onje_villa

3 goals in 21 for Inter, but we'll let him off because he's only a kid (20) and clearly has room to grow.

Im just a bit puzzled as to how people are raving about him, when he's been nothing but a bit part player since coming to Europe. I will confess to not having watched him play, but as he's only played five games this season I dont suppose Im on my own.

So whats the big deal? At 10m Euros he seems the right kind of price, assuming he is really worth "wetting your pants over", or whatever the saying is. is it just because he's a Brazilian playing (occasionally) for inter? Does that make him brilliant by default?

Go and take a look at the guy on Youtube (yeah I know...) If that doesn't look like exactly the sort of player Villa have been missing for the last God knows how long then I don't know who is. He has more talent in his left bollock than the rest of our squad put together. Amazing technique, scores from free kicks, gets fans excited and attendances up, sells shirts.

No, we definitely don't need a player like this

I agree with this ^^

For me this club is potentially huge. Our main problems in my opinion are:

1. Unlike the other "large" clubs, since we won the big one way back in 82 we have been run with a distinct lack of vision.

2. The surrounding area in Aston has plummeted & the majority of the local population hold no interest in the support or otherwise of the club which to me has an impact. For me the whole region needs redeveloping in a Man City esque style or the club moving somewhere where it is appreciated although i do of course understand that this would be heavily opposed by many & a very controversial action. My view is that desperate times call for desperate measures & although Villa Park is of course a magical & very special place for me personally, if it meant the sleeping giant finally awakening i would go for it. Surely any massive club has to have it's own neighborhood behind it? This would surely add some of the missing numbers to the attendances? & indeed maybe in part the reason we struggle to fill the stadium?.. Most people who go to Villa Park have a journey of sorts which adds to cost & time etc etc... This ultimately has to have an impact in times of recession such as the one we are in at present?

3. The main thing though is surely the depressing transfer policy this club has had for several seasons now. Even under MON we bought quite dull "Mr average" players rather than players who got your pulses racing & for me this is where the club has erred spectacularly... We have a reduced wage bill matched by reduced excitement levels resulting now in reduced attendances & poor results.. it is a downward spiral & it needs to be reversed. The fun has been strangled out of a visit to Villa Park & we need that back too...

So over to you Mr Lerner & Paul x 2

Time to have a new vision, give the fans something to be excited about once more & over time this club can indeed be great once again... The fans are there make no mistake but they need to be sold the club again, to get excited about matchday again & this can only be done by getting it right on the pitch & attracting some decent & exciting players here. Villa fans are proud of their club & this last 3 years has been frankly highly embarrassing.

Very much agree with point 3. We seem to always steer clear of exciting signings. Fans need players to get excited about which will gets bums on seats, get the atmosphere going and get us back up the table. I actually think Merson was the last genuinely exciting player we had down at VP.

I'm definitely firmly behind Lambert but Morpheus and Papillon before him make a lot of good points.

I must admit, Lambert's idea of setting the ball rolling on a new forward-thinking way of playing the game had me very excited. Even when we were successful under MON I just hated watching us mindlessly hoof the ball up the pitch.

However you could argue that the short-term needs to be mixed effectively with the long-term else we may drop. Maybe Lambert's just got more balls than us though and he's not going to change his outlook despite the pressure cranking up. If that's the case, good on him and it would be great if at the end of the season, we all realize he knew what he was doing all along. Something about the man gives me huge confidence in him.

All that said, the short-term is pretty bleak and you don't just worry about relegation when you're in it, you worry about it when you're hovering near it consistently.

Is this a joke? Yes I know he's shipped a fair few but the man's been our MOTM in virtually every game this season. Don't forget he has made world-class saves in the last two games and also stopped a penalty.

Looks like a young Rio on that first vid

To be fair he looks an amazing talent on that video.

Check out the first goal on this vid too.

I don't recognise half of our players any more

I know, it's great isn't it?!

