The Fun Factory

We're already charging "top dollar". That's the premier league for you. I think people will be more inclined to pay that if they're getting a better service, or a better view. Well yes- that means if the stand is ever to be built, it would have to offer better service, as the view will not be better than the trinity or doug ellis.

Thing is I dont think the club could charge top 'dollar' for seats even in a plush new north stand as it will still be behind a goal or corner view from the seats. Same goes for corporate seating- I am sure people would be interested, but the better views would be in the trinity or doug ellis areas.

Probably a daft question- has the North Stand roof ever been replaced? If not, how long do they supposed to last for?! 40-50 yrs?

Ok- the figure I have found is 17mil. Plus the new signage and restaurant etc I guess it could be around the 20 mil mark. Villa spent 2 and a half mil on the old Trinity in the early 90s before knocking it down. NTL- what were they thinking?!

I think we got about 36,000 v Inter Milan, 22,000 v Fiorentina, and about 18,000 v Valencia and the club gave up on home friendlies after that. I guess they are hoping for about 25,000 for Malaga. If its nice weather and the tickets are a tenner they may get around that number I guess.

Yes but that doesnt count the cost Lener did when he refurbed it when he took over.

Monaco are a bunch of sell outs. They have really moved from their working class, proletariat, origins. TBH why wouldnt any player not move to Monaco? Cash, no tax, nice place to live. Its a tough gig.

I think even with the best will in the world I can't see Villa ever getting 60,000 crowds. That is huge support. Only Man U, Arsenal and Celtic can get those gates in this country. 50,000- maybe, 60,000- too much! As for the cost I think the Trinity cost around £30 million over 10 years ago. So I would guess a new North Stand would be at least £40 million. Or 1 andy carroll, nigel reo coker and a zak knight.

Postive thinking- I would like to think ur right but who knows? I always think Villa should have a bigger away allocation- if we did expand, there should be a 5-6,000 away section. The 'big' clubs would sell this out and you would get a extra 3,000 on the gate already.We are near most clubs and should encourage it as a good away day. Gets a better atmosphere, but I would be careful in a Blues game though. You could also 'tarp' upper sections for smaller teams (eg Fulham, Swansea etc) to reduce the capacity. This probably won't justify building lots of new seats though! To justify a bigger North Stand Villa probably need to have 38-40 k minimum crowds with nearly 50K potential support in the big games. Have we the support for this?

They have recladded the building and cleaned up the concrete. It would help if you picked a photo that wasn't ten years old. It looks more like this these days. Yes, it is still a 1970s brutalist office complex, but it's functional. I'd hope when it does get rebuilt then we will see a red brick facade like the Holte end has but the implication that Villa Park is a bad looking stadium is laughable because even from it's ugliest corner (this photograph) it is still better than most grounds. From that angle it looks fairly easy to whack in seats in the corner, but on the trinity side I always wonder if there is the space? Makes you think when the redid the doug ellis/witton lane in the 1990s they could have just carried on and filled in the corner, and properly connected it up with the Holte at the other end. Then you could have kept the old Triniity in a Horseshoe type design with bascially the same capacity as now.

Villa park lost something when the old trinity got demolished. Lerner has done a nice job putting the mosaics and stained glass in the Holte, but its not the same as the Trinity. Villa Park has always been a collection of 4 stands and have lacked a well thought out plan since the days of Rinder. Mind you bar Man U, that has been the case for most other British Clubs. I give you the example of the (Sir?!) Doug Ellis stand obstructing the view of some seats in the Lower Holte, when both stands were rebuilt in the mid 90s- the original thinking was to bolt seats on the Holte terrace before they changed their minds. I think there have been 2 models of potential new north stands- one under Doug which just looked like a extention of the new trinity, and a photo shot at the time of the 2018 world cup bid which looked a bit better. All a bit pie in the sky at the moment though. If anyone is interested in the History of Villa Park may I point you to the excellent 'Villa Park-100 years' by SImon Inglis. It was written in 1997 so there is nothing about Mr Inglis low opinion of the Trinity knock down or discussions of a new North Stand.

I would be suprised if the Premier League ever allow standing. Its againist their principles of screwing the fans and pushing ticket prices up. And I dont think the government can really be bothered to push it. The FA are nowhere to be found on the issue as usual.

10/10. That's because I am a sad git. A few overseas ones where educated guesses.

No I think Lerner was right to finish Bodymoor before any new stand. It was half finished if I remember when Doug sold up. Isn't HS2 going very close round the training ground? Demitri- yes could be the way forward doing some development before pushing on with more. On the flip side we could end up with a half finished stand for about 10 years!

Well yes- but our attendances for the last 4/5 games shot up, which does show the potential support for Villa. I mean we went from 30k v West Ham to over 38 k QPR. It's the club's task to get the 'floater' fan coming more at the Villa. If that ever did happen, then there could be a case for a new stand. How we do this than other having a good side and/or cheaper tickets, I do not know.

