Indigo

He's been a weird one. Was such an exciting signing at the time, but I think a combination of injuries, struggling to adapt to the league and seemingly constant hits to his confidence have made him a bit of a write off. You can see the ability is there in moments but I'm not sure I can see him putting it together properly. He'd definitely still be a handy option in the squad but can see why the club would be open to offers.

4 hours ago, paul514 said:

WTF are you paying so much attention to this 'story' for?

Just a journalist blah blahing.... he doesn't know anything.

Grrrrr why are you posting about a transfer-related article from a known credible source in its relevant thread grrrrr.

According to Tom Collomosse:

Leon Bailey is for sale this summer.

Villa desperately want a wide man  Harvey Barnes, was on the list but not top of it, the same with Brennan Johnson. Over the weekend Villa asked Leverkusen about Diaby and Emery remains a huge admirer of Nico Williams.

Villa also want a forward to be both partner and alternative to Ollie Watkins.

Matteo Moretto, who has proved to be pretty credible, has said Villa are interested in Lo Celso and that Betis aren't able to make a sufficient offer for him.

3 hours ago, tomav84 said:

 

as has been said plenty, people don't bat an eyelid when teams line up with 2 right footed CBs but we sign a left footed CB and automatically people are suggesting mings is going to be dropped.

At the same time reasons to the contrary have also been said plenty. Ultimately none of us know until the season gets underway, but it's not unfounded to think this signing puts Mings' place in a bit of jeopardy.

Just now, Kiwivillan said:

When did I write off link with Torres who's been linked since January? Asking question about happens with Mings and another left footed CB is not writing off a link. Every major Villa podcast has discussed the same thing

Tielemans. 

4 hours ago, Kiwivillan said:

Is realistic speculation too much to ask for? It's not called the unrealistic wishlist thread

What do you consider as "realistic speculation" seeing as we've literally signed players that you initially wrote off as being nonsense links.

Some of you lads need to lighten up a bit. It's the off-season, there's only so many times where people can debate over the merits of Konsa at RB or Buendia's wastefulness in possession. Give me all the nonsense in the meantime.

1 hour ago, Mazrim said:

I don't agree with you either but thats fine, just dont say I dont understand as thats a bit patronising.

Foyth is the only time he's done this (play a CB at RB) as far as I know, and Foyth is far more natural a right back than Konsa.

I'd also add we're a bit more fluid than who ever is RB defaulting to a RCB where in possession. Kamara dropped into a sweeper role when Young and Moreno went forward too.

Anyway, I don't want to labour the point. However we see the nuances, I think we need at least one natural right back.

I agree with you for what it's worth. I think people are over-simplifying the role by just saying that it doesn't matter if they're a CB because that's ostensibly the role they'll be playing. The below is Foyth's heat map for his last full season under Emery, he's still playing as a right back, albeit a more reserved one but he's not so far tucked in that he's playing as a CB. If it ends up happening and works then fair enough but I'm personally skeptical that Konsa being able to fill the role effectively for a team with Villa's aspirations is a no-brainer.

A winger, striker and another midfielder are all wanted according to Collomosse. 

I don't like that Roma kit tbh. It should be great given that it's simple, the crest etc but Adidas managed to make it just look like a run of the mill training top.

We already had a small squad and have let Young go, I know Konsa might have had a couple of training sessions at RB but it'd make sense to sign one.

12 minutes ago, Philosopher said:

Well Gnonto was the only real threat from Leeds that night. He did indeed beat Young to set up a goal. Had that goal been the winner we'd be saying Gnonto done Ash! It's all a matter of perspective really.

I was very impressed with Gnonto's dribbling abilty, with his low centre of gravity. He had Ash twisting left, right and all over the place. Lucky the rest of their front line with rubbish that day, because they had us under a lot of pressure for long periods, and Gnonto was the only real threat.

Young had a tough day at the office, but stuck in there and used all his experience to fend Gnonto off.  For me Young got a close majority decision in that one. But only just.

My post was just off the back of the debate of who got the better of things on balance, wasn't a comment on Gnonto's ability or agreeing with the notion that he got "schooled" by Young as it may have been lumped in with 

I think both things can be the case that Gnonto showed he's a great prospect and was extremely dangerous that night, and also that despite this Young largely dealt with him fantastically. At least that's how it came across to me at VP that night, was a performance of Young's that stuck with me in terms of showing he still had it despite his age. Saying that I think he was poor for the goal more so than Gnonto skinning him or anything, he kind of lazily tried to win a foul rather than properly challenge the ball and the ref wasn't having it.

