Gillz

Class from Crawley. With him and Pope (struggling a little bit this series - but undeniable class) England have a nice young middle order to build around

Frankel the Horse. I know its an odd one, but simply theres never been anything like it The only horse to have a perfect 140 rating, and only 1 of 2 to retire unbeaten. He ran 14 races, and won them by a combined 77 lengths. Including the 200 Guineas which is as close to a horse 'jogging' across the finish line you will ever see:

I mean, i fully appreciate it is just a list of main 4 people we've been linked with. Not exactly ground-breaking. I'm just incredibly bored.

Based on all the links, speculation and twitter guff, i now have my 'list' of what i'd like to see and think is realistic ST: Watkins RW: Buendia LW: Rashica CM: McKennie That probably about £80m give or take - so maybe there's a bonus buy in there which will come completely out of left-field. Either way, i'd be happy with the above for sure

I am subbed to the Athletic as i follow a number of teams in different sports - like the NFL for example. In general, the standard is significantly better - and there's some really good insightful articles and pieces (the type of stuff journos spend time on developing and researching - rather than just cycling out trash for clicks). Unfortunately for Villa fans, the Athletic picked up Evans as their 'team reporter' who is well below the standard of his peers there. 50 odd football writers, so there's bound to be some dross in there, and unlucky for us it happens to be the reporter covering the Villa

Based on absolutely no insight or information, i expect this to be our first signing at some point early next week

The proverbial 'Like a New Signing'. Great to have him back

Rank Player Club Nationality Stat 1. Jack Grealish Aston Villa England 8 2. Trézéguet Aston Villa Egypt 6 3. Wesley Aston Villa Brazil 5 4. Anwar El Ghazi Aston Villa Netherlands 4 5. Conor Hourihane Aston Villa Ireland 3 5. John McGinn Aston Villa Scotland 3 5. Douglas Luiz Aston Villa Brazil 3 That's the list of our goal-scorers from last season. (bit harsh on Wes due to the injury), but worth noting that our other strikers got 1 goal combined. That simply isn't good enough. Now i'd love for us to unearth the next star who is going to score 20 a season, but i just dont think it's going to happen. Instead, i think it's quite sensible to sign a few attacking options (Wilson, Watkins, another TBC) etc with the hope that they will combine collectively for those magical 20 goals that would ensure us an mid-table finish

Talk of selling him for a loss is nonsense. The guy is 23 and by all accounts relatively new to professional football. In his first season he scored 5 PL goals before a horror injury sidelined him for the second half of the season. (Our 3rd top goalscorer and 4 more than our other strikers combined) He showed enough to at least let the lad recover and play another year to see if he will for-fill his potential (albeit, maybe as a backup striker/sub) before we right him off.

I'm not sure the whole 'I've never heard of him' line works for sporting directors. Even the biggest football manager fan would probably struggle to list more than 5 surely?

Ryan Fraser: 120 PL games - 16 goals and 29 assists. Could do a lot worse for on a free

Wesley was brought in and the expectations were huge - rather foolishly he was the only real striker and we needed him to score the goals to keep us up. I actually think he got off to a really good start - scoring 4 goals in the first 8 games and getting an assist. But then he hit a slump and didnt score for 12 games in a row. Fans and the media started to get on his back but there were signs he was starting to pull it around - particularly with his performance at Burnley. I honestly think if he had been fit, our survival would have been guaranteed much sooner. 5 goals in 20 appearances. That doesn't sound amazing, but if you apply that record for the full season and take into account some better form, you are looking at maybe 10 goals in his debut year. I really don't think he's the flop people make out - i think he's got potential and hopefully next year, when fully fit, and with a striker to share the burden with, he will surpass his potential. For context: Haller - West Ham - £45m - 7 goals Joelinton - Newcastle - £40m - 2 goals Kean - Everton - £25m - 2 goals

Let's be honest - he wasn't great since he came back from injury. He was probably rushed back and only got close to full fitness towards the final few games. Firstly, its a great testament to his commitment to the team that he was willing to come and play when still not fit as he knew how important it was. And Secondly, i don't think its any coincidence that we looked much better, and picked up 8 points out of 12 in the final 4 games when he was up and running at closer to full fitness and his former self. Rest him up, keep him fit, and he'll be back to bossing the midfield for the new season before we know it.

To be fair, if we'd gone done i'd be gutted and i'd also expect our board to be trying to find a way to soften the financial blow. The article says they are considering it, and i doubt it will go much further than that, they'll consider and realise its a completely silly argument and lawsuit. Firstly, just because a goal was given, doesn't mean the game would finish 1-0 Sheff Utd. If that goal had been given, the entire event of the game would be different and there i no way anyone can say with certainty what the result could have been. Secondly, trying to rationalise the reason for relegation to an individual moment in a 38 game season is nonsense and ignores the various advantages and disadvantages that happen thoughout a season. For example. the PL have said that Spurs should have had a Penalty against them but it wasn't given, Villa should have had a goal at Palace - Palace should have had a goal at Villa! It ebbs and flows but ultimately it breaks about even eventually. If you start take legal action over individual decisions where would it end?

He came good in the end, albeit some dodgy moment before the lock-down. I would expect Heaton back as No1 next season, and Steer filling the gap until he is fully fit. Nyland and Kalinic im not fussed about either way

Without his step up, i dont think we'd have stayed up! Incredible improvements and i hope he will only get better. Real credit to the Scouting department on this one - it took a while but think we can all agree on his quality.

I honestly wouldn't mind if we only brought in 2 players this summer. This window needs to be Quality not quantity. If we have say £50m to spend, i'd rather a £25m Striker and £25m Winger - both of proven quality, over 5 roll of the dices on unknown entities

Now that we have ensured another season in the PL, I think he is more likely to stay. 1) We won't need to money. Realistically it will cost £60m+ to even tempt us and i don't see clubs spending that much on him 2) I think many of the 'Top' teams are actually quite well off in his current position - particularly now United have started firing. My fear was that a mid level team like Everton, Burnley or Newcastle would come in for him if we went down, but by staying up i don't think the 'step up' would be big enough for him to uproot.

To be honest, it is a miracle we have survived considering none of our strikers have scored since the restart - it's a real testament to the midfield and the much improved defence. Samatta ran hard, applied himself and pressured the opposition, but he never looked like scoring (admittedly he only ever had a few half chances). I always felt we looked better when Davis came on - better hold up play and got in behind a few times. He shouldn't be our starting striker and Davis has proven to be more effective coming off the bench. He might improve with a bit more time under his belt, but i wouldn't by upset if he left

Can we change the title of the thread to 'Slammed shut' rather than 'closed'?

Improvement on what we had for a relatively small fee. Great signing.

To be fair the tackle at 1:17 would probably be given as a red in the PL these days

Absolutely delighted

Butland Guilbert - Engels - Mings - Targett Mcginn - Luiz - Grealish Trezeguet - Wesley - El Ghazi Bench: Steer, Elmo, Konsa, Lansbury, Hourihane, Jota, Kodja, That's my starting line up and bench from the deals that are supposedly done/nearly done. Whilst i would obviously welcome another marquee signing (Benrahama) or additional squad depth(Nakamba), for me, the above is good enough to stay up.

I don't know why im just not too excited about this potential signing compared to some of the others. I think i wanted a real marque statement signing at RW and this feels like a bit of a let down. With my record on transfers and player prospects, that probably means he'll be a superstar though!