skarroki

I think the idea that he's a bad egg doesn't hold much water. Falls apart when held up to any scrutiny, other than the echo chamber online of false information Duran seems a commited player, exciting prospect getting a few opportunities and progressing off the pitch. 

Think it's a bit daft of people who think he's a bad egg and we want to get rid, to also be posting links of him to AC Milan, Chelsea and West Ham as if it's evidence. Surely it points to the opposite, we're not making a profit on a lad who's barely broken into the first team 12 months after signing. The clubs linked will do due diligence and if there's whispers on a Villa forum about him having an attitude that will have reached recruitment staff at top clubs too. 

4 hours ago, sharkyvilla said:

Number 9 will probably be available in the summer when Bertie goes, I don't think they can change mid-season.

Yeah sorry I meant in the summer we could offer him that shirt, or promised it's his once available. 

Noticed that Duran has started signing off a lot of his Facebook posts about villa with #JD9 which makes me wonder if he's been promised a shirt number swap in the future, or whether he's just manifesting that number. 

Looks like he's playing the troll in the dungeon in a Christmas panto

Forgot we still had him honestly. Imagine the things Emery could get out of him in our set up if he wasn't made of wet paper. 

We need a killer kit design that the uninitiated can get behind buying. We've already got the great colour as a relative USP in terms of top clubs in Europe. If we have a brilliant home shirt and new badge, and play in the champions league next season I think you'll start to see people wearing Villa stuff all over the place. 

Just one of those where both teams and sets of fans will be gutted. You just don't want to draw a big team at this point.

There's no easy games obviously as any minnow could have the games of their lives to cause an upset, or Stevenage 12 months ago where they didn't even have to try that hard. 

The problem for a club in our position now is that there's no particularly hard games either, other than City and Liverpool. You go into every other tie thinking we can get through. And every round after that where you don't get city and Liverpool you think it could be your year as you edge closer to Wembley. 

Chelsea away feels like we're out the cup but I'll also be disappointed to lose to them and I can't get my head around it.

I'm one of the simpletons loving the Wrexham documentary so would love us to play them. Have it at Villa Park and get a full episode of them talking about it being a huge game and what an amazing stadium VP is etc etc 

Not too fussed either way about Duran, I'd rather not lose him but a lot of the fee we were paying was performance-based I believe. If we can get around having to pay that and make a profit on him in 12 months might be worth wishing him good luck and putting faith in other academy prospects, and getting a more senior backup for Watkins. 

14 minutes ago, HeyAnty said:

I googled it and some seem to think he has a 20m buyout clause 

There's a lot of nonsense going on at Leeds with most the players having ridiculous loan and buy release clauses to higher division clubs if they got relegated baked into the contracts. That's why so many of their players have gone on loan around Europe and Harrison is at Everton. £20mil release clause would not surprise me even slightly. 

Worth mentioning he's represented by Wasserman, who also represent Mings, Lenglet, Dendonker, Teddy Rowe and Bogarde. So I think we would have had plenty enough dealings with them that they would perhaps flag the release clause of a player to us. 

They do represent loads of people throughout Europe though so I wouldn't say Villa is a particular stronghold for the agency, just that there are definite and recent connections. 

6 hours ago, Kiwivillan said:

Heard the other day Dortmund got rid of him initially because was staying up all night playing his game console and turned up late for training and tired. Also he's on £300k a week so no thanks

5 hours ago, MaVilla said:

 

Yeah i saw that too, bad attitude at Dortmund, bad attitude and Manure.

Wouldnt touch him with a barge pole.

I saw an interview with Vidic also, where he called out Sancho for being unprofessional (from when Vidic was in the dressing room with him).

not a good look.

I'm not saying the bad attitude thing isn't true, but the guy was absolutely sensational for Dortmund for years and as a teenager, consistently across seasons and competitions. And Man Utd spent the best part of 2 years trying to sign him so publicly they may as well have paid for public service annoucments about their intentions to pay more than what Dortmund were even asking for. 

Dortmund very publicly and memorably said he was their best player and they wouldn't sell for any price after a certain date in July as it would derail their season too much and they stuck to that despite how much Man Utd tried the year before they got him. Hardly stinks of a bad player and awful attitude they were forcing out the door. 

Also the thing about Vidic being in the dressing room with him? Unless it was for charity it's nonsense, Vidic left United in 2014 when Sancho had just turned 14 and was playing for Man City youth teams. Vidic retired when Sancho was 15 and he didn't sign for United until Vidic was 40. 

These rumours about him being a terrible person recently just seem quite revisionist. The guy openly said he was struggling mentally early last year. I don't know why everyone sided with the bald fraud over this too, the guy quite clearly making a complete mess of managing Utd in every other aspect seems to have been widely backed over this decision to treat Sancho like a second class citizen whilst continuing to play a lad in his position with 1 assist to his name and sexual abuse charges in public domain. 

