Aston Villa Group End of Year Accounts - year end May 31st 2022

[pauliewalnuts]

Overall a fair and balanced summary and for me supports why we didn't just go snd buy a player in the transfer window .

The only way we're going to make more money is by being more successful. And to be more successful we need better players than this midtable at best squad.

Do we have the ability to pull off the transfers that we need to change this significantly?
I have my doubts.

Jesus Christ. 

Why are you even bothering to show an interest if it’s all that impossible?

We’ve got a big supporter base, we are currently enlarging the stadium - which is full every time we play - we’ve got an elite level manager, we have extremely wealthy ambitious owners. There is no reason we shouldn’t start to fulfil our potential.

Seriously with that sort of attitude, why bother? We are shit / we don’t have the money / we don’t turnover enough / we are unable to buy decent players / we shouldn’t try to play in Europe next season. 

Honest question - why are you bothering with all this at all if it is so doomed to failure?

I consider myself heavily on the sceptical side of the argument but you should like you’ve just entirely given up.

Well I have seen the accounts and there is very little to be reassured about there.
I agree we have the best manager that we could hope for and he is doing as well as can be expected.
The issue is how do we get from a mid table level to challenging top 6 and this is where I have my doubts.
By my reckoning we need 5 top 6 level players and the budget for that is £250 million £300 million ? You think we are spending that?
I am still trying to work out how they spent £209 million in 1 year and look at what that bought us.
The owners great, Manager great after that I think there are a lot of problems which shows up in the accounts and the match day experience.

I don't know if we are going to spend that, but you've just yourself reference a year in which we spent over 200m and then asked if we're likely to spend 250+ - so it's clearly not entirely the stuff of science fiction.

We're not going to go out in a window and immediately buy a squad that is going to get there - we need to be improving several positions in every window over the course of a few windows, and in the meantime, winning as many games as we possibly can - finish higher up the league, earn more money to make those accounts look better, and have less problems holding on to players because we're (for example) in Europe, or we are visibly improving our standing in things.

It won't be easy but all the elements are there if we can get it right. This isn't the first time we've spent money, but it's the first time we've done it with ALL the pieces in place, with seriously capable people running things.

It's probably true, for example, that we mostly find Purslow a bit oily at times, but I'd back his ability to run and grow a football club over that of the people who ran things in the Lerner years, for example, every single time.

Nobody has a divine right to success, but we give ourselves a great chance if we improve year on year at a decent rate. I still wish we'd done more in January, but this summer is the big one, this is when we'll see how serious we are.

[pauliewalnuts]

Sometimes one player can make all the difference, like a Toney, Mitrovic or Guimaraes for example. Take away all of those from Brentford, Fulham and Newcastle, and I guarantee they'd all be lower midtable fodder again, fighting relegation.

Yes, and I feel at the minute the right player in Bailey's role could be transformative for us.

Absolutely mate. A decent attacking forward to weigh in with double figures of goals and we'd be miles better. Them back that up with somebody like Guendouzi, a replacement for Konsa who can play out from the back and we'd be motoring.

I honestly reckon (and said this the other day) that he's a ******, yeah, but who cares, someone like Zaha would have a disproportionate impact on this team.

I tend to agree, fill those roles you mentioned and we'd be a much better team.

[Risso]

I honestly reckon (and said this the other day) that he's a ******, yeah, but who cares, someone like Zaha would have a disproportionate impact on this team.

Me and LeeB said exactly the same at the match. Get him in on a free and he'd be excellent. A huge upgrade on Bailey, and somebody who would give us versatility as well.

[Pat Mustard]

The window this summer almost feels like 1995 again to me, with three key signings for the spine of the team.  It won't necessarily cost £200 million, but that summer I think we broke our transfer record 3 times so every penny we have available is going to be needed.

[London Villan]

Sometimes one player can make all the difference, like a Toney, Mitrovic or Guimaraes for example. Take away all of those from Brentford, Fulham and Newcastle, and I guarantee they'd all be lower midtable fodder again, fighting relegation.

We had him, globally marketable, brilliant backstory and a fantastic player...

[ChicagoLion]

Overall a fair and balanced summary and for me supports why we didn't just go snd buy a player in the transfer window .

The only way we're going to make more money is by being more successful. And to be more successful we need better players than this midtable at best squad.

Do we have the ability to pull off the transfers that we need to change this significantly?
I have my doubts.

Jesus Christ. 

