Philosopher

Disappointed with Carew not doing what you expect from a target man in that he just keeps giving the ball away, Heskey on the other hand has been the model target man. Albrighton's delivery is top class, there is no doubt about it, he could have a very bright future ahead of him, Ashley has showed a few flashes of his class, but overall that's all that stands out. Clark's looked solid, and seems to have filled out, he might be able to do a job as back-up this season, I bloody hope so because I can't see us signing more than one CB. Lichaj is not good enough yet though. He is one kid with a hideous touch.

Petrov has a dis-located shoulder, which is anything but a blessing in disguise.

We have lost our 2 best players (which I was ready for) but I thought Barry would only be allowed to leave for Champions League football, that was the impression the club and the player gave me, this hurts! Do you think Barca would sell Real Madrid Messi, or Milan sell Kaka to Inter? the Answer is NO! I am not blaming the general, however he is the only one that can let the people who run the club (MON and Randy) know how I and many other Villa fans feel. Anyway I am staying away from Villatalk, and anything Villa related until August, because this has really upset me! I was saving for a season ticket (I am poor so I have to save, plus I will have to travel from London) I will still save it, but I may not buy it as I do have other needs/wants which I may decide to satisfy first, it depends on how I feel! I am Villa till I die that will never change, but right now I need to get this out of my system.

I am here primarily to register my disgust! I am angry about MON and Randy letting one of our best players go to a direct rival in Man City! More than anything I am angry at Barry himself. I and pretty much all Villa fans feel that if he went to a champions league team then fine I/we can accept that but to MAN CITY, one of our main rivals! I see this as a step backwards and my optimism and excitement in regards to what I thought to be a club making great strides forward has been sucked right out of thanks to this. I am one of the biggest defenders of the current regime here on Villatalk, so for me to writing this means I am now myself asking serious questions about the future of Aston Villa and to be honest we will do well to finish mid table as we are now. First Laursen's retirement and now selling our best player to one of our biggest rivals, where the hell has the ambition of Aston Villa football club gone?

I am not a foreign fan, but I can understand those feelings. When I started supporting Villa it was the beginning of the 92/93 season and I had just started secondary school. Up until then I preferred to follow particular footballers rather than teams (Gazza was my favourite player along with Roberto Baggio). Anyway I started secondary school and was being told "oh you have to support a team blah, blah, blah. So I asked everyone who they supported and pretty much everyone said Liverpool. If I am honest I didn't like the fact that all these Brummie kids supported Liverpool over Villa, simply so they could brag about supporting the best team when they wouldn't give a shi'te about them otherwise. So in many ways I started supporting Villa not only because they were my local team but more so because I was disgusted by the glory hunting attitude of most of the people I was surrounded by. Basically I supported my local team to make a moral statement to all the fake 'fans'. At the time I found watching football matches boring (but I loved playing it), and as such didn't have any real reason to support any team. Now I realise the only reason I enjoy watching football is because I support a team and have a vested interest in the results (As such I can only sit thorough Villa and England matches, unless an English team is playing in Europe - as in Europe I support all English teams so long as they aren't playing Villa). I myself am happy to go along with the crowd if I feel that is right for me, but I always (and still do) find it pathetic if you go along with the crowd to 'fit in' or because of peer pressure, or because it made it easier to make a decision. As far as I am concerned one should follow the team that fits one's own ideals (however some ideals are better than others). So if you love attractive passing football, playing on the deck with lots of flair and the style of football is what you deem to be the most important thing you look for from a prospective club to support, fine support Arsenal enjoy I can respect that (not that much though - for reasons that will become apparent). If one supports a team because they love the atmosphere of a packed football stadium and so you want to support a team you can visit regularly then support your local team. However to support a team just because they are winning is foolhardy as no team will keep winning forever (and no team we play the same brand of football forever), what do you do when they stop winning? Support another team? Probably, and for me the whole idea that one can suddenly support a different team is horrendous if you pick a team you stick with them and show your loyalty through thick and thin. So essentially I dislike glory hunting supporters as I feel it displays a weakness of character and lack of loyalty. The way I see it I am different, we are all different and I follow Villa for my own reasons. I like the fact that everyone that has supported Villa (up until this season) are GENUINE fans and not fans that will stop supporting Villa if we got relegated (god-forbid), I know we will all support Villa through thick and thin, and that's what I love about supporting a team that aren't one of the glamour clubs. If we become one of those teams it will make all the years of winning very little and all the stick we have taken for supporting Villa worthwhile (not that supporting Villa in itself is not worthwhile). I will enjoy every minute of it, remembering what I and my fellow proper Villa fans went through to experience the good times, and that will allow us to savour it so much more and truly understand what that success means to the club. Seeing Villa win the Premier League and Champions League is what we ALL dream about, glory hunting fans don't dream about that as its reality, they have NEVER had to do so and as such the value of the memories of seeing their team be successful can never be as sweet.