4-0 shots to nil away at Newcastle.

Oh and as I type - GOAL!!!

FFS guys, I think we're playing pretty well. Can definitely see a young team taking shape. We may still get shafted 4-0 but I'm sorry I can definitely see an improvement in our play

Saw little to inspire me and frankly don't understand why people rate him.

Un-be-****-lievable

It is typical of the self gratification jungle we live in.

We have illustrated our failure in graphic detail of signing players in excess of c 5mill, we have simply crashed and burn't them.

We have to try a different approach.... no one knows if it will work, but it has worked for HIM before and it has worked for US before.

As to the quality v quantity debate, I think in this instance we did need quantity also, its the thing that will help change the type of player and the culture.

The "hungry" needs to out populate the "over fed" and then the mental attitude to winning will hopefully change.

There are never any guarantee's but I think I can see what PL is trying to do.... fingers crossed.

Well said.

Feeling generally very positive despite sharing people's fear of a lack of quality.

I absolutely back the way they're going about building a sustained development, TRO and P3TE are completely right about buying players and improving them and them having a resale value.

I just hope we can get by this year. It seems to me that we can slowly add to this squad in the next few windows and we'll end up getting better and better.

We just need to start collecting some points but I think it may be a few games yet before we do.

Hoping for a good second half to the season.

Funny how people on here tend to range from one extreme to the other.

I can definitely see both side's POV.

While I totally agree that Lerner has spent plenty of his own money on Villa and I see the value in a long-term young players based approach, I do look and think "Shit, we really have fallen a long way".

Spin it how you like but for one reason or another, it would seem that a large portion of Villa fans are now happy with us avoiding relegation.

That saddens me more than anything.

As in Villa - a type of house?

**** yes. He could be our best Youtube signing yet!

Hmm anyone else think this morning has made us look a bit small-time.

Why put in an offer for a player without sounding out if he was interested in us.

I fear it was an Ellis style ploy sadly.

Villa have had a bid accepted for Clint Dempsey!

You know, we may just go down this season but come back up with a maturing youthful squad that gels together and learns to play the same way and ends up being more effective in the long term (Swansea?).

Or we may stay up by the skin of our teeth.

Or we may sink like Notts Forest, I hope not.

Either way, you have to say it's a very brave call if Lambert has anything to do with this and you'd have to admire him for sticking to his principles when everyone around him seemed sure we'd go in to panic buying mode.

It's obvious why we're buying this guy.

To make Benteke look good.

Adams. Adams. Who the **** is Adams?!

Funny Sonic, I've thought the same a few times these last couple of seasons.

Reassuringly a lot of replies to the original post, show that Villa has some great fans just like any other club and though I share Gazton's hatred of the money involved in the game today, I believe Villa fans are starved of enjoyment.

Things need to pick up on the pitch and badly.

Whoever is sitting right now thinking "yeah, i'd love NRC back here, he'd sort us out" - take a long hard look at yourself, immediately.

Agreed. The only worrying thing, is a vastly overrated "leader" though he is, he'd still probably improve our team.

Someone else said it further up but there's only really 3 or 4 players of Premier League standard in the team, the rest is filled up with players who either aren't there yet or will never be.

Totally back the regime but think we desperately need a stronger starting point.

This on 7500 to holte pretty much sums up how I feel, hope link is OK

http://www.7500toholte.com/2012/8/26/3268983/aston-villa-west-ham-match-review?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Lambert, Lerner and Faulkner will sit down to see what's going to happen on transfers.

http://www.avfc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10265~2900135,00.html

Reminds me of that scene from Life of Brian...

Have to agree that it seems like Lambert is still trying out different players in different positions. Our selections have the air of preseason about them, maybe after 3 games, he'll go "Enough **** around" and pick a solid side and get the ball forward.

Or... he'll stick with it and in 2 years time we'll look back at a very important learning period for the players as well as the fans.

I daren't think of the other alternatives.