2023 Summer transfer window - hopes, needs, expectations and rumours.

[Risso]

Just on buy back clauses, has anybody ever invoked the clause to buy a player back?

[paul_e]

Just on buy back clauses, has anybody ever invoked the clause to buy a player back?

Yes, Xavi Simons by PSG.

[Dante Lavelli]

Why would we sell him - he seems like a top talent

FFP gold, though, as a home grown player.

Yeah, I think he has loads of talent as well, but then again, so do a lot of players at that age.

It's difficult, but I honestly think the added value of a home grown product to FFP constraints makes it a more complicated decision.

Yup. We'd probably get £50m for his older brother right now. And that's because he's really good, so we shouldn't try and sell him.

But from an FFP perspective, it sorts the spreadsheets out for at least two years, while we bring through all the other youth that we're clearly planning on selling at some point for the same reason.

It's sad, but we're going to see a lot of "one of us, next Gary Shaws" sold in the years to come, and for some of them it won't be because they're not good enough.

To look at it from another club's perspective, there's a reason that to sort their horrible finances out, there's a reason that Forest will end up selling Brennan Johnson rather than Gibbs-White.

Yep.

Also, and I know how cut-throat this will sound, we say things about how we wouldnt want to buy players who stand in the way of development of our home-grown players.

We need to get past that. If the home grown players are good enough, they'll break through and claim a place.

We're not here to grow and improve local lads, we're here to win matches and silverware.

It is great if we can do so with lots of home grown players, but we're - as you said - going to have to get a lot less emotional and more business like about that sort of thing.

Clearly you’re not wrong with that objective Paulie but how is that objective different from most clubs.  [Arteta mode on] We need to find a process that differentiates ourselves from other clubs and being a champion of youth development is a more realistic strategy than out-spending Man City or having better South American scouts than Brighton.  If that is our USP then we need to start living it [Arteta mode off].

[john e]

Just on buy back clauses, has anybody ever invoked the clause to buy a player back?

Dougie decided to play piss poor for a bit to stop Man City buying him back

[DrGonzo]

Silly season is upon us, after a couple of decent pre season performances Liverpool have "held talks" with Philogene's agent.  There's literally no evidence in the article.  It's interesting to see, it shows other clubs are concerned by our progress.  We haven't had attention like this for how many seasons now?

[Gareth]

It is silly season and we have to remember that we are on the up and the London centric media will see us as a threat to their darling Spurs, Arsenal & Chelsea so we can expect plenty of silly rumours till the end of the window….I fully expect them to try and unsettle Martinez at some point in the next 3 weeks.

As others have said selling youth products is great for FFP, it’s for the club to recognise the ones to keep, the ones to sell and the ones to put buyback clauses on…Manchester City & Chelsea have done this well from the position of throwing gazillions at young players initially

[Ads]

If there's a buy back on Ramsey, then it's just a loan, where we get to offset £12m entirely against our spending thus far. If he's as good as his older brother, we get him back. If not, oh well.

[Beard82]

But 12 million is nothing - what is that going to allow us to do that we can’t do now.  Buy Tyler adams?  Duran cost 20m and looks useless: 

I get the theory - it just doesn’t seem good business to me.

[exigo]

It's not a £12m loan if the buy-back clause is £30m.

[pauliewalnuts]

Why would we sell him - he seems like a top talent

FFP gold, though, as a home grown player.

Yeah, I think he has loads of talent as well, but then again, so do a lot of players at that age.

It's difficult, but I honestly think the added value of a home grown product to FFP constraints makes it a more complicated decision.

Yup. We'd probably get £50m for his older brother right now. And that's because he's really good, so we shouldn't try and sell him.

But from an FFP perspective, it sorts the spreadsheets out for at least two years, while we bring through all the other youth that we're clearly planning on selling at some point for the same reason.

It's sad, but we're going to see a lot of "one of us, next Gary Shaws" sold in the years to come, and for some of them it won't be because they're not good enough.

To look at it from another club's perspective, there's a reason that to sort their horrible finances out, there's a reason that Forest will end up selling Brennan Johnson rather than Gibbs-White.

Yep.

Also, and I know how cut-throat this will sound, we say things about how we wouldnt want to buy players who stand in the way of development of our home-grown players.

We need to get past that. If the home grown players are good enough, they'll break through and claim a place.

We're not here to grow and improve local lads, we're here to win matches and silverware.

It is great if we can do so with lots of home grown players, but we're - as you said - going to have to get a lot less emotional and more business like about that sort of thing.

Clearly you’re not wrong with that objective Paulie but how is that objective different from most clubs.  [Arteta mode on] We need to find a process that differentiates ourselves from other clubs and being a champion of youth development is a more realistic strategy than out-spending Man City or having better South American scouts than Brighton.  If that is our USP then we need to start living it [Arteta mode off].

Oh, I agree with that, I'm just saying that they need to earn their place in things, rather than being give one to 'stop getting in their way' as we hear quite a lot.

Also worth noting, Man City and Chelsea, for all their insane spending, are also masters of growing and selling players, many of whom never get near their first team - it's a big part of what allows them to do that.

[Beard82]

12m is ridiculously cheap, for a top talent.  Im all for selling those that don't make the grade, or maybe do but we choose to but this seems neither.  Selling a player that may well make the grade for below market value. 

[Dante Lavelli]

Why would we sell him - he seems like a top talent

FFP gold, though, as a home grown player.