I want to be clear I'm not accusing anyone here on this site or who I've quoted of racism or anything similar in nature, just stating that broadly non-white and/or non-british players seem to be called out for bad behaviour or unprofessionalism even when there's no real evidence of it aside from vague comments from a manager, whereas for example Grealish stumbling around streets coked up and smashed is just him being a lad and enjoying his success, him taking months to get going again the following season is just one of them things. 

I really hope Sancho turns it around, he was completely unplayable when he was still a kid in Germany, with that Dele interview last summer it's a good reminder you never know what's going on in some players lives or when that stuff will catch up with them and completely derail their careers. I used to work in a call centre with a lad who's brother was and still is a professional footballer and this guy could well have been too but he just met the wrong "friends" at the wrong time and was sat listening to abusive customers on commision 11 hours a day instead of living the dream. 

Kind of surprised by this one as I wasn't sure he'd get into a club this high up the ladder and their fans who actually are okay with the signing seem to think he'll be backup. Hopefully he proves everyone wrong and does well. When lads like Barry are stuck in league two though does shock me when Revan and Chrisene are suddenly showing up in the championship. The clubs that players move to always seem so random, I'm sure we've got things in place to ensure it's a good fit but there's nothing obvious or stated from the outside. 

9 hours ago, OutByEaster? said:

The design has been registered online as copyright for legal protections, it was found there, that can only have been done by the club or someone acting for the club in a legal capacity.

 

Okay but done over a month ago and suddenly found online as an easily accessible, public item anyone can pull a copy of? Who was the first person to find the copyright and start shouting about it enough to get national attention? Why did it take so long to find? 

I'm a complete nerd when it comes to videogames and especially Pokémon and you wouldn't believe the amount of stories over the last 10 / 15 years about new Nintendo consoles, logos and new Pokémon games that all just end up as dead ends, some randomly have their trademarks and stuff renewed out of nowhere and then nothing again. So maybe I'm being completely stupid about this but it feels like a thing I've heard before where people have been furious and then nothing until a few years later someone is like "remember this? What was all that about"

If Villa have paid for this badge and someone's created it, couldn't it just be copyrighted for legal reasons with no intention to use it? How many other images have we got under copyright and how many of them are relating to the badge and in current use?

1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said:

Has there been any word at all yet from the club on this?

With this much noise, you'd expect them to do one of two things:

1. Bring forward, or at least announce, the date of the official launch of this badge in a way that gives them back a little bit of a sense of control of the narrative, at the moment, it's chaos and the longer it's not addressed the worse it looks - piss up, meet brewery.

2. Publicly announce that this isn't the badge so that the noise stops.

That they haven't done either of these things suggests that there's a lot of puckering butt at VP and that they're either not quite sure what to do about it so are trying to pretend it isn't happening and sticking to Plan A or that they're surprised by the reaction and they're looking to see if they can squeeze in some alterations before launch day/it going out to kit manufacturers.

You know what, if this is it and this crest will be representing the football club going forward, I'll get right behind it, it's claret and blue, it's got a lion on it, it says Aston Villa. I don't hate it and I'm sure it'll grow on me over the coming years - but jeez, squeeze the damn thing out so we can get on with accepting and embracing it.

This is very cynical but whenever one of these "leaks" happens where it's difficult to work out where the leak started, who had the material to put it online, I'm inclined to assume it's a deliberate ploy by someone and not accidental.

Either club endorsed, to float the current favoured badge internally and monitor the reaction to it around the world to see how people feel about it. 

Or, what I would think, someone from the external logo design company has done a fairly basic mock-up of a badge for the club based on what the people our side involved on this have requested, this has been sent over and someone probably junior within that company has seen it within an email chain and downloaded the image. So they have sent a mockup of the badge to a news outlet anonymously to try get a bit of cash.

I normally think if it would involve more than 3 people it's probably not what's happened, so I would bet the club is maybe waiting to next week to understand who has leaked the badge and what steps the company has taken.

If they know that either this is all fake nonsense, or that it's a genuine design but from ages ago and has moved on since, they won't address this at all because the proof will be in the reveal when a completely different design is shown. 

Twitter football moves so quickly these days, especially in transfer windows, this will all be buried by midday tomorrow I'd think and no-one will care 

1 minute ago, Jas10 said:

I'll come back in February

3 hours ago, Jas10 said:

 

No such things as “free” either really, sign on fees, agent fees and big wages/demands for players out of contract… another older player on big wages is going to eventually be another problem/burden that we will struggle to shift again… 

Don’t have much more to add or say on the matter, so I’ll leave it there. Time to move on

 

Sorry to respond when you've said you're leaving it but more generally speaking in, this is what I meant by box clever.

If he's coming in at 31 on a 3/4 year deal it's a bad move, if we spend £22mil on Zaniolo and bring Anderson in too, keep Bailey and Diaby and don't play with wingers it would be bizarre. 

