I have a theory regarding our lack of transfer activity.
Everyone knows that we have a lot of money, so if we are genuinely interested in a player his price will go up above his market value, the same as happens to Chelsea (albeit to a greater extent than us). I think that Villa maybe waiting until another club has a bid accepted for the player and then we go in with the same bid and get the player to choose us (because of our good manager, ambition, history, etc.). Example - Marlon Harewood. Wigan had a bid accepted, we match it and obviously he would choose us.
So are we waiting until Hearts accept a bid from Sunderland (who have less money than us) for Gordon so we can simply match it and persuade him to join us? Let's hope so. The same could be happening with other players.
This tactic wouldn't work if any of the big 4 were in for a player, but at the moment we're not in the same market as them. In any case, they have a lot of money so the price will go up anyway. If anyone else is in for somebody we have a fighting chance of getting them.
Hopefully I'm right and the transfers will start flooding in once everyone else has done our negotiating for us!
