mikeyjavfc

Craig Gardner you say?

Reminder that Wes Eden's Milwaukee Bucks were linked to lose their star player before... Lets see a Grealish headline like this in the near future please.

I think he'll stay. This is a short and disrupted pre-season and selling JG now, or more likely following a protracted weeks long saga, would be extremely bad for next season's prep. I don't think the powers at be are that stupid or desperate for the money as to derail our season like this. If we go into next season half cocked and without Grealish we could literally be risking a relegation scrap. If and when JG is sold I think it will be agreed before the end of the season so the move can happen quickly and the money can be reinvested.

Arsenal couldn't raise £100m for Grealish if they sold every player in their squad

The only way Jack leaves is if he agitates for a move in my view. Our owners are minted, do not need the money and no doubt love having the best player in the league at their club like the rest of us. The prestige and coverage he brings to the club whilst we are rebuilding to be a top 6 side is pretty much invaluable to the owners. Any fee raised for JG would largely go straight out the door trying to replace him, and given we are clearly not a sell to buy club at the moment this is not something we need to be doing.

Bye bye Bjorny. You showed promise but we just couldn’t give you time to settle and play yourself back into form in such an important position. In the pantheon of legendary villa centre backs you will go down somewhere between Phillip Senderos and Zat Knight.

FFP means that Villa can’t afford to be picky with sponsors, we simply have to appoint the highest bidder to help balance the books as best as possible. Either that or we take the high road and less money, and hand a competitive advantage to our rivals. Our owners are minted so I don’t think think for a second we would do business with a dodgy Chinese book maker if FFP wasn’t in play.

Wow If Smith Rowe is already earning £20k a week despite only breaking through this season then I can see why Arsenal are in financial trouble. I would have guessed £5k a week MAX for a young player promoted from the youth set up who signed his last contract in 2018.

They dedicated about two lines to this rumour in a massive article about Harry Kane. Feels like if City were actually about to smash the transfer record for Grealish it would get at least a full article! I’d chalk this one up to pure speculation / bollocks at the moment.

Southgate seems afraid to start Grealish as if his perceived lack of positional discipline or lack of pressing is going to massively upset the balance of the team. It’s like he thinks he’s Pep Guardiola or Bielsa and playing some incredible ideological football that will fall apart if Grealish plays. Mate, you are playing stodgy sideways possession football with 2 DMs with no thrust…Grealish roaming around the pitch a bit is going to do nothing but help your team create some bloody chances.

Glad Grealish got on the pitch, to leave him out of another big game would have been criminal. He did more to progress the play and carry the ball with his cameo than Sterling and Kane did all game. Unfortunately for Grealish the prime time of his international career is going to overlap with a clueless England manager full of inclusive corporate jargon and light on football knowledge, experience and tactical acumen.

Not always. Sometimes you get one of these:

A proper old school left back who got a nose bleed when ever he dared to cross the half way line. He feels like a bit of a throw back player now that full backs are expected to create as much as they defend. I would have always liked to have seen him on the left side of a back 3 where he wouldn’t have been expected to push up and attack (which always exposed him), because I think he was very underrated as a pure defender, although unfortunately he isn’t large enough to be a centre back in a back 2. Really interested to see where he goes next.

He really is great at those deep crosses that land in the corridor between the goalie and the back line. The most important one being in the play off final of course. Good luck Elmo!

I like Nakamba; he is fantastic out of possession pressuring and winning the ball back, but you can't say he looks after the ball well when in possession. Those errors in possession that lead to chances for the opposition like the recent spurs game are too frequent and I would like to see us pick up a DM who is better in possession. These are the kinds upgrades we need to make if we want to have more and better possession in games against top teams.

*checks score*

It’s all coming together nicely

Emi needs to have a serious chat with the other Emi about why he left that sinking ship at Arsenal and came to the promise land! It’s a no brainer

Sold it for £11m, rent it back for £15m. Genius planning. Either it is another FFP loophole or they are desperate for the cashflow.

The international break has come at a good time for us and gives us time to reflect before the run in (would have been even better 2 weeks ago!). Dean now has 2 weeks to analyse our recent performances and plan for the games to come to mastermind a way back into form for the seasons end. Hopefully Grealish will line up for the remainder of the games the season. From the position we are in now, and considering this is the weirdest season ever, I will be happy if we maintain a top 10 finish and don’t slip further down the league. I’d be ecstatic with 7-8th and I think any higher is beyond us. I hope Dean has another worldly and finishes the season how we started it.

Awful again. Thank god for the international break because I seriously can’t watch us play again right now. It’s soul destroying. Please please please be back for the next game Grealish

A good time to play them I reckon but I'm still dreading this game. It's negative to say but we just look so lifeless at the moment and it has been a difficult watch. If Grealish is back I'll get excited again but given he will not travel with England I think that is a slim possibility. Therefore I think a battling draw would be a good result on current form, and it would keep us comfortably on track for the top 10. May not make for comfortable viewing though.

A frustrating player. Flashes of brilliance and masses of poor decisions and questionable play. Reminds me of other mercurial villa talents such as C N'Zogbia and S Ireland. The kind of player who we would traditionally sign to a long lucrative contracts and then regret it for years... Chelsea already made that mistake with RB so I hope we don't pay them for the pleasure of doing the same. If he could be had on the cheap then he may be worth the gamble but no doubt Chelsea will want to recoup their losses. .

Praying this is true When they sack Bowyer in 10 games times they can put him on gardening leave too and hire a new “team leader”.

The sad thing is this would be a good point if we can hang on now