If we know we can get good money for someone in the squad who's perhaps floating that they wanna go, and the recruitment team feel like they can get someone on the continent signed up to a pre-contract agreement, even if we're paying higher wages/ agent fees etc, for profit and sustainability rules we'd be in profit because we'd bagged a transfer fee for one player and paid no fee for the other. 

For example, if Traore is saying he wants to play regularly and we get offered £5mil from Turkey that's £5mil profit, if we then bring in X from Germany who's on £10k more, a similar age on a 3 year deal we'll be £5mil to the good by the stupid rules which can go towards a top target instead of being eaten up by supplementing the squad with a £15mil player on less wages on a 3 year deal that would balance out to £0.

Sorry if I'm labouring the point, I just feel that with all the workings with fees at the moment, I think we could bring in more players who are genuinely top tier in the summer if this season carries on in the same vein. Spending on any position means we have less wiggle room if someone amazing becomes a realistic target. 

If Leao becomes available in August for example, and we've got any chance at all of getting him in a room with Unai and Monchi, I don't want us to have spent £45mil across a backup striker and a couple midfield bench options that's meant a deal isn't possible or we have to sell a good squad option to make it happen. Especially if there were interesting free transfers to be had on sensible contract lengths. 

4 hours ago, Delphinho123 said:

And then you go and ruin it with this nonsense. Spence is a wasteman.

Why is he? Has he done something in his personal life that makes him undesirable that I've missed or do you just not like his personality?

3 hours ago, Jas10 said:

Do we need him? Is he better than what we have?

If not, there’s no point. We have enough players at the club…

It’s no longer a great league either and many can’t manage the step up… 

I’m sure many people would prefer to bring back a talented youngster like Philogene Bidace than sign an ageing, average player on a free (probably on big wages) when we don’t need him…

Personally, I hope and believe we’re much more ambitious and capable than that and the only signings we make from now on are genuine competition, upgrades and youngsters with huge potential.

Again, we have been trimming the fat off this squad and upping the quality and standards…

Dunno why we would suddenly change that strategy now that we are flying and so high up the league…

 

It’s all just opinions…

bit if Unai wants him (not so sure), then Unai gets him

Anderson is genuine competition and is also free in a position we don't have particular depth, and will be coming in next season not in Jan. If we don't sign Zaniolo it's like for like replacement. 

Lot of stuff still swirling that Djed Spence was recalled as he's being sold. We need a right back in the club, if we'd got him at the time he went to Spurs I'd have been absolutely buzzing. 

Look for every example of one thing there's an example of the opposite, but people talking about Anderson at West Ham as if that's his entire career and therefore he's not that good, sound like people who still can't help themselves with mentioning Emery's time at Arsenal as if he'd never held another role before or since. 

The guy has played most minutes of every season since 14/15 and is consistently getting great numbers in the league. We are going to have to box clever to continue rising and this guy on a free looks good business. 

Think if O'Riley is on the move we should be in the conversation 100% 

1 hour ago, Pongo Waring said:

His numbers are pretty amazing in the Championship this season

One season wonder? 

Living in Leeds I actually have a slight soft spot for the team and the Podcast The Square Ball is top tier in terms of team specific podcast. Don't know anyone that doesn't rave about this guy and think he's brilliant.

He's only turned 22 a couple months ago so to be honest I think he's a similar situation to lots of European talents moving to the Prem. They bought a brilliant talent around 18/19 but were fighting relegation and he wasn't ready to be bedded in slowly, he wasn't given the opportunity to cameo and make a name for himself.

There's people who still have no idea who Duran is even though we spent £20+mil on him a year ago. Some of these guys just stay out of sight for a while. 

40 minutes ago, useless said:

Feel sorry for Plymy, I wonder if we can sort them out with a replacement, he's different type of midfielder, but apparently Bogarde has a Championship move lined up, maybe he could be heading there.

In terms of creativity, Tommi O'Reilly is probably the closest we have to Azaz, with regards to 21s that need a loan, but not sure he would get a Championship move, not a reflection on his ability more circumstances

Bogarde only played 14 of the 23 league games he was available, seemed to fall out of favour at Bristol Rovers. I would think he's being recalled because Matty Taylor doesn't want him, rather than because a club higher up is trying to get him in. Don't think he's seen a minute on the pitch since Taylor came in. 

Really happy for Azaz to get a move to a big club like Middlesbrough and seemingly cement himself as a championship player. Was league two level when we brought him in so been able to help him up the leagues and give us a tiny bit of wiggle room in the P&S rules. 

Probably already been mentioned but couldn't find it as I lazily scrolled through, surprised that we're not heavily linked with Guirassey given his release clause, seems to have been linked to so many other teams maybe because a lot of people need a top first choice striker. I personally think if this isn't a purple patch in his career he'd be best joining us and being bed into England slowly from the bench as a rotation option, learning from Emery, Paco and the rest of the team. 

I don't think it'll happen but I don't see why we'd be any less likely than anyone else to take a punt