skarroki

Very limited pool of players available who have already won the Europa Conference League as well, if he signs with us he'll be the only person to have won it twice. Take that, Rice.

Ignore me then I thought it was up in 2025, didn't want him coming back with 12 months left

They have no money or strikers really so a new contract signed followed by a loan out in the Prem for the season would be the best scenario imo.

I do not think it's nonsense and stand by it despite how many people seem to agree with you. This is recency bias and "injured player is good" logic in my opinion. The entire time Buendia has been here he's fallen short of expectations, especially considering what he showed at Norwich and his price tag. The fact is he needed to up his game if he wasn't going to be a bench player this year and as one of our most expensive players that's not good enough. He's fallen behind a £3mil championship signing and an academy graduate in the pecking order. I really like him and his style but I still don't think he's done enough ever and he's now at a do or die stage in his career, he's definitely no prospect now, if he's got to come back from being out for a year too on top of it I don't expect him to continue his career here post injury. I know this is very harsh but just how I see it. Love to be proven wrong.

This news but for Watkins or Martinez, I'd be beside myself.

Realistically people were saying we needed to lose one of our attacking options from midfield in this window and I don't think many had Buendia in their ideal starting XI, yes it's a team game now but he was an expensive player who never lived up to the hype until a few glimmers in this pre-season. I still think there was a good player in their but I think he was a bench option that could easily have gone the way of Coutinho. It weakens us slightly but we've got time to readjust to this during the window. Overall I'm not bothered by this from a cold, supporting Villa perspective but obviously feel for the lad himself as he must be devastated, and also feel for whoever caused the injury in training as they must be reeling right now.

I'd only want a cup keeper if we had a young keeper in the squad who we wanted as backup and also wanted to give experience and game time. If Marschall for example was seen as good enough already for the championship but we wanted him on the bench, I'd be happy with him as cup keeper. I don't see the need to play Olsen though, we don't owe him anything and don't need to develop him. The only other argument would be keeping him as fresh as possible for a potential need to step up following an injury

This should be my thread and therefore I hope we don't sign him. No but if we were signing this guy 2/3 years ago my jaw would have hit the floor. Same could be said of Tielemans. If we can get them close to their best we have some squad.

Came third, like that amazing dream I had one time.

Bring back Ciaran Clark or Delfouneso? Both available on a free transfer Or one of Bannan? Albrighton? Weimann? Hogg? Get the old boys back for one last pop at Europe. cheeky bid for Grealish? I'm being ridiculous I'm just trying to understand how this rule works. I'm assuming those players qualify for the squad despite coming through the academy what feels like 30 years ago.

That sounds like a verbatim quote my friends who support Man City said to me when we got Dougie.

His France days surely aren't behind him! He's only a few months older than me and I'm still working on my fitness for the World Cup 2026.

That's a wrap folks

regarding the Archer speculation, too many murmurs for him to be sticking around I think, must be something in it. I would say after looking at squad registration, the fact his birthday is in december has massively hampered him. If he was born Jan 2022 instead he wouldn't be taking a spot in the squad and that might have been enough for Emery to give him a season to impress.

forgive me if this has been done a few times already but I was bored and made a quick spreadsheet to wrap my head around squad restrictions this season in the Prem and how our current squad fits into them. My main takeaways were the fact we currently have an exact 25 man squad, with main team and under 21s combined. In that 25 are a few I'd expect us to move on instead of register, the main two being Davis and Hause. I then think you could put question marks against all of Olsen, Chambers, Coutinho, Traore, Archer and Bailey. All of them leaving though would obviously cause a lot of upheaval so I'm half expecting us now to just sit tight with a few in the squad and give them another year under Emery to see how they fair / whether they feature. I definitely think a defender needs to go so I imagine it'll be Hause. I think an attacking player needs go and I'm not sure on this one, but would prefer Coutinho or Traore over anyone else. Then Davis to go too would be my assumption from the strikers. My other takeaway was how impressed I was by the volume of players we don't need to register in the squad in order to play, that could actually pick up a lot of minutes. Duran, Philogene, Iroegbunam, Revan, Feeney, Young, Kellyman, Marschall, Chrisene, Bogarde to name ones I think could get game time. A lot of these could do with loans out but in the case of Duran and Philogene in particular, I'd feel comfortable with a 23 man squad knowing these guys are ready to step up, and we've got space in Jan if they don't step up and we hit an injury crisis. Not included Aaron Ramsey for obvious reasons but if he stayed he'd be right up there for me. The issue being we are already bloated in his position and even then Duran and Philogene would be ahead of him in the youth ranks for game time. Current 25 man squad: 2 GK: Olsen, Martínez 9 DF: Hause, Chambers, Digne, Moreno, Carlos, Mings, Cash, Konsa, Torres 4 DM: Dendoncker, Tielemans, Kamara, Luiz 7 AM: Coutinho, Traoré, McGinn, Buendía, Bailey, Ramsey, Diaby 3 ST: Davis, Archer, Watkin

