tinker

If he does leave for Man City where is he going to play? He has the makings of a great middle of the park player but ain't really a good crosser or great winger. Is he could enough in the middle for Man City? I don't think so, not at present, in a season or two perhaps he will be. Its a big mistake for him to go atm. Next season would make far more sense for all concerned, IMO.

FWIW i think when a fee is agreed with man city another team will match that bid that makes far more sense for him to leave us for.

If City are willing to meet the £30m asking price, would they offer it straight away? I doubt it, they will leave it late. Im sure MON will just stick to his guns.

With all due respect, Milner is a completey different person to Lescott. Lescott had spent a few years at Everton before he forced his move. Milner may well leave but one things for sure, if he does it will be on MON terms, not Man Citys and thats what would make any move more agreeable, at least to me.

I wasn't comparing Lescott to Milner as a person. I was comparing the situation to Lescotts last year. Which, when you look at it, has obvious similarities.

Lescotts move, in the end, was on Moyes terms. He was happy to keep him unless City paid what he wanted after he had made his mind up to sell but only for what he wanted.

I agree, Lescott did leave on Moyes terms and they were very good for Everton. My point on the personalities being different is relevant to this discusion, Lescott forced his move, i dont believe its in Milner personality to go about a move in such a way. This weakens Man Citys position.

With all due respect, Milner is a completey different person to Lescott. Lescott had spent a few years at Everton before he forced his move. Milner may well leave but one things for sure, if he does it will be on MON terms, not Man Citys and thats what would make any move more agreeable, at least to me.

Ok, lets say City are about to offer us around £30m, there are 2 other teams waiting in the wings, once the fee has been agreed with city then the other clubs match that valuation.

Villa are not the sort of club to play the teams against each other, the fee will be £30m.

Its then up to Milner to decide who he goes to.

Milner can say nothing on any transfer to any club atm, he cant say he wants to stay, why? Because its up to MON if he goes or stays. He has not signed another contract because he has not even been offered one yet.

As for new players to replace him, well we already have some players for the middle and dont be surprised if he is not replaced this transfer window. We need a striker more, imo.

The guy jumps out of tackles all the time and constantly chickens out. He has zero confidence. How could he possibly play in the middle?

Downing has played like that in parts of some games for half a season, after coming back from a serious injury. Watch him in the game against us (when he got injured) for borough, then you may see why.

Agreed, his confidence is low, the guys had season after season of not, "chickening out"

Anyway, time will tell. :winkold:

He could easily be the man to replace milner in the middle, if he leaves us. Is this the beginnings of us being softened to the idea?

People seem to be forgetting that the wages Mr Ireland is on at City will not be matched by Villa.

Stephen Irelands wages

i would imagine we would pay him no more than £40,000 a week, then he could improve his wages if he earns it by his performances. I do not believe he is even on a radar at those wage levels.

IMO Milner will go if the price goes over £30m and only when we accept Citys offer will he consider a move. Its a this point other interested teams may make their move and if Chelsea or UTD match the price then he will go to one of those before city.

We need to get away from monetary valuations being a kind of definitive guide to a player's ability. They are as pointless as using soccerbase as the be-all and end-all of a striker's ability. Villa was £30m because of his contract and because Valencia are crippled with debt. Barry was £12m because of his contract.

Spot on, Milners value is what Villa (MON) wants for him. Anyone who infers this is a done deal at £28m is wrong, im not saying it wont happen but its has not happened yet, despite what a few M City fans say and the usual red tops.

IMO Germany will not win in it, Argentina were a mess and so was we. Its either Holland or Spain for me, but if im honest Holland are going to take some beating. They outplayed Brazil in that second half, fought for ever ball, plus they have some terrific tallent, WS is my player of the tournament atm.

The Milner situation is stalled, we have rejected their bid and until they get really silly he aint going anywhere but Villa. Milner will negotiate a new deal with Villa in th e next 2 weeks, probably a one or two year extension to his deal and a near doubling of his wages.

Man City will never be able to earn the type of money from turnover that will allow them to pay many more £220,000 a week contracts, they will have to sell in order to allow themselves to even get close to UEFA's turnover rule.

On Ireland? Forget him or any other city player coming to Villa, their wage structure is in a different league to ours and 99% of the other teams in the PL. Most of their fringe players will sit their inflated contracts out in order to get wages close to what they have now, when they leave on bosmans.

If he goes then i would like to see downing in the middle, he needs to get his tackilng back to his borough days but i dont think thats beyond him. We could then get another winger as replacement, Bentley for one or perhaps someone else.

Yes, France were crap at the world cup so I think we should make a bid for Ribery - I am sure he'll be going quite cheap now....

not convinced by this rumour of him needing to be at the centre of everything leading to the rift with gourcuff though

and huge transfer fee ignored, there is still the near fact that he's want a 6 figure sum every week

I was just making comment on the suggestion that Milner's value would drop because England played shit - not actually suggesting we would