mikeyjavfc

Really now...Managers weave their own narrative with the press all the time, Mourinho is the master at it. It is not grounds for terminating a multi million pound contract. Bad results is the only thing that will sort that out.

I’m not sure we are above having James Collins in our team to be honest. I think it would be a good move. JC played 12 times in the premier league last season, which is approximately 12 times more than most of our other players... He is a decent, experienced centre back and if he isn’t up to scratch fitness wise then he won’t be signed. For what it is worth I would still sign him on a pay for play if he was only likely to manage a hand full of games. We will need cover for the odd game to ensure the others aren’t playing through injury and he is experienced enough to slot in, especially with his experience playing with Chester. I know we all want to sign a star starting centre back but the window is well closed, so this is a good move.

I smell a bore draw. Not good enough to get us moving up the table nor bad enough to get Bruce the boot. The slide into mediocrity to continue for at least another week.

It would be fairly common for a CEO of any company to be given a stock option. I wouldn’t read too much into that.

Probably true, but you cannot read the statements from the owners and think that Bruce is anywhere near getting the sack. The owners no doubt have their own plans to put in place and this will take time - the ceo appointment is the first step. I think Bruce will be in place as a ‘safe’ pair of hands until they have put together the structural changes behind the scenes, which will not be for a while. Better strap in folks.

I hate to disappoint people but Bruce is not one loss away from the sack. Not even close. The owners statement called for stability and sustainability and have already played up the difficulty of the league and the likelihood of ‘up and downs’ (which suggest to me downplaying of promotion chances). Bruce is their man to deliver these things in the short term. A Tony Xia style early sacking of RDM is not on the cards, especially not while we sit in 4th place and have no CEO.

I honestly think performances will pick up as the season goes on with Bruce. There was a lot of upheaval in the summer and we are only now finishing up our recruitment and finding a settled team. Every training session and match that we play should improve the cohesion and confidence within the squad. We’re still inconsistent, but we HAVE looked good in flashes so something is working even if it’s only in small bursts. It’s up to Bruce now to nurture these flashes into 90 minute performances. I don’t think we are miles away. There may be other managers who could do more with this team, but I see no point in moaning about Bruce whilst he clearly has the backing of the owners. Until things get really bleak, I’ll back him to turn these ‘just OK’ performances into ‘good’ performance eventually.

It’s surely just brinksmanship over the wages. He is on £75,000 at Everton so there is quite a sliding scale to consider in the negotiations. My guess is we will have offered to pay £30,000 absolute tops, as it’s disproportional to the rest of our squad (and the championship at large) and we are doing them a favour in giving him playing time and a platform to impress for a sale next summer. We’ll squabble over the percentage of wages paid and then it will get done. Might go down to the last day though!

I miss John Terry and Sam Johnstone ?

Standard villa-linked-to-former-player rumour. Absolute rollocks no doubt.

Their early stuff was better.

The difference is that a fine is easily blocked or deferred by the club by refusing to pay; a points deduction is enacted by the EFL and is basically impossible to block in the short term if that’s what the EFL want to do. Any successful appeal would be too late and would only overturn the points deduction retroactivity and I have no idea how that would work: extra points awarded in a later season?? The EFL would have serious balls to do a points deduction though because if they lost an appeal then the damages would run over £100m for missed promotion.

It doesn’t make sense really - they want clubs to be self-sustaining businesses, which completely ignores the fact that football clubs have only been seen as profit-making businesses in the last 30 years or so. In years gone by football clubs were just that: CLUBS, and routinely survived off the generosity of their members and fan donations.

We really need to bring in a forward on loan to provide competition for Kodjia

I’d take that rumour with a pinch of salt.

Maybe he’ll use some Unsworth style grovelling to get out of his Villa contract?

Whats the point...if we lose against Hull next week this thread will hit 200 pages.

Correct. The last 3 months of accounts for the season have to be forecasted to allow rulings and punishments to be doled out before the end of the season.

Correct me if I’m wrong but we haven’t got a merry hope in hell in complying with FFP if we need £75m investment just to meet our current obligations, do we? We couldn’t meet that shortfall organically if we sold the entire squad plus villa park, and external investment is not counted as revenue under ffp. I know we are not in danger of failing to meet these obligations due to the money the new ownership will bring to the table, but it shows how far away we are from being ‘sustainable’ or passing FFP. Expecting sanctions next year unless we argue special circumstances due to takeover.

This is left field for Bruce. I wonder how he happened across Moreira? Mendez smelling money at villa stopped by to flog his wares? Or something to do with the new owners and their contacts? Or good ol’ fashioned YouTube scouting?

Chasing shadows. Reminds me of the playoff final.

We look like a team that have lost 4 of our starting 11....hardly surprising we look bad. Elphick, steer, bree and Wealen weren’t good enough to start last year - nothing has changed but now they have to start since we have shed our loanees and signed nobody.

Big Ron (experienced) - Success Brian Little (relatively inexperienced) - Success John Gregory (relatively inexperienced) - Success Graham Taylor mkII (experienced) - Failure DoL (relatively experienced) - Failure MoN (experienced) - Success Houllier (experienced) - Failure Mcleish (experienced) - Failure Lambert (moderately experienced) - ??? Tom Sherwood (inexperienced) - Failure Remi Garde (inexperienced) - Failure Bobby Di Matteo (relatively inexperienced) - Failure Steve Bruce (experienced ) - ??? Try and draw any conclusions from that mixed bag!

Well I hope the famous EFL 'fit and proper' test is being applied before a sale! Wouldn't want some chancer with no funds, no transparency and no business acumen taking over the club!!!

Well, more or less 50:50.