AXD

I don't mind all these youngsters coming in, but since they are long term investments, we need other players who are immediate assets as well. Dale Stephens will not save us on his own, I'll be happy if he performs like westwood.

how about loaning from bigger clubs, it's cheap, low risk and teh players will want to show themselves and their actual club

Looking at the squads from the big clubs, there are quite a number of players who are rotting on the bench mostly and want to see more action (some have been mentioned here before).

ManC: K. Toure, Milner, Guidetti

Arsenal: Djourou, Rosicky, Arshavin

Chelsea: Ferreira, Malouda, Benayoun

Tottenham: Bentley, Naughton, Jenas, Livermore

Don't mind their wages, you can agree to only pay half of them. I don't think arsenal would mind to still pay half the salary to rosicky for example if he actually plays for us. it'll get his price up and it's better than paying the whole salary when he's not ding anything.

Players like Warnock and Hutton already proved they were shite last season...

thank god the rest of the team were in awesome form last season.

A guy like Warnock has proven to be a good left back when playing with good players round him (in the MON era).

on left back, i would take him over lichaj or Bennett, stevens was to only one who looked decent enough.

Samba is being payed a fortune in Russia.

Out of the relegated clubs:

Wolves: Doyle (4M), Hunt (2.2M), O'Hara (4.4), Ward (3.5M)

Bolton: Mark Davies (3.5M), Wheater (2.2M), Eagles (4.8M), M Petrov (0.875M).

Blackburn: Scott Dann (3.5M), Olsson (both) (4M & 1.3M), Givet (1.3M).

Blackpool: Matt Phillips (2.2M) (presume Ince is going to Liverpool)

I added the prices found on transfermarkt to get an indication. Not all of them are good enough, but they are certainly affordable. Other than that, none of these guys will be in salary ranges which should scare off Villa, they're playing in the championship and none are looking to get back up this season. The ones that are on high wages will be given permission to leave.

I think there are certainly 2 or 3 in this list that can strengthen our squad significantly

Hmmm, such a difficult one.

Guzan

Lowton Vlaar Dunne Baker

N'Zogbia Westwood Bannan Agbonlahor

Benteke Bent

That's a really aggressive line up so not sure how well it'd work but both central midfielders play deeper so should be covered.

Only real other players i'd say knocking on the door would be Joe Bennett, Bret Holman and Ireland/Delph/KEA if Bannan (most likely) isn't performing well.

I don't want players like Lichaj, Herd even near the line up.

I quite agree with this, espacially the last sentence.

Guzan

Lowton - Vlaar - Dunne - Warnock

Ireland - Westwood - Bannan - Nzogbia

Bent- Benteke

Dunne is question mark though, as you never know if he ever returns to his level, Baker/Clark his replacement

Bannan should go off for Holman if it's a more power-play game.

Subs: Given, Clark/Baker, Stevens, Holman, Albrighton, Weimann, Gabby (so every position can be covered)

a few shouts (some already mentioned)

defence: Upson, Samba, Dann, Lombaerts. Experience is very much needed.

Baker and Clark are good squad players, but not yet starters for the entire season. Lichaj and herd have been here for a while now and haven't convinced me at all. Bennett and Stevens can still prove themselves; Lowton is a good RB

midfield: Milner on loan, Perisic as winger (two-footed, good free-kick, technique, benched at dortmund but would walk into our squad). both of them can score a goal, something our midfield hasn't been doing so far

strikers: we have Bent, Gabby, Benteke and Weimann. the first two have loads of experience, the latter are obvious talents.

possible line up

Guzan

Lowton --- Vlaar ------ Lombaerts --- Stevens

Perisic ---- Westwood--Milner----Nzogbia

------------Bent-------Benteke

Milner could go right, perisic left, Zog on the bench and KEA/Bannan/Ireland on CM

So with 2-3 specific signings, this could be a very different team.

Lamberts idea of playing wiht youngsters is fine, but then you will be battling relegation all season (and have a chance of losing in the end).

Another thing that I keep noticing on this board. players can play 2-3 bad games and are immediately horrible and a waste of money. Last season Bent and Given were 2 of our best players, now everyone wants to offload them as quickly as possible. players like Zog, Given, bent, Ireland have proben themselves at other clubs, so they have what it takes to be PL players. I can't say the same for Bennett, Baker, Clark, Bannan just yet.

The answer is simple we never qualify becuse we used to have always 2 big lands in our qual poulle like spain and germany this year is the first time we have a qualifable poulle to do only Croatia can be a treat neverentlesse wer at the moment First in our group and only concead 1 goal in 4 qualify fixtures so if we keep this up and if Benteke keeps scoring wer very sure to finnaly qualify again =] fun statistic: since Benteke is red devil we raised 34ish places on the rank table ;-) and yes we have 10millish population. wer only a little country

the chances of having Germany AND spain in one poule are slim to none.

for euro 2012 it was germany and turkey. they didn't make it because they screwed up against the turks (and against the smaller countries); now there's more experience kicking in rather than talent alone

I'm not entirely knowledgeable about the Belgian National squad but all the forwards seem relatively new.

What seems to be the plan with them up front?

Are Benteke and Vossen the first choices?

Or does Lukaku or another get more of a look in?

Benteke has been the first choice for the last few games. Lukaku is still seen as the biggest prospect, but that has been changing due to Benteke's performances.

on the wings there's mertens, chadli, mirallas, de bruyne and Hazard (De Bruyne would be great for villa next season, chelsea have loaned him to Werder Bremen this season and want him at a PL club next season)

Vossen doesn't always make the squad as he's not that kind of striker, he works better in a 4-4-2 round a type like Benteke

Ivan Perišić has allegedly been told he can leave Dortmund if they receive an offer of €7M. Good player who's good with either foot and can play out wide or through the middle.

not the best mindset though, goes crying to the press when he's on the bench