Yeah, I think he has loads of talent as well, but then again, so do a lot of players at that age.

It's difficult, but I honestly think the added value of a home grown product to FFP constraints makes it a more complicated decision.

Yup. We'd probably get £50m for his older brother right now. And that's because he's really good, so we shouldn't try and sell him.

But from an FFP perspective, it sorts the spreadsheets out for at least two years, while we bring through all the other youth that we're clearly planning on selling at some point for the same reason.

It's sad, but we're going to see a lot of "one of us, next Gary Shaws" sold in the years to come, and for some of them it won't be because they're not good enough.

To look at it from another club's perspective, there's a reason that to sort their horrible finances out, there's a reason that Forest will end up selling Brennan Johnson rather than Gibbs-White.

Yep.

Also, and I know how cut-throat this will sound, we say things about how we wouldnt want to buy players who stand in the way of development of our home-grown players.

We need to get past that. If the home grown players are good enough, they'll break through and claim a place.

We're not here to grow and improve local lads, we're here to win matches and silverware.

It is great if we can do so with lots of home grown players, but we're - as you said - going to have to get a lot less emotional and more business like about that sort of thing.

Clearly you’re not wrong with that objective Paulie but how is that objective different from most clubs.  [Arteta mode on] We need to find a process that differentiates ourselves from other clubs and being a champion of youth development is a more realistic strategy than out-spending Man City or having better South American scouts than Brighton.  If that is our USP then we need to start living it [Arteta mode off].

Oh, I agree with that, I'm just saying that they need to earn their place in things, rather than being give one to 'stop getting in their way' as we hear quite a lot.

Also worth noting, Man City and Chelsea, for all their insane spending, are also masters of growing and selling players, many of whom never get near their first team - it's a big part of what allows them to do that.

After posting, I did think that if we turned on the youth tap too quickly then we could undo a lot of the good work Emery has done.  So evolution rather than revolution as Alan partridge would say.

[Smithy]

Why would we sell him - he seems like a top talent

FFP gold, though, as a home grown player.

Yeah, I think he has loads of talent as well, but then again, so do a lot of players at that age.

It's difficult, but I honestly think the added value of a home grown product to FFP constraints makes it a more complicated decision.

Yup. We'd probably get £50m for his older brother right now. And that's because he's really good, so we shouldn't try and sell him.

But from an FFP perspective, it sorts the spreadsheets out for at least two years, while we bring through all the other youth that we're clearly planning on selling at some point for the same reason.

It's sad, but we're going to see a lot of "one of us, next Gary Shaws" sold in the years to come, and for some of them it won't be because they're not good enough.

To look at it from another club's perspective, there's a reason that to sort their horrible finances out, there's a reason that Forest will end up selling Brennan Johnson rather than Gibbs-White.

Yep.

Also, and I know how cut-throat this will sound, we say things about how we wouldnt want to buy players who stand in the way of development of our home-grown players.

We need to get past that. If the home grown players are good enough, they'll break through and claim a place.

We're not here to grow and improve local lads, we're here to win matches and silverware.

It is great if we can do so with lots of home grown players, but we're - as you said - going to have to get a lot less emotional and more business like about that sort of thing.

Clearly you’re not wrong with that objective Paulie but how is that objective different from most clubs.  [Arteta mode on] We need to find a process that differentiates ourselves from other clubs and being a champion of youth development is a more realistic strategy than out-spending Man City or having better South American scouts than Brighton.  If that is our USP then we need to start living it [Arteta mode off].

Oh, I agree with that, I'm just saying that they need to earn their place in things, rather than being give one to 'stop getting in their way' as we hear quite a lot.

Also worth noting, Man City and Chelsea, for all their insane spending, are also masters of growing and selling players, many of whom never get near their first team - it's a big part of what allows them to do that.

Also, it's going to be a big change for us supporters.  As long as I can remember, the promise of a youth prospect making it to the first team, and actually IMPROVING it, has been more exciting than just about any bought player (barring a few significant exceptions). 

For me, it started with two friends from school who did their YTS at Villa in Riccy Scimeca's year. They would tell me about the kid a couple of years below them who was going to be a star - Lee Hendrie.  Since then I've always found the 'production line' of promising kids to be a big part of why I support the club.  Yes, the 90 minutes on a Saturday will always be the biggest part, but the promise of what might come next week, next month, next season, the season after that, is always there with me.

I've always had FAR more affinity for the likes of Hendrie, Barry, Vassell, Jack, Gabby (early years) and so on. Certainly more than their peers who were bought by the club.  Even the players who started with us but who were sold on to have reasonable careers before making long-term contributions for us, like Cahill, Steven Davis, Luke Moore, Weimann, Albrighton I remember more fondly than the players around them that were bought in.

But now it's different.  Players can come through the ranks here but then get sold for millions before making more than a handful of appearances for the club.  I totally get why it has to happen for us to be successful. I support it happening. But I also mourn the fact that it is no doubt going to slightly kill-off part of the reason I'm a villa fan.

There will come a time when we'll see the youth team win the FA Youth Cup, and the first thoughts of many supporters will be "this lot will do wonders for our FFP" rather than "this lot could help us win a trophies for years to come".

And I think that's a shame.

[Ads]

So he can play Premier League football and if he's good enough for us (meaning he's better than JJ, which would be pretty special) we get a top 5 midfielder for relative buttons.

[N'ZMAV]

I think we loan Burnley Aaron Ramsey.