ender4

44 minutes ago, AshVilla said:

Is that the sign to chop off their heads or their legs?  

12 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

For an outsider looking in its hard to explain how much of an island Newcastle is compared to us

For us lot who went to school with man utd and liverpool fans let alone baggies and wolves (Kidderminster 15 miles south of brum maybe 1 or 3 blue noses in a thousand kids) it's a no brainer what our problems are

The demographic of the city is also key, the roots aren't as deep for too many people in our catchment area 

Which is why we really could do with a ground where we can offer 5-8,000 tickets for free or at major discount to school kids, so they grow up Villa fans rather than Man Utd/Liverpool fans. 
 

They will also come with an adult and spend money on the ground and shop. 

42 minutes ago, nick76 said:

I get that we are doing well and football is immensely popular at the moment but I’m yet to be convinced that we have either 30,000 genuine season ticket waiting list people who would snap up a ticket if it was available now, maybe 10,000 tops or if they would be general sale that we would sell anywhere near 60k in the lower class premier league games especially midweek games.

Even if only 10,000 of our 35k+ waiting list actually took up the option of a season tickets, that takes our current attendance from 42k to 52k. Add in 2k extra hospitality and 1k extra away fans capacity, then we would already be averaging 55k for a rubbish category B game. 
 

Then we’d have lots of casual fans who would buy the extra 5k tickets that would be on general sale, even if that was only for the big 6 games, Wolves game and 4 CL games, that’s 50% of our games selling out a 60k stadium. 
 

The smaller games probably only attract an extra 2k casual fans and so attendance averages 57k for those games. 

1 hour ago, Avfc96 said:

The time for Qatar to 'invest' in an English football club has been and gone. They bought PSG 14 years ago with the intent of promoting the 2022 WC which they did and are now going the other way in terms of their investment with most of their high earners now gone and focusing on bringing through and signing younger players.

 

Maybe time for Iran, North Korea and Houthi rebels to put in a joint bid to buy Everton.  Should get passed the PL board just fine.

Lower Grounds tickets for this match is also sold out. Terrace View tickets still available.

26 minutes ago, Talldarkandransome said:

Aren't they the ones they normally block off cos of the advertising boards

I thought Europe has bigger boards so they can’t sell these seats for Euro matches?  

2 hours ago, CVByrne said:

 In the same period we would be playing 10 CL level opponents, means more required from our best players and 4 more games. 

We wouldn't though.

We'd be playing four teams on par with Man City, Arsenal, Liverpool.  Two teams equal to a Spurs or Newcastle.  And 2 teams equal to a West Ham, Brighton, Wolves level. 

And we'd only need to win around three of those eight games to qualify for the play-off round. Four wins would put us mid-table and give us a decent chance of getting though the play-off round.

Four wins also pay an extra prize money of £10 million on top of the base CL money.

12 hours ago, fightoffyour said:

The crest stands out because it's baby blue (for some reason) on claret. The lion doesn't stand out on the badge because it's pale yellow (for some reason) on baby blue. It's just a smudge. The lion either needs to be claret on a blue background or gold on a claret background with a gold or blue trim so it stands out on the home shirt. This should be obvious to absolutely everybody - apart from Lerner and Heck apparently - and is absolutely fundamental to any Aston Villa crest design.

Exactly this. It's so simple yet no-one at Villa seems to understand the basic concept of contrasting colours.

So there is a pic of a kit doing the rounds on Reddit - someone took this photo of our ‘new kit’ being sold in a market in Turkey.   
 

A fake shirt of course, but the Turkish seller said it’s a copy of our new kit.

It’s Adidas, with the new badge and AU1500 scrawled in the middle.  If you ignore the rubbish badge and ignore the AU1500, it looks pretty decent.

Not sure if anyone can get it from Reddit and post it here?

3 hours ago, duke313 said:

They’ve transfer listed the whole team bar Mainoo, Garnacho and Hojlund

They should just swap 10 players with Chelsea. Win-win for both of them

7 minutes ago, Czarnikjak said:

The 85% cost control was voted in unanimously last week. Today's vote was for x5 anchor cap In Addition to cost control.

