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9 hours ago, Rugeley Villa said:

I thought all 3 were 50/50 calls . I was expecting them to be more obvious. 

The problem is.

All 3 of those 50/50 calls would have been given at Anfield or Old Trafford.

Just now, ozvilla28 said:

Gez me including was harsh on him last season what turn around.

Yep - that's why I firmly believe Diaby will be the second coming of Christ next season. Bailey was beyond awful last year.

14 minutes ago, Okonokos said:

Does anyone know the difference in prize money between qualifying for the Champions League vs Europa League? How would we look for FFP this summer for both scenarios?

The winner of the Conference League only gets 2 million less than getting into the group stage of the CL (this year, not sure next year as it's expanded). Obviously going deep in the CL is massive money.

As per below, it's now vital we qualify for the CL group stages, or go deep into the Europa / UECL each season to maintain an extra 15-20 million. 

That's just prize money. Add in at least 1,500,000 for each home game. 

2 hours ago, duke313 said:

I don't think Emery would leave the project yet, maybe in the future when he's felt he's achieved enough here.  Bayern won't have a shortage to manager to choose from, and seems like they still want Alonso, so may go for a stop gap until next summer.  

I can't recall exactly where; it might have been Guillem Bllague; but someone said quite categorically - Emery would only leave Villa for Real or Barca, with Athletico Madrid a possibility.

Bournemouth game is absolutely everything.

120 minutes of football, players emotionally and physically tired. Bournemouth are a really decent team as well.

Win this, we are mentality monsters and get CL.

Looking ahead to next season - works for us to have both Newcastle and Man U in European competition. Really will stretch their squads. 

Most of the Conference League who plays man united will treat it as probably their biggest games ever, it won't be easy for them.

Just now, Zero7 said:

Was there a post match interview, I've not seen anything? 

I love how he is really really into it. 

But for his players and his club he walks straight down the tunnel and probably on the laptop within 5 minutes. 

Whilst we have Emi Martinez, he will be so vital to our European adventure.

Other teams will need to beat us, a draw i no good as we are now massive favourites in any penalty shootout we go into.

The "Saka Limp" on Twitter / X is quite funny.

Multiple fan groups now realising Saka limps / feigns injury whenever he has a bad game. 

My goodness - I actually read a couple of page of SHA thread on our expansion.

How absolutely deluded can they be? Is it actually their fans posting this stuff or our fans taking the mick? 

I went to the Real Madrid game with my Polish friend who is a Man City Fan (he unfortunately has cancer, and I drove him). It's becoming clear, around the away fans / that side of the stadium is there the original Man City fans sit.

The opposite side, where I sat, genuinely; 2/3rds were "tourist fans". A lot of people from different ethnic backgrounds, lot of different languages, many actually supported different clubs. There's a video of Rio Ferdinand doing the round walking into the Etihad with swards of people trying to take a selfie. Years ago, he'd be sneaking in.

As soon as they drop down to 3rd/4th expect their stadium to literally be half empty as those tourist fans will move on. Particularly if Man United get back to their former glories.

5 minutes ago, Jonesy7211 said:

As great as the result was last night, they're never going away whilst they've got the backing of an oil state.

I disagree, 

I think the machine behind Pep is one of the main reasons for their utter dominance. That Txiki DoF has built this squad, with an elite manager such as Pep.

Take one or both of those out, then it's easy to waste money (Chelsea, Man United).

11 hours ago, useless said:

They've already spent quite a bit of money, bought the club, have refurbishd their training ground after it burnt down, and have also done up the stadium somewhat, as well as having bought the wheels site, they've apparently bought a bunch of other land besids that, 60 acres in total was the quote I saw. What I though was strange was the plans they've announced for their current ground, they're building two fan parks, and a bar in the stadium called 'the box to box' that stretches from one end of the pitch to the other, they're also expanding and 'reorientating' their club shop, all this going to cost tens of millions, not sure why they'd do all that if they're moving, their fans rationalizing it as the owners wanting to see what works and what doesn't for new stadium*

They are VC guys. VC guys are ruthless money makers, after a return on whatever investment they make.

They've purchased a distressed asset, hoodwinked an extremely desperate fanbase, in an area where the local council is effectively bankrupt. Lick of paint to the ground, fist bumps to the fans, sing along to SOTV, few nice power point presentations and they've managed to negotiate a really nice, sizable part of prime Birmingham land for a cut price.

Slap down a 30/40k Euro bowl stadium (leicester, southampton etc) on the cheap; do what you want with the rest of the land as long as it's profitable. They can also sell the Small Heath land as well for a healthy profit.

9 hours ago, S-Platt said:

Pep will jack it in end of the season me thinks

Pep will only ever move to "a sure thing". The only one left is PSG. Can see Enrique doing a lot of the hard work for this non galactico rebuild, failing in the CL then Pep moving in around 15 months to "save the day".