Flop or legend if I had to chose it would be flop! He had a great attitude in that he was always very respectful. But his head dropped too easily for me and his confidence always seemed very fragile. Atop talent and had one great season for us, but most of the time he was distinctly average. I always got annoyed at him for look for the run in behind when he never had the pace do it. I always felt that he should have been getting stuck in more and using he physical strength more. I don't think he was a flop, but there is no way he is deserving of legendary status. I don't think we got 9.5 million pounds plus his 35k a week wage worth of a return.

Pleased with the window. We signed 7 players (because as far as I am concerned Davies was our player since last summer), which was the number I was expecting, and felt we needed as a minimum to push on and maybe put together a challenge to 4th. I do feel that we need right back cover and a top class striker would have topped things off nicely for me, but I am happy with what we have. Also while I think Milner is an excellent player, I would've preferred a more cultured and creative winger. I still have doubts about our ability to unlock stubborn, well organised teams that defend in numbers. As we didn't get the creative winger I was hoping for, it made me want a quality striker even more, however the type of player I would've liked to see is a link striker, someone who can pick a pass, link the play nicely, and pull defenders out of position with clever movement. This would've offered us an extra 'dimension' to add to our current, pacy counter attacking style. However we have definitely improved and now we are only missing a real creative attacking force in midfield/attack. Ashley is fantastic but he is no Elano, Rooney, Berbertov, Kaka type that would take us from possible 4th place contenders to a definite 4th place contender, also a proper holding player would be nice. Also I think the reason MON didn't sign a decent striker to provide competition for place was because of young Delfounso's potential. For me it was top top quality or forget it. So in January I expect another striker and maybe a right back. However I am hoping young Delfounso shows enough promise to negate the need for another striker. Next summer I expect a real creative attacker/attacking midfielder if we are to continue to progress. Just about an 8 as it would be unfair to expect any more really. Randy's rich but he is no oil baron. Edited because I never put my rating.

I revkon it will be Milner - Reo - Barry - Young in the prem and Milner - Petrov - Barry - Young in Europe As for Sidwell I reckon he will play in a midfield 3 , with either barry and reo or barry and petrov when we play top sides like arsenal and man u when we need more bodies in midfield.

Personally BOF I don't think MON saw Sidwell as a direct replacement for Barry, the fact we have been linked with Huddlestone, Johnson and De La Red indicate this. As these 3 are more in the Barry 'mold' than Sidwell. In fact Sidwell just isn't in Barry's class when it comes to passing range and defensive ability. Also while I think Milners a good player, I can see him improves us in the way I feel we need. We need an intelligent attacking midfielder, who rather than bomb down the wing all the time will drift inside an make things happen with composure in possession and and eye for a pass. A player in the Arteta mold would offer us something we don't have at the minute. Much has been made of needing another striker and unless we can snap up Santa Cruz I think we are better off not signing one, as we would need a player that can play with both Carew and Gabby, so a pacy striker, or a target man is out of the question for me. As for our Prospects this season I feel 5th or 6th (which seems to be the general consensus) is a good shout. However a back up RB and a Right sided midfielder of type I have mentioned could turn us into contenders for 4th place. My only concern is whether we can put together an assault on the 4th, 5th and 6th places while trying to progress in the cups. I believe that we now have a team that is more than capable of doing well in the cup comps, but it can't be at the expense of our league form. The premiership must still be our priority. Predictions. League: 5th UEFA: quarter finals League Cup: quarter finals Fa Cup: 6th round

I n purely defending terms last years back four is marginally better. However Carson was awful. For me it was his complete reluctance to come of his line. He needed to back four to protect him too much. So having freidel behind our back 4 is a big improvement. Going forward it is vastly improved. We now have fullbacks capable of delivering a good cross and linking up well with the player directly in front of them. this will help us to concede less simply by having FB's that don't give the ball straight back to the opposition when under pressure, as well as the awful crosses Bouma in particular would put in, they always when straight to the oppostion LB or out of play.