The 85% cost control was voted in for 2024/25. 

The anchor cap vote today was for 2025/26 onwards to replace the 85% cost control. 
 

Not one article is saying otherwise.

1 hour ago, wishywashy said:

This thread is under the impression that there won't be a 85% spending cap for Prem clubs, which The Times and The Athletic have both said will remain.

It’s funny that we both read the same articles and have interpreted it completely different.  
 

As far as I can tell, and I’m pretty confident that is what The Times and The Athletic are trying to say, is that this new fixed cap will REPLACE the 85% PSR limits. The key word there in both articles is the word “replace”.   
 

Of course, they might be wrong themselves, but that is what they are telling us.  In my interpretation of course.

20 minutes ago, viivvaa66 said:

Actually there are 36 teams, so 12 teams get knocked out.

Top 8 teams go directly into round of 16, where they are seeded. Teams 9 to 16 are drawn against teams 17 to 24 in a qualifying round before the winners are drawn against the top 8 teams.

I believe we could manage get into the top 16, that provides a good chance to get into the round of 16.

Oh yeah sorry, 36 not 32 teams.  Agree, we’d still hope to be mid-table.

6 minutes ago, foreveryoung said:

I want it too, but no way are we ready, I doubt we get out the group.

24 out of 32 teams get through the mega-group stage next season.  Only the 8 worst teams get knocked out, and most of those will be teams who have gone through qualifying rounds to even get to the group stage.

Id expect us to get through to the play-off round.

14 minutes ago, TRO said:

Are we ready for Champions league?.....missing out on the Europa, is a huge step up.

Don't get me wrong, I want to achieve it, but I wonder, if we are actually ready for it.

Yes definitely. Under the new 32 team league system, we are guaranteed 8 games.  Only 4 of those games should be against teams who are actually better than Villa.

We have a really good chance of finishing in a mid-table position, and a great chance of qualifying for the play-off round. In the play-off round, we should play a team of a similar quality to Villa, giving us a decent chance at the knock-out rounds.  
 

Of course, if we get to the knock-out rounds, we will be massively outgunned, but that’ll have been an amazing CL campaign by that point.
 

33 minutes ago, GlobalVillan said:

Yep. Maybe not £100m but certainly not cheap. Unless he decides to run his comtract down and pocket the "transfer fee" in increased wages.

Yeah that’s what makes most sense for Salah.

Take the £30m wages for this year.  
 

Then he’s a free agent, sign for a Saudi club next summer for a massive signing on fee and massive wages.

5 hours ago, duke313 said:

Have a look who their defensive set piece coach is 

Who?

29 minutes ago, NoelVilla said:

Seems lilke the best for us would be Champions League next season and then miss Europe 25/26. A bit weird.

Nah the best is for us to win the CL next year and so get the £100m extra revenue and global recognition that comes with it.  

1 minute ago, wishywashy said:

Now I genuinely have no clue: in the Independent article you can read it both ways, and in the Times' article (by Martyn Ziegler so pretty much the defining authority) it suggests that the squad cost control replaces PSR and that once again it'd be in addition.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/81e36d08-ad3a-470b-8a8b-7fc0c540a74e?shareToken=cf42a3f3d4cef7bbed7def89354ca948

So the BBC suggest it replaces the limit, Independent you can argue both ways, and the Times suggest it's in addition. The joys of the media. And English.

Though The Times also suggests a conflicting viewpoint in the same sentence - the sentence starts with "The Premier League has already agreed to replace..."  using the word replace.  But then continues by talking about 85% limit.   I now have no idea lol.

10 minutes ago, mark359 said:

Desperately hoping I will be able to get a ticket when my criteria opens up in 10 mins, having been to the other Europe home games, but not very confident. 
 