With no Klopp and Arsenal being the usual bottlers they will absolutely walk the PL next season. 

Quite sad at the though of moving from VP, and the acceptance of it.

Villa Park is what's unique about us in a mire of Euro Bowl stadiums. I think in a decade of so, the fact its an old school authentic stadium will be a USP / visiting factor.

Knock down the North Stand, make it as big as the Holte, or bigger. Use the car park, put as much prawn sandwich stations, Corp hospitality, accommodation as required. 

Acquire the park behind the Witton and make it as big as possible with restrictions based on the houses behind that.

There's plenty of space for the 60k+ stadium. I don't understand why that need's to be away from our home. 

Just now, useless said:

Arsenal should give Spurs a tough game, but we have to look after ourselves, Lille and Bournemouth going to be tough games, in theory we should be favorites against Bournemouth, this week will have taken a lot out of us going into that game, and we have at tims stumbled ths season when we're expected to win, but if we play as well as we can do, then we should give ourselves a chance

Bournemouth game is everything now.

They are an underrated good team with absolutely nothing to lose. If we can win that, after a tough couple of weeks we have every chance.

9 hours ago, Genie said:

At some point the figures for the Haaland deal will come out. I suspect it was astronomical and WAY more than is in the public domain. 

Benefits of state ownership, and will never come out to the fullest extent. 

Haaland, his dad and the unrealised sperm in his scrotum will have untold millions tucked away in Abu Dhabi. 
The Premier League has absolutely no way of tracking this. 

Interesting statement from Iran. Hinting this is straight retaliation for the consulate and the matter is “deemed concluded”.

Obviously if/when Israel respond this will be on them. 
As usual the only losers will be innocent people in both nations. 

22 minutes ago, Mantis said:

Fully agree with this. As a fan base I think we're quite old-fashioned in some respects.

The 1982 brigade (as I call them) the front of the upper Holte are terrible for this. We could be winning 3:0 and they are moaning to pass it forward, shoot from 40 yards. 

1 hour ago, HanoiVillan said:

Good post. I don't agree with all of it - in particular, whatever you can accuse someone of making a £2-3bn stadium investment of, it certainly isn't 'making a quick buck' - but the thing I have been thinking about and really agree with you on is the way this has been sold, and the nature of the claims made for how the stadium will be monetised. You lay out correctly why they're unlikely to be able to host more than the (very) odd NFL game even in a best-case scenario, but I keep seeing Wagner talk about 'Euros' and 'World Cups' as well. This is crazy:

• The World Cup has hosts already awarded out to 2036, England are not one of them. Since European nations are the main hosts in 2032, Europe presumably wouldn't be hosting again until 2048 at the earliest, and no guarantee England will be hosting. 
• The Euros are coming to England in 2028, but host stadia have been assigned and this won't be completed in time anyway. Since the British Isles will have been the hosts in '28, it's likely the Euros wouldn't be coming back for ~30 years again.
• Of course there are the women's tournaments as well, but even there England have hosted the Euros recently, and the most recent World Cup was in Europe, so there's no short-term prospect of it and they're obviously less lucrative in any case. 

The stuff around housing and office space seems more plausible, but is even more challenging. Commercial real estate is a tough business, and companies go bust all the time. You're at the mercy of the health of the wider economy and changing social trends like remote working or hotdesking or whatever. It could work well but it's a hard industry and it's a completely different set of competencies than running a football club so it's more management, complication etc. 

It's normal for people to put a little 'masala' on a big announcement to make it newsworthy, make a bit of a splash etc, but there's also the danger that they're quite deluded about what they're going to be able to achieve with this project. 

Thanks @HanoiVillan.

Just to be clear, I'm not accusing them of making a "quick buck" on the field. I think they wanted the land on the cheap which is what they've achieved (to make a quick buck). Because the commercial viability of SHA / funding doesn't make sense. 

If Spurs are the "finished article" / dream / aspiration. Best stadium in the country, in London, international fans, huge revenue, CL etc. They are "only" worth 2.5-3billion. So why would you risk 2-3 billion for a 1 percent chance of creating a club worth 2.5 billion?

The whole financial thing doesn't make sense or add up. 

The guy has 9 billion of other peoples money, who pay Knighthead to increase that money.

You're telling me, they are going to gamble a third of their portfolio (2 billion on a stadium + probably another billion on players) for a 1 percent change of becoming a team like Spurs to just break even? For indications, Tottenham is valued around 2.5-3 billion with the best stadium in the country, in London, half of Korea supporting them, and a NFL agreement.

Something does not add up. I think the council have been hoodwinked, and the desperation of the fans being used as bait. 

7 hours ago, VillaChris said:

Stansfield's had a good season. Not sure what Fulham's plan is for him but could SHA bidding 4-5m if they stay up so better they go down

He'd cost at least treble that. He's an England U21 international, even starting ahead of Rodgers.

Their owners have naively made a song and dance about how much they have to spend, Fulham will rip them off.