Why are you even bothering to show an interest if it’s all that impossible?

We’ve got a big supporter base, we are currently enlarging the stadium - which is full every time we play - we’ve got an elite level manager, we have extremely wealthy ambitious owners. There is no reason we shouldn’t start to fulfil our potential.

Seriously with that sort of attitude, why bother? We are shit / we don’t have the money / we don’t turnover enough / we are unable to buy decent players / we shouldn’t try to play in Europe next season. 

Honest question - why are you bothering with all this at all if it is so doomed to failure?

I consider myself heavily on the sceptical side of the argument but you should like you’ve just entirely given up.

Well I have seen the accounts and there is very little to be reassured about there.
I agree we have the best manager that we could hope for and he is doing as well as can be expected.
The issue is how do we get from a mid table level to challenging top 6 and this is where I have my doubts.
By my reckoning we need 5 top 6 level players and the budget for that is £250 million £300 million ? You think we are spending that?
I am still trying to work out how they spent £209 million in 1 year and look at what that bought us.
The owners great, Manager great after that I think there are a lot of problems which shows up in the accounts and the match day experience.

I don't know if we are going to spend that, but you've just yourself reference a year in which we spent over 200m and then asked if we're likely to spend 250+ - so it's clearly not entirely the stuff of science fiction.

We're not going to go out in a window and immediately buy a squad that is going to get there - we need to be improving several positions in every window over the course of a few windows, and in the meantime, winning as many games as we possibly can - finish higher up the league, earn more money to make those accounts look better, and have less problems holding on to players because we're (for example) in Europe, or we are visibly improving our standing in things.

It won't be easy but all the elements are there if we can get it right. This isn't the first time we've spent money, but it's the first time we've done it with ALL the pieces in place, with seriously capable people running things.

It's probably true, for example, that we mostly find Purslow a bit oily at times, but I'd back his ability to run and grow a football club over that of the people who ran things in the Lerner years, for example, every single time.

Nobody has a divine right to success, but we give ourselves a great chance if we improve year on year at a decent rate. I still wish we'd done more in January, but this summer is the big one, this is when we'll see how serious we are.

I have less faith than you in Purslow, how long has he had to fix the catering problems. He is certainly no David Dien.
But you are right this summer should tell us an awful lot.

[olaftab]

Didn’t someone say we’re fourth since we very belatedly got rid of the incompetent scouse fraud?

If you remember Percy there was a lot on here telling us that we had made a seismic jump since Dean left after Gerrard's first 6. All sorts of conclusions were drawn to prove that Smithy was useless and Stevie is the new Brian Clough.
So no doubt me and you and the rational one's will wait another 12 games before raising our hopes.

[olaftab]

I honestly reckon (and said this the other day) that he's a ******, yeah, but who cares, someone like Zaha would have a disproportionate impact on this team.

Me and LeeB said exactly the same at the match. Get him in on a free and he'd be excellent. A huge upgrade on Bailey, and somebody who would give us versatility as well.

I think Bailey will do well at Palace

[Risso]

Didn’t someone say we’re fourth since we very belatedly got rid of the incompetent scouse fraud?

If you remember Percy there was a lot on here telling us that we had made a seismic jump since Dean left after Gerrard's first 6. All sorts of conclusions were drawn to prove that Smithy was useless and Steven is the new Brian Clough.
So no doubt me and you and the rational one's will wait another 12 games before raising our hopes.

You did, and you were right.

[Neil Hawkes]

Didn’t someone say we’re fourth since we very belatedly got rid of the incompetent scouse fraud?

If you remember Percy there was a lot on here telling us that we had made a seismic jump since Dean left after Gerrard's first 6. All sorts of conclusions were drawn to prove that Smithy was useless and Steven is the new Brian Clough.
So no doubt me and you and the rational one's will wait another 12 games before raising our hopes.

You did, and you were right.

Except for one big difference.

This manager is not a flash in the pan that's stumbled across winning ways, he has history of consistent success from all his previous clubs, with the backing that he has been promised (otherwise why would he have come to us and tarnished his career to date), I do feel this is only the start of greater things to come.

I've been able to watch all the games, and apart from the cup exits (which soured things a little), I've seen a style and substance to our game plan that is either left in place from kick-off to the final whistle OR (most importantly) changed during the game to try to achieve a win - even in the matches where individual errors screwed us. I have not seen that for decades.

Of course, if it all goes tits up - I'll deny any knowledge of this post and claim my dog found my password and typed such drivel.

