KMitch

I see that Lyric has deleted his Twitter account... Found out to be a fraud.

Pathetic... Just shows how much work this squad needs. I expect a major overhaul this summer.

He's the Carrot Top/Nickelback of the football world. That said, if Emery wants him, I'll back him 100%... Seem to recall another overrated Manchester United central defender with off the field problems and the wrong side of his prime doing very well for us ~30 years ago...

The problem is that most football managers think short term and right now vs building for the future and the club is left holding the bag when signings don't pan out... This approach ends up putting pressure on the club to overspend on the manager's preferred players on bad long term deals to get them in the door to keep the manager happy, then you can't shift them if they turn out to be shit or the manager gets the sack and the new manager doesn't rate them... Not the manager's priority... They're judged on the here and now and not the future by the media and the fans... Look back at our last "successful" era under Martin O'Neill who ran a similar model to what you're proposing... Remember Habib Beye, Nicky Shorey, Nigel Reo Coker, etc. All these players we paid a lot of money for at the time on very lucrative long term deals who were riding the bench and couldn't get anything for. Part of the reason he threw his toys out of the pram when Randy told him to sell some of his deadwood before he gave him even more money to spend on players he wasn't going to play. This is where a DOF comes in... They don't answer to the manager/head coach, their job is to protect the club's interests long term and make sure we're recruiting sensibly and buying players who will in general grow in value with good coaching, while fitting the style of football the club has defined... Smith himself preached a lot about this when he was here, but priorities seemed to change to the "win now" model under Gerrard and we started buying players in or past their prime to get us into Europe on a timeline quicker than Smith was promising... I'm guessing Gerrard's team sold the board on a plan for spending on quality in a few key positions and we'd gatecrash Europe ahead of schedule, but that never happened and we're back to the drawing board again. Who knows what the direction will be under Emery, but my suspicion is that it will be somewhere in-between Smith's long term vision and Gerrard's short term here and now goal (2 seasons before we're in Europe regularly).

https://www.calciomercato.com/news/juve-c-e-mckennie-in-vetrina-esterno-a-cremona-aspettando-l-offe-37863 I read that too from the Italian rags... Sounds like a bunch of made up BS... Basically said he's stalling on the Bournemouth offer because he's waiting for a more ambitious club than them. Said he turned Villa and West Ham down in the past, but "It would be different if Dortmund or perhaps Chelsea or Spurs decided to make a concrete offer"

As an American, I've seen quite a bit of him... He is McGinn 2.0... All action, jack of all trades, master of none. That said, 15 million is a bargain. Just the exposure/shirt sales alone he'll bring in the USA will be worth it. If Emery is looking for another McGinn to rotate in and out of the team for him, this would be good business. Considering McGinn is the first player most on here think isn't good enough for the squad, most of VT will hate McKennie after a few months.

Started watching footy/following the Villa in 2006: Laursen Barry Young Benteke Grealish Honorable Mentions: Friedel Milner Martinez

This is what I'm expecting this summer as well... Splashing the cash to compete with the big boys.

Sums up his day, doesn't it? Oh Bailey... lol

LET'S GO WIN THIS NOW!!!

THERE WE GO!!!! NEVER A DOUBT!!!

See? Different fooking team this half! Plenty of time still left to win it.

Biggest thing is the difference in intensity of the two teams. Wolves running their socks off all over the pitch chasing the ball out of possession and charging forward in it... On the other hand, Villa look sluggish and several steps behind everywhere. Tactically, I think the team was expecting Wolves to park the bus, but they're taking the game to us and we don't know how to respond. I trust Emery to sort it out at halftime, but what a mess this half was.

Me either... Some of the reactions on here so far are out of line.

This... Need to settle the game down and cut out the misplaced passes.

Yeah, I'm not even mad... That was impressive. Unlucky for us.

I really don't care who other teams are in for right now... I have full confidence in Emery to put together a team to get us into Europe over the next few transfer windows. Going to just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Digne is much better than Targett. Targett himself thought so which is why he wanted to leave and not even try to fight for his place in the team because he didn't think he could compete... To your quote about heart or bottle, this is spot on... https://talksport.com/football/1043839/matt-targett-newcastle-aston-villa-lucas-digne/ “It was a difficult decision because obviously last season I was pretty much the only left-back,” Targett began. “I knew the club wanted to sign a left-back and I was quite surprised when they signed someone like Lucas Digne.” He continued: “Obviously he was out there at the time, the club had to do what they had to do, but yeah it was quite hard to take, to sign someone of that calibre. “But if that’s where the club wants to go then I completely respect that. At the same time, I’m 26 – I don’t want to be sitting on the bench. “I want to look back at my career and have played as many Premier League games as possible so that’s probably one of the main reasons [why I left], yeah.”

McKennie is very similar to McGinn in style. Lots of energy, all action, and a jack of all trades, master of none. He's a solid 8 but considering how divisive McGinn is in Emery's system, I don't he's a good fit for us now.

This guy is again, hedging his bets... Saying on one hand we aren't signing anyone then on the other saying we'll buy Deulofeu if the deal makes sense.

"Several people, myself included said while we welcomed the appointment, we HOPED the appointment would not be another worst Villa manager in the history of the Premier League era, but I never said I was against his appointment." Baffling that you're even trying to defend the original statement here... "I'm ok with it as long as it doesn't turn out to be the biggest disaster in the history of the club, then I'll say I told you so."

Fantastic performance all around by the boys. 1st half we completely blunted their attack to the point where Harry Kane didn't even get a touch on the ball for the first 20 minutes of the match. We caused all three Spurs CBs to pick up yellows for trying to disrupt our counter attacks way too aggressively, so it was only a matter of time in the 2nd half for space to open up for us to do our thing going forward. Emery's Setup: Very Good again - Amazing to have a genuine world class manager in charge of us. 3 wins from his first 4 league games in charge. MoM: Douglas Luiz was immense on both ends of the pitch, but you could also make the case for both Kamara and Young, who didn't put in a foot wrong either UTV!!! Let's go on a run this January!!!

We've completely disrupted Spurs' setup here. Kane didn't have a touch for the first 20 minutes of the match and now all 3 Spurs CBs are on yellows. Trusting Emery to make the right tactical changes in the 2nd half so space will open up and we'll create chances. Good performance so far.

Agreed. Would prefer him over the very overrated Sarr.

Deulofeu wouldn't be a signing people would be excited about, but he's been playing very very well for Udinese for a few seasons now. For the right price he'd provide good competition for Watkins/Bailey up top or would be a great option off the bench if we need to score a goal late.