

Aye, I'm not sure the Portuguese league is that much better than the Belgian one. Good record there won't necessarily translate here.

Jovetic I'd consider, if the deal was right.  He won't need to get around the pitch as much as Drinkwater needed to. And obviously couldn't.

Maybe but Watkins work ethic is a big part of why we're playing so well. I have no idea if Jovetic is struggling for fitness but I'd rather not gamble on someone who's played so few games over such a long period (32 games and 3 goals in 3 seasons). 12 appearances this year looks better on paper but it's an average of about 20 minutes a time.

[tomd2103]

Watkins is clearly first choice at the moment, so anyone coming in is likely going to be on the bench to begin with.  Just not sure how an attractive proposition that would be unless it is someone nowhere near a first team, someone from a lower division moving up, someone who has perhaps seen better days or someone from abroad who we can offer more money to.

Depending on his fitness, I would be happy enough with giving Wesley a go as second choice for the remainder of the season, with Davis as third choice. 

[ozzjim]

Our bench is desparately short of forward options to either change things or rotate. If we can get a forward that will do the running and hold up that Ollie does in reserve, we should do it. Otherwise, we my well be better waiting till the summer.

[FatSam]

Yes, I’d agree that Milik is the only one of those that we should be looking at.

The range of potential transfer targets is very different to last year. With the team playing well, the options that would actually improve the squad are fewer, and the quality that we can attract is higher - so we should be operating in a completely different market. We aren’t really looking for short term fixes, unless a unique situation arises - like perhaps Costa. I don’t think Marega and Jovetic fit the age profile.

[Lastfootstamper]

Villa's January transfer market according to the beeb:

Aston Villa
Don't expect any big-money moves here but manager Dean Smith may look at his attack. Ollie Watkins, the £28m club-record signing from Brentford, has been outstanding but Keinan Davis has not produced enough goals when he has had a chance.

January is a fraught market, especially for acquiring the priceless commodity of goals, as Villa discovered with the failed £8.5m signing of Genk's Mbwana Samatta last year. He is already out on loan at Fenerbahce.

Villa have long been linked with Werder Bremen's Milot Rashica but at this stage there are no plans for any serious spending.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/55428143

A bit of me wants to think this might be a smokescreen. The missus has just asked me if I reckon we'll get anybody in, and midway through my explaining why I thought we'd not see much movement, something dawned on me. If you're our multi-billionaire owners, do you envisage a scenario in the next few years in which we're better placed to have a proper tilt at the title than we are right now in this crazy-arse season?

[Border villan]

I have faith that Lange and Dean will already have identified and begun to discuss signings/outgoings with our owners/CEO and the players concerned. Our new system of going about our business in a quiet considered manner is what we all want after the last 20 years of headline making turmoil.

[Mister E]

Our bench is desparately short of forward options to either change things or rotate. If we can get a forward that will do the running and hold up that Ollie does in reserve, we should do it. Otherwise, we my well be better waiting till the summer.

I take your point, Ozz, but I'd also argue that a different type of striker would be useful too; to provide something different for the opponents to deal with.


Can I give an example, you ask? - shit, no idea! 

[richtheholtender]

Watkins is clearly first choice at the moment, so anyone coming in is likely going to be on the bench to begin with.  Just not sure how an attractive proposition that would be unless it is someone nowhere near a first team, someone from a lower division moving up, someone who has perhaps seen better days or someone from abroad who we can offer more money to.

Depending on his fitness, I would be happy enough with giving Wesley a go as second choice for the remainder of the season, with Davis as third choice. 

Being in the bench for Aston Villa is like being a starter anywhere else 😊

[mcgrath_85]

We have given ourselves our great platform with the start we’ve made this season. I think signing a striker is really important for us to keep on improving and maybe stay around that top 6.
I wound try and sign someone to challenge Ollie for the starting spot. He’s been great and a wonderful improvement on Wesley last season, but he has only scored in 3 individual games so far. I know he’s been unlucky with VAR, but he does miss a fair few too.
Let’s cease the opportunity and go for it.

[Aldridge Villa]

The reserve striker is a tricky one. Are there many strikers out there on a parity with Ollie willing to join us knowing full well they’ll be on the bench a fair amount of the time ? If there is , would it be a prudent signing on our part from a financial perspective? Only time will tell of course.

[paul_e]

We have given ourselves our great platform with the start we’ve made this season. I think signing a striker is really important for us to keep on improving and maybe stay around that top 6.
I wound try and sign someone to challenge Ollie for the starting spot. He’s been great and a wonderful improvement on Wesley last season, but he has only scored in 3 individual games so far. I know he’s been unlucky with VAR, but he does miss a fair few too.
Let’s cease the opportunity and go for it.

As I've said many times over the last year or 2, I think the days of relying on 1 or 2 centre forwards to score a fuckload and drag you up the table are over. The trend now is to have regular goals for 3-4 players and that's where we are. If Watkins and Grealish can get 10-12 each (which is easily in reach from where they are) and a mix of AEG, Barkley, Traore and Trez can get another 20 (again well within reach) and then the rest of the team get 20 between them that'll be 60+ for the season which is usually enough for being in the mix at the top so long as the defence is competent (ours clearly is with the number of cleansheets we've kept). I've purposely gone for the lower end on all of those as well, I suspect we'll finish the season with something in the 70-80 range because we look a massive threat every game right now.

[SoccerHQ]

Arkadiusz Milik at Napoli and Moussa Marega at FC Porto are both out of contract this summer.

Former Citeh striker Stevan Jovetic n'all.

Marega was one of the names linked with us had we gone up in 2018.  Haven't really followed his career since, TBH.

Jovetic has barely played for 3 seasons, I worry he'd be similar to Drinkwater.

Marega doesn't look good enough to me, would have been an ok signing to add a bit more experience whilst Wes settled but he's Samatta level in my opinion and we're better than that now.

Milik is a very good player, I suspect he'll have a lot of options, him in and Davis out on loan then review in the summer would be exceptional business.

I see a bit of Porto games on Freesports and I think he'd be o.k in premier league. Scored good number of goals and has a physical, bustling style and can work the channels so he's everything really that Watkins is and we want Davis to be.

Was racially abused in a game last season so suspect he'd want to move if premier league club came in.

Agree on Milik though, that would be statement signing like Barkley was. Seems he had some dispute with Napoli and they didn't register him this season so all he has played is 5-6 games for Poland so will surely move to get match fit for euros.

Linked to likes of Spurs and Atletico Madrid but would only be backup at those types of clubs.

[john e]

When all said and done Aston Villa are a different proposition in the transfer market this time round
no longer are we relegation favourites but now looking to push on into the European spots

That makes a very big Difference to the players you can attract

[SoccerHQ]

When all said and done Aston Villa are a different proposition in the transfer market this time round
no longer are we relegation favourites but now looking to push on into the European spots

That makes a very big Difference to the players you can attract

Cue half of the posts suggesting championship and relegation threatened players so far (wink) like King, Connor Gallagher, Sander Berge etc.

Don't get me wrong there's a place for some of them like Watkins and Cash who've been excellent but there's also a place for Ross Barkley types so hopefully we're not far away from getting in a Milik type as signing a proven top level like Bent or Carew is something we haven't done in a long while and that sort of signing always massively excites people.