[Smithy]

Didn’t someone say we’re fourth since we very belatedly got rid of the incompetent scouse fraud?

If you remember Percy there was a lot on here telling us that we had made a seismic jump since Dean left after Gerrard's first 6. All sorts of conclusions were drawn to prove that Smithy was useless and Steven is the new Brian Clough.
So no doubt me and you and the rational one's will wait another 12 games before raising our hopes.

You did, and you were right.

He's already had 12 league games. Not enough to draw any long term conclusions, but certainly enough to see us be beyond the "new manager bounce". 

We've won 7, lost 4 and drawn 1.  Three of the losses were away to Liverpool and Man City and home to Arsenal (a game we were leading twice) - and we also beat Man Utd and Spurs.  If these games had been the first 12 games of the season, we'd be in the top four, having already played FIVE of the six teams with realistic hopes of being in the top four themselves.  And we've done all that without suddenly becoming a sparklingly entertaining side. Lots of good periods in games, some very good performances, and some pretty drab and forgettable ones too - as you'd expect from a side transitioning to a new style of play.

But if you can't let yourself get a LITTLE bit excited by Emery's start after that, when can you?

[paul_e]

Didn’t someone say we’re fourth since we very belatedly got rid of the incompetent scouse fraud?

If you remember Percy there was a lot on here telling us that we had made a seismic jump since Dean left after Gerrard's first 6. All sorts of conclusions were drawn to prove that Smithy was useless and Steven is the new Brian Clough.
So no doubt me and you and the rational one's will wait another 12 games before raising our hopes.

You did, and you were right.

It was true though, there were a lot of promising signs when Gerrard arrived and I don't think they were as simple as new manager bounce. He identified Ramsey as someone worth bringing in and for a few months there was genuine talk of him breaking through into the world cup squad. The problem was the tactic he was using to get that uptick was fairly basic and teams worked it out. It was only when that happened and he had no answer to it that it became clear he was a waste of space (this was also my biggest concern with him because he'd only ever managed in a league where he had a massive advantage over all but 1 of their opponents so the tactics never got put under the same sort of pressure).

Where Emery is different is he's done it at multiple clubs in different leagues and has learned how to adapt tactics both to the opposition and his players but also just to mix things up and avoid becoming predictable.

Once Gerrard got found out we never looked like we had a plan on how we were going to create chances and win games. Under Emery we've shown we have it in us to control games without looking particularly good and still take points, you can also see phases of play that look a lot like his teams in the past played but it just needs time and a few additions to really take shape.

[Risso]

Which games has he changed things to good effect in?

The wins have been against:

Man U
Brighton
Spurs
Leeds
Southampton
Everton
Palace

All welcome victories, but a big spread of perfomances, from excellent (Man U) through solid and workmanlike (Palace) to played quite badly, lucky to get away with it (Leeds). I can't really recall any big changes in tactics that affected any of those games though to be honest. He seems to pretty much favour his version of 4-4-2, which is fine as it's mostly working in at the moment, and as it is with our miniscule squad there's not much scope to change things up anyway.

[Smithy]

Which games has he changed things to good effect in?

The wins have been against:

Man U
Brighton
Spurs
Leeds
Southampton
Everton
Palace

All welcome victories, but a big spread of perfomances, from excellent (Man U) through solid and workmanlike (Palace) to played quite badly, lucky to get away with it (Leeds). I can't really recall any big changes in tactics that affected any of those games though to be honest. He seems to pretty much favour his version of 4-4-2, which is fine as it's mostly working in at the moment, and as it is with our miniscule squad there's not much scope to change things up anyway.

If you're looking purely at performances, and not just results, then I think you also have to look at the losses. Barring the (obviously) costly individual errors, I thought we played better in losing to Leicester than we did in beating Palace, for example.  More possession than against Palace, more than twice the chances, more than three times to shots on target - but we still lost.

There has also been a tendency for us to have a "slow" first half, and be better in the second, which Emery has to take responsibility for, but I do think the performances overall have been much better since he came him - even when the results have not.

[PeterWithesShin]

Seems a bit more thought behind our performances under Emery than "look me in the eye", "they should wipe the floor with us", "we need a bit of magic from someone". Gerrard was a complete fraud who after his opening 6 games barely had us averaging a point a game for the next 32 and never beat a single team that either wasn't shit or massively out of form. He was clueless and shit. Unai isn't either.