This article is bollocks! Why? Because you fail to highlight the fact that Barry is insistent on leaving, even after he gave his word (yes you mention it), that is the only reason we are selling him as we all know. Yet you blame the board as much as 'my word isn't worth shit' Barry. Why do our own fans have to badmouth the club. Go and support the bluenose.

So what if Barry's our captain, if 45K is the deal he's negotiated and he's happy with that, then I am. I am sure if we had the chance of signing someone like Sneijder we would offer more as I believe Sneijder to be a better player. We should pay what a player is worth. If Barry was worth more than 45K then I am sure his agent would have made sure Barry got more money. I can only see a club paying him more than that if they were desperate for him anyway, except West Ham of course, but they're playing silly buggers!

Oh dear what a panic the writer of this article has got himself into! Its all for nothing though. People seem to forget that the wage structure we have here at Villa Park under HDE and now under Lerner is set with the intention of keeping us out of debt. There is no point paying excessive wages (which is what the big clubs and most of those trying challange them are paying) to players that will accept a lower wage (refering to GB), or to past their prime players. MON has adopted a very workable strategy of investing in young hungry players, young players at any level cannot expect to earn as much as proven players in their prime. Therefore our current wage budget is very workable. Second do you not remember Darren Bent turning down an £80,000 a week contract from West Ham to play for Spurs at £50,000 a week! Another point is do we really want to be signing injury prone players, who are past their prime like Dyer on £60,000 a week contracts? West Ham are paying ridiculous sums in wages to secure players unlikely to take them further than mid table. Do you want villa to do that? Plus people must remember that Villa have spent 9.5 mill on Young and 8 mill on Reo-Coker, each one of those transfers is more than what West have spent on a single player, and in the case of Young he represents more talent than any of West Hams recent signings. In comparison to Man City, their highest transfer fee was the 8.8 mill on Bianchi, very similar figure to Young and Coker's fee. Man City have also invested heavily in Youth, however their young players are from the continent which makes sense, as Sven's work for the England national side has shown his style does not suit that of the English player. We must remember that MON is a British manager who is excellent at getting the best out of British players. Another point is that the hungry players, hungry to play football and win titles will alway chose the big clubs over the smaller ones even if the smaller one's offer more wages. The players that chose money over success are not welcome at Villa Park as far as I am concerned. In addition players that want to play football above all else would much rather come to a team like Villa where there is a greater chance of first team football then your Tottenham's and Newcastle's. Curtis Davies for example is likely to find himself stuck on the bench once Dawson and King return (if he were to go to Spurs) plus they have 4 other CB's, whereas at Villa we have Laursen (who won't be able to play twice a week) and Cahill who has yet to threaten Laursen or Mellberg for their places. So maybe, just maybe having a small squad makes us a more attractive option for young players as it means a little less competition and so a greater chance of winning a first team spot. As hungry players alway want first team football. The first two seasons of the five year plan is surely to achieve european qualification, that will allow us attract a higher class of player and to invest in Young player that can become future greats, as the last thing we want is to be signing up average players to long expensive contracts and then not being able to unload them as they will not accept a drop in wages (Remember to problems DO'L had getting rid of players like Hadji). This is why the investment in Youth has been the focus, None of the players we have been linked with are over 25, with the exception of Defoe and Wright-Phillp's who are better than your average and still only 26. We have every right to worry, but the fact remains MON and Lerner have done nothing wrong. The only player I was unhappy to see leave was Davis, but he didn't want to stay, he wanted first team football and was probably tapped up a little by Laurie Sanchez. All the rest that left were either not good enough (McCann), lazy (Djemba Twins), or whingers (Samuel). So we don't have a deep enough squad, at least we know the atmosphere in the dressing room is good, all the players want to play for Aston Villa and are hungry to do well. Getting the right players must be our focus, any players who are report to have a little class won't do. Almost every player in the Prem has class, but class means nothing without, hunger, desire and team spirit. Remember you don't suddenly became a top four Team overnight. People seem to forget that Chelsea were already in the Champs League and had their to two most important players when Abramavich's money came along, not to mention the only other club that had big spending power at the time was Man Utd. Judge the transfers situation on the 1st of Sept and stop bloody panicking! As that is our only real worry.