Thing is in the next 5 years or so, several clubs could well overtake Villa Park's capacity. Man City are set to expand to 54,000. Liverpool planning to extend Anfield, though in fairness they have been talking about that for years. Spurs want to have a new 50,000+ ground. West Ham are getting a free 60,000 to play in. We could be left well behind. Although the North Stand does have boxes, they are seen as old fashioned as they cannot have a outside section for the customers. On a interesting footnote, having 2 levels of boxes was suggested at the time by the Villa Chairman, Sir William Dugdale. Who was Dave Cameron's uncle. A new stand could have some very plush corporate facilities, which are the big money spinner in modern football. The world bank wants the UK to invest in infrastructure- how about a new VP stand?! Joking aside if it did happen, it would also have to have facilities outside football such as community rooms for the local area, or links with local schools and colleges. A massive new club shop and muesuem would also be nice, but we are probably dreaming for this to happen.

As the original poster has said, the North Stand Redevelopment has gone very quiet in the past couple of years. Remember when the general was giving strong hints that plans were being made etc for building work?! I was never sure if the plans were to be a complete rebuild, or a refurb job with the corners filled in. Perhaps they didn't either. It was a modern stand in its day, but it is looking tired and dated now. It was built in the era of terracing- no way would Villa have built such as small stand with the goal post construction roof today. I am sure it was all part of the master plan in the heady early Lerner days that this would happen when we got CL football (how naive we were all pre man city days). Take in the factors that they removed the old megabox and did not replace the big screen, and they pulled out of the 2012 olympics as 'major' building work 'could' happen at Villa Park during that summer. In a recent H&V article about all this, a educated guess was made by the author that the club effectively gave up on this when even under the MON days, Villa hardly ever sold out. In 2007-2008 we peaked at 40,000 average gates, and we have slipped back since. They have put the ticket prices up a lot to balance up the crowds going down- something I disagree on myself, but perhaps this is another issue altogether. The club is now making noises on safe standing on the German model. I guess if this ever happens it would be in the Lower Holte. But there could be a argument for the Lower North stand as this was originally built as a terrace and the seats are rather shallow and cramped down there. The North Stand is a symbol of the frustrating part of following the Villa. Potential. It is all there for a massive new stand. We have the room to build something fantastic and make Villa Park a world class arena. But the crowds do not justify this massive investment at present. As the club have argeed to host Rugby World Cup matches in 2015, it will be at least 3-4 years if anything ever does happen.

It is just a deeply, deeply, average england side. I feel sorry for Wiltshire- he looks like he has to carry this team for the next 5 years.

Yes big fan of westers but I think he should have a target of 4 to 5 goals next season. If we can get our midfield to chip in with a few next season, it will take some pressure off the forwards.

2 defensive managers in a pointless friendly. Having said that, it will be probably 4-3 now.

This basically. If we sell Benteke (and I really think we will) we HAVE to keep Darren Bent. What's the point getting £7m odd for him? He IS a goalscorer and we won't get another for that money No we don't. Bent does not fit in with Lambert style of play- why woud he stay even if Benteke is sold? Bent is usually only first choice for teams which come lower mid table- sunderland, charlton, us under Mcleish etc. He seems a nice fella, and he hasnt rocked the boat this season but he is off. 8-10 mil to a team like Stoke or Norwich, thanks and goodbye.

I am not so sure I agree to that sentiment. We didn't exactly play good football last season, barring a few games, and we are incredibly lackluster when we are trying to create an attack. It's mostly counter-attacks or coincidences, we seldom pass the ball through or cross it for a goal. Of course I am looking forward to the next season, especially as we are in the Premier League, but I doubt we are going to catch anyone's eyes. Our defensive setup is poor at best and that is not just the quality of our defenders, and when you score a measly 47 goals on top of that there is going to be a hard quest changing it. Here's for hoping we have some cash and that Lambert can follow up the purchase of Benteke and not KEA/Bennett. Eh- did you watch the Sunderland game? Granted they also put in awful, awful peformance but at times they played some great stuff.

Fair play the work he has done hear has shown he is a cut above the rest.

Whatever you can say about Lambert, at least he is making Villa interesting again. Last season under Mcleish was so,so, so dull. Like Pink Floyd would say, it was comfortably numb for us. Granted some of this season really hurt, but that is because we care about this side. You can see what Lambert and the players are trying to do, unlike last season team full of old pros looking for a easy life at Villa. 15th can never been seen as a good season but I hope Lambert has helped create the foundations for something exciting and progressive at Villa in the years to come. I am looking forward to August. I havent thought like that for years at Villa.

It is partly done to Lambert- he has been calling him 'world class' all season- so people bound to get interested! Everyone take a chill pill, I am fairly confident he will be hear next season.