For the Lille game I logged on as soon as it opened and there was nothing, but I kept trying in the following days and a whole block opened up in Doug Ellis. Not really time for that to happen now

Well right now the ticket website is showing zero tickets left for the game.  So it would be Lower Grounds or Terrace View tickets coming onto general sale if they decide to do that.

Weirdly there is no button to buy LG or TV tickets.

11 minutes ago, wishywashy said:

Ahhh, I see what you mean.

That does seem... questionable. Would make far more sense to combine them.

Not sure why Newcastle would vote in favour of that sort of proposal.

Maybe more fake sponsorship deals on the horizon to massively increase revenue so that they are fine spending more under the UEFA Squad Ratio Rules. But they won't spend so much that they will hit the new PL cap.

1 minute ago, Baldricks Cunning Plan said:

The below is what the Independent are reporting - I think that WishyWashy is right.

 

In principle, the idea is to prevent a further widening of the financial chasm that is increasingly seen between the top and bottom ends of the league. In reality, it might mean that excessive and lucrative sponsorship deals made by the richest club have no additional impact on their spending power, if their income is already over the anchored amount of the least affluent sides.

Clubs have already agreed to replace the current Profitability and Sustainability Rules (PSR) from 2025-26 onwards, with cost controls instead limiting club expenditure on salaries, signing and fees to 85 per cent of total revenue.

No, that's exactly what i'm saying. 

Look at the word i've bolded - it says "REPLACE" PSR, not in addition to PSR.

10 minutes ago, wishywashy said:

The Premier League will be restricting teams to 85% spend of turnover from next season anyway (which is the big change that's replacing FFP in it's current form), so Newcastle wouldn't be able to do that. The new UEFA financial rules will be restricting teams to 90% spend next season, then 70% from 2025-26, so we wouldn't feel any additional restrictive effects from being in Europe next season.

So the Premier League rules will definitely be a bit looser for teams not in Europe, 15% more of turnover to be precise, but I suppose that's mitigated a bit as teams in Europe will get more money. I can see why the likes of Villa and Newcastle might not be overly keen, but this was unanimously agreed on about a month ago, and this hard cap would be an additional measure.

I guess one reason you'd be opposed would be if you think the Premier League's broadcasting money has peaked with this current deal, and will decrease in the coming years to the point where the 'hard cap' suddenly becomes restrictive for more than just the likes of Chelsea and Man City.

Yes and no. 

The PL PSR rules are for 2024-25 season. 

Then the new PL cap system replaces the PL PSR rules for 2025-26 onwards.

https://www.sportsmole.co.uk/football/ac-milan/transfer-talk/news/ac-milan-lining-up-move-for-aston-villa-man_542486.html

Quote

AC Milan have reportedly shortlisted an Aston Villa player as a potential defensive target for the summer transfer window.

All things considered, Milan have enjoyed a respectable 2023-24 campaign, notably sitting in second position in the Serie A standings.

However, while their performance in the league will again deliver Champions League football, sitting 19 points adrift of champions Inter Milan will reportedly have ramifications.

Last week, it was claimed that the Milan board are ready to part ways with long-serving head coach Stefano Pioli in a bid to close the gap to their neighbours.

As well as opting for a fresh approach from the dugout, the likelihood is that different options will be acquired for a number of positions in the squad.

https://football-italia.net/milan-start-negotiations-aston-villa/

Quote

Milan director Geoffrey Moncada has opened direct talks with Aston Villa defender Diego Carlos ahead of the summer transfer window.

The Rossoneri have struggled with cover in defence for large parts of this season, an issue that’ll again be present in their upcoming clash with Juventus. As such, a new centre back is one of many reinforcements set to arrive in the summer.

The Rossoneri appreciate the 31-year-old’s leadership skills, experience, strong aerial ability and strong man-marking. The Villans aren’t keen to give up the defender for cheap, having spent €31m to sign him from Sevilla back in July 2022.

The only good thing is that this is from the 2025/26 season. We have 14 months to basically double our current revenue if we want to compete at the top end of the table.