Came to post the same thing and a bit confused by this. Both players to Qatar were young CBs. I would have thought a promising youngster would have been offered a good deal to stay at the club with the amount our owners now hold of the club. The 3 most expensive players on their books at the start of the transfer market, according to Trasfermarkt, have all moved on to different clubs now. In all cases they've sold the players for slightly over the websites valuation of them so I guess that's a good thing, but the income from transfers has been £20mil+ and the outlay on transfers has been £2mil. I'm wondering if the announcement from UEFA that we can't trade players between clubs for 12 months has pumped the breaks on plans for the club and we're now letting them sort themselves out until we can establish a better link.

If we can get one more to join in the next 24 hours we'll be laughing. Be good to not have the old "AVERAGE" to play every few weeks

Said this a couple times in the summer transfer thread but Bali Mumba is some player. How Plymouth got him back for £1mil I do not know. He'll be in the Prem barring a bad injury by next year if not sooner I would say.

I can ask IRL people to join if you guys are looking for numbers? I understand if we're keeping it thoroughbred VillaTalk though. I've joined the league too now

Was one of the top rated players for them until the injury. Hopefully nothing serious. Does seem like a player a lot of people in the lower leagues are excited by but my worry is he's maybe starting to be discussed as someone to bring in permanently after a good loan, instead of someone like Grealish at Notts County who's clearly too good for the league and has no chance of sticking around

Mentioned on "not the top 20" podcast as one of the best players at a good Salford side last season and described as an exciting signing for Stockport

Came to post the same thing. Assuming Preston get knocked out of the League cup 1st round by Salford they'll have played 26 games by the end of the year to our 31 assuming we get through the playoff round and win 2 rounds of league cup action. Otherwise it's 23 games. West Ham last season used 27 different players in their starting line-ups and played a total of 57 games, so 17 more than if you played a normal season and got knocked out in the first round of the cups. Of those 27 players, 21 were outfield players that started 10 or more games and they include Dawson who left in Jan and Ings who signed in Jan, so effectively what I'm saying is that West Ham had 22 players they used which was essentially two full teams, then a few youngsters were given a run out on the rare occasion. Just as a side note, all four of their senior CBs got 30+ games in total including sub appearances (Kehrer, Aguerd, Ogbonna and Zouma). Comparing our squad to West Ham, they had 4 senior CBs as do we, then Coufal and Johnson got game time in the same way I expect Cash and Chambers to, Digne and Moreno in the same way Emerson and Cresswell did. Comparing defenses we're definitely in a stronger position. Comparing keepers we're weaker with 2nd choice but that discussion is at groundhog Day so gonna leave it. Comparing managers is chalk and cheese, we have the best possible manager and backroom staff to deal with the fixture situation. Comparing midfield is more tricky, I do think Soucek, Rice, Paqueta and Downes is good but we arguably even win this department for strength - Luiz, Kamara, Tielemans and Dendonker is much stronger with Iroegbunam a better academy backup than Coventry too. Strikers they had Scamacca, Antonio and Ings whereas we have Watkins, Archer and Duran so unless the hierarchy genuinely believe we can push the latter two into being strong squad options for a season, we could do with more up top I believe. Then for attacking options they had Cornet, Benrahma, Bowen, Lanzini and Fornals. With Diaby, Bailey, Buendia, Ramsey, McGinn, Coutinho, Philogene and Traore here we definitely need to trim in this area if we were to match strength in depth. When you look at Man City it's a similar story with their 61 games, only 20 outfield players for them played more than 10 games and that includes Gomes, Palmer and Lewis so basically 17 players who were established first team squad players. Again that includes Cancelo so they ended with 16 outfield players in the senior setup and 3 emerging from the under 21s to get through 61 games. Now we haven't quite got Pep in charge at the club but still. I do think the need for a big squad is a myth. The need for sensible rotation and good coaching / physios to keep on top of potential injuries or something similar is what is needed. You could argue injuries can derail a season but big injuries to Laporte and Phillips didn't halt Man City, no real injury worries for West Ham from what I see but I could be wrong.

Are there any indications as to when these games take place and where they'll be held? Do we play home and away in the group? Sorry, still fairly new to the women's game other than watching the highlights and following transfers so not sure how the Conti Cup works. Planning to get to every game Villa play up north this season so going to both the away games against the Manchester and Merseyside clubs. These Conti Cup fixtures would open up a lot of extra opportunities to go see them play though.