1 hour ago, gwi1890 said:

And then go on to waste money on several strikers 

Awoniyi is a good player/signing to be fair,  and they got him for the reported fee they didn't want to sign Davis for. Without checking I'd guess his PL goals total last season isn't far off what Davis has scored over his entire career.

18 minutes ago, Steero113 said:

They weren't all against each other, ya rascal.

Young won three quarters of his duals that night while Gnonto only managed a third of his. You'd imagine a large portion of those were against one another so it's fair to say Young got the better of things.

2 hours ago, lexicon said:

Which is a fair point but you could also say that their valuation of him is also a lot lower than Forest's, which is the point. 

It's important to state here that we're not talking about bad players anymore, but rather looking at value and ceilings. I don't think Johnson would be worth spending more than 25/30m on in today's market - that doesn't mean I think he's shit, just not up to the required level yet. 

Yeah I wasn't suggesting that there's enough to indicate he'd theoretically be worth £50 million or anything of the sort, just there's likely more to his numbers on paper or at least enough context to them (like Forest having comfortably the least possession in the league etc) to justify the likes of Brentford and Villa being at the very least curious about him. Just seeing a lot of FBRef screenshots floating around completely writing him off which is probably harsh on him.

It's a tough position because it's a place in the squad that needs filling to take Villa to the next level, so there's much more scrutiny on the likes of Johnson who probably would be looked at as good potential signings previously before Emery elevated us to such an extent. I can understand why they'd be interested as he is the right profile of player - has often played on the right of a kind of asymmetrical front two, is quick, decent quality in front of goal etc. His quality relative to the likely price would make it questionable to the point I'd be more than surprised if it happened, but the type of player he is ticks some boxes anyway.

3 hours ago, lexicon said:

Same - which is why I don't think we'll sign him because he's not showing enough to justify 50m or whatever they want. His data is available and it's not really that impressive. 

Nationality has absolutely nothing to do with it - don't be silly. 

To be fair, not to be the "just buy whoever Brighton and Brentford want" guy but everything Brentford do is based around data and he's been a main target of theirs for a couple of seasons now. So he must be doing something right on that front even though it doesn't seem the case on FBRef and whatever else us common folk use.

Av1 took the Johnson link hard. Hope for his sake that he doesn't end up actually signing.

44 minutes ago, Jas10 said:

Kind of sad to see the state of Serie A nowadays, relatively weak and a lack of quality (beyond the “top” teams). Far cry from the dominant days of the 90s, superstar players and formidable teams…

Not many players like that around nowadays either… I would bloody love a young Batistuta at Villa!! Unique. Del Piero, Totti, Pirlo, Vieri, Baggio, the real Ronaldo, Zidane…. glorious days…

Not too many players I would want from there now and the good ones are far too expensive and difficult for us to attract.

Can we get Chiesa though?

I'd say it's widely considered to he the 2nd strongest league in Europe right now in terms of top to bottom quality. It's had a resurgence in recent seasons if anything.

18 minutes ago, WallisFrizz said:

So hang on Luton are willing to break the transfer record for some Barnsley player but not our Marv?

 

Wages are the issue with Nakamba apparently, not the fee.

7 minutes ago, HKP90 said:

People are going on about Barnes. Question, as I know very little about him- Isn't he a LW? 

I thought we mainly need a RW/ST?

I think there's a lot of assumptions going on with how Emery is definitely going to set us up going forward based on the ultimately small sample size of his work so far with an unbalanced squad that he inherited from Gerrard, when really we don't know for sure.

Barnes is almost exclusively a LW at this point in his career but seeing as Gerrard hated width outside of the full backs we haven't really had one at the club in Emery's time to know if he'd want to use a player in that position or not. It's what makes this transfer window/pre-season so interesting as we'll probably get more of a firm idea of things as it moves along.

Instead of simply not reading things I'm not interested in of my own accord, I prefer to demand people stop speaking about these things full stop.

The whole "in the eyes of the law" or general "not found guilty" shouts with Greenwood do my nut in considering there is literal evidence of what he did. No mental gymnastics would justify signing him.

2 minutes ago, Delphinho123 said:

We’re definitely looking at Barnes

It's gotten to a point now where I would be delighted if we signed him purely for how funny it would be.