villabromsgrove

Good post .... "Onwards and upwards" should be our positive belief, as well as our motto.

Top post in my opinion.

A quick glance at the age of our defence, highlights the fact that from now on we have to sign much younger players if we're building for the future. Five of our key defenders are 30 years old, and one of them Diego Carlos has yet to prove that he can be the player he was before his catastrophic injury. Konsa 25 and Cash 25 are our only younger defenders with Chambers 28 (likely to be sold this summer) and either Konsa and Cash might decide to push for a move (depending on who gets the RB spot) in order to play regular first team football, if either or both are used mainly as bench and cup players this season.

From what I've seen of Brennan Johnson (which is regular MOTD highlights and occasional Sky televised games) his stats don't do him justice, but I think that the eyes and tablets of the scouts may tell a different story. I put this down to the fact that he was playing at the sharp end of a desperately struggling team. I know a lot of what I've watched is condensed into highlights, but he looks a very bright and bustling player with a lot of potential waiting to be developed. Without him Forest would definitely be playing Championship football again this coming season, and for me that's a far greater recommendation than stats collated while playing for a poor team.

I've just seen an express article saying that Gerrard has done a u turn and accepted the Al Ettifaq managers job. Could Coutinho go to Al Ettifaq to join his great mate?

"Public consultation Wednesday" We're not hanging about now are we. There seems some real urgency behind the scenes as NSWE push this project.

I hope you're right. Exciting times!

That's a good comparison and look how well that turned out for us.

One compelling reason for buying a young player with great potential like Brennan Johnson is that he qualifies as a home grown player. If we intend to play in Europe every season going forward, then Euro squad compatibility has to be considered if a suitable home "grown player" becomes available.

Johnson would make sense. He's nowhere near the finished article but he appears to have all the building bricks in place to be modelled into an outstanding right sided attacker. According to Brennan, right wing is his favourite position at the moment and he has really good pace to put left sided defenders under big pressure, as he doesn't need to get goal side initially to get by them. His left foot is surprisingly good as well so he can go inside or outside. Emery could work wonders with him imo, and as he is only 22 he could become a very valuable player longterm. He will cost a lot more than he should be worth at the moment, because Forest desperately need to keep him. Koopmeiners is less suitable as he has no pace and although he's a good passer I think he's more suitable as a CDM, and I don't think Emery is looking to add to that area. We now have Tielemans to do that progressive passing job for us.

A match is at least 90 minutes, so impact subs can make a big difference against tiring defences. I've recently seen fans of other clubs pointing out how strong our match day squad will be this coming season (we haven't finished yet!), and we will need that strength in depth to attack a top six finish and play euro matches, and domestic cup matches.

It's been said many times on here recently, but seeing Tielemans in a Villa shirt .... We really are building the best looking football team aren't we!

I think it may be the exact opposite. Alemany staying at Barcelona means he is faced with having to cut 200 million off Barcelona"s budget this year in order to comply with La Liga's regulations. They are being monitored and have to make it happen through Sales of players and getting big wages off the books. It has to be Alemany's number one focus. His recent dealings with our owners have given him an insight into the honest and very solvent owners of AVFC. It may well be a good opportunity to deal with us over a player that they like but desperately need off their books. If Ferran is interested it could easily happen.

I occasionally go on the Newcastle fan forum and I'm impressed with some of the comments that have been made recently about Villa. In the main they are decent reactions to players we have signed and are now currently linked with. A couple of comments about them not being able to match our squad depth with both PL and euro matches in mind and an acknowledgement that we are after top quality players is also interesting, as it shows a fans view from outside looking at a rival club. The fact that decent fans see us as real rivals this coming season is encouraging. If we sign Ferran Torres it will be good to see further reaction.

Why wouldn't Ferran Torres be motivated? If he leaves Barcelona he will feel like he's got something to prove. He's only 23 and has played 35 times for Spain already, scoring 15 times. He will want to show people how good he is this season, and was quoted as saying today that he's "going to train like a Bull" to be ready for the coming season. That doesn't sound like an unmotivated player to me.

Great going forward but their midfield will get outworked and outplayed by good teams. It's definitely Moyes' type of 'hoof it to the wingers' football though, and it will work in some games. I didn't want us to sign Barnes because although he is dangerous on the left and has scored goals, his team contribution and work ethic is lacking, and he ducks fifty /fifty's.

Thanks Jas, that's the story that I saw but due to being computer illiterate I was unable to link it, lol.

I'm an old codger and useless at links, lol. The part of the story that caught my attention was Ferran Torres saying about Emery "I've seen him at Valencia. He's been a benchmark, he's doing things very well and you never know". That preceded the comments about "today I want to be at Barcelona but football takes many turns".

It's on twitter .... "Marca" quote.

Ferran Torres is making much more encouraging comments today about the possibility of a move. He appears impressed with Emery.

I've been really excited about the possibility of signing Gonçalves, but the more I've read about his stats and history makes me wonder whether he is exactly the player we need. His stats are excellent, but when you factor in the number of penalties he scores (as part of his goals total) and the obscure names of most of the teams he's scored and assisted against ,the stats become less impressive. Ramsey has played the same number of games for Villa in the PL as Gonçalves has played for Sporting, and JJ has played twice as many age group internationals as PG just to compare experience. Also PG has only played two senior internationals for Portugal (a friendly against Spain in 2020 was one, and I couldn't find details of the other). He was in the initial group of 55 players named for the World Cup, but didn't make the squad. In his two years at Wolves he played only one competitive game and that was an EFL cup game against Sheffield Wednesday. One of the reasons he gave for returning to Portugal was homesickness. I know he was young then and that wouldn't have helped him. I'm glad that Monchi has joined us because I watched him say on his YouTube videos that he looks at the person just as much as he looks at the player, which is hugely important when you're thinking of taking a player out of an environment that may have become a comfort zone. I'm still very impressed with Gonçalves, but I wonder whether he is a perfect fit for us. At his asking price that's what he has to be .... a perfect fit!

Speculation is fine and is the life blood of forums, but can we have more "Positive" speculation please. These are exciting times.

Welcome Pau and Paula to the Villa family.

Tielemans and Torres. Already a big technical improvement.

I noticed this morning that Jonathan David has been left out of the Canadian CONCACAF squad, apparently because he is sorting out a move from Lille to a "bigger league". He would definitely improve us imo.