I firmly believe the the likes of Barry and Petrov are excellent passers of the ball. The difference between Liverpool and Villa was the movement of the players and the passing styles of the teams. Villa play a more direct passing style, mostly aimed at Carew (who was poorly) to hold up the ball and Agbonlahor to run onto the ball behind the opposition defense. This is all good if your frontmen are at the top of their game, but Gabby is hardly the most intelligent runner off the ball so if he is shut down we become one-dimensional as the ball will keep going to Carew. Also we will play more stray passes then arsenal, man utd and liverpool because we are passing the ball long distances which are having to go past more players and require pinpoint accuracy and weighting. Liverpool do play quite direct, however they play lots of safe sideways and backwards passes with the aim of pulling players out of position and then their players exploit the openings that makes with the precise long passing of Alonso and Gerrard. They don't commit to many bodies forward, which works against us as we score most our goals on the counter attack when their is lots of space to exploit. Man U play a fast paced short passing game, every player (with the exception of the two CB's) are constantly moving when not in position looking for the space and making themselves available to receive the ball, the full backs are always looking to overlap, the Def mid is always in a position to receive a backwards or sideway pass from the attacking mids, the wingers happy running down the wing or infield and Scholes late runs into the box and very clever movement mean that he always finds space and time. In addition Rooney's movement pulls players out of position making openings for Ronaldo and Giggs to run into. Plus when starting attacks the two centre mids are looking for the two frontmen, and wingers making forwards runs to aim long passes at, so the attacking play is varied and with the superb movement of Rooney, Giggs, and Scholes, the direct running of Ronaldo and Excellent support play of Carrick and in the past, the master Keane. The point I am getting at is that Liverpool's style of play is perfect for modern premier league football, where most teams look to sit back against to big sides pack the midfield and look to hit them on the counter attack. It means Liverpool don't lose many games, because in the past they haven't had the attacking talent of Man U or Arsenal they have to be patient going forward and try to lure the opposition into losing patience or tiring to make openings. They invite teams to try and press them so they can pull their players out of position. Alonso was schooled in this type of football in Spain (it is the archetypal continental style of play), the fact is european footballers are thinking footballers and English football is traditionally hardworking, physical and instinctive. The foreign players are better tactically as well as technically. Diving is not just about winning freekicks and penalties, but winding up the opposition (English players fall for it hook line and sinker), breaking up the play and disrupting the flow of the game. It means they can play the game at their pace and style rather than the oppositions. In the premier league (at the top teams - Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal) we have a mixture of the two styles, attacking players that have great movement pace and/or strength, with skill that can pull players out of position and make time and space for the centre mids to control the game, it means they have more time to think, to observe whats going on further up the field and pick their passes better. This is why the best attacking talent cost a bomb, because attack really is the best form of defense. At villa we cannot attract that kind of talent, but we have 3 or 4 young players the potential to achieve that, and that what MON is working on. Our movement is vastly improved under MON and with more games, and experience it will improve further. The reason why it takes time for teams with lots of new signings to play well is because they have to learn how they move, how they like to receive the ball, and when they like to pass the ball. The best players have more intelligence on the pitch, they see the space sooner, they outsmart their markers and because they are so technically proficient they don't think about controlling the ball they don't even need to look at the ball (unlike Gabby and how McCann used to, however I have noticed that Gabby is working on that) it gives them more time to analyse the game and plan their next move. It's not simple enough to say that the top teams pass it better, its their most movement and touch that make the biggest difference. The top players are alway one step ahead of their lesser counterparts and as a result when your McCann's are flying in for a tackle your Alonso's and Torres', can see him coming a mile off and play for the foul. Roy Keane would be charging down players before they even got the ball because his reading of the game was impecible. MON is investing in the players he feels are young enough to improve and reach that level of on field intelligence and that have the hunger to continuously improve their game and never give up, because thats the kind of attitude a player needs to reach the top. MON is doing everything right, however like all the great managers have had he needs a bit of luck to turn a good team into a great one. Your point that the referees crackdown on aggressive play is not valid, because the banning of the tackle from behind, the crackdown on two legged challenges and the protection keepers get is fair. The two footed challenge and tackle from behind are extremely dangerous and are likely to cause serious injury, as they are very difficult to pull off safely, and a lot players careers will be saved because of it, after all our player are massive investments for our clubs. Keepers have to be the bravest players on the pitch, the amount of time we have seen keepers concussed, cut and unconscious is numerous. I do believe that the crackdown on challenging keeper rules out many fair challenges, however in a crowded box how hard is it for the ref and his assistant to see what is a fair challenge and an unfair one? I don't envy them having to make such decisions. I do think that when goals are scored or denied in which their standing can be questioned TV replays must be used, if that was the case England might have won a european championship or gone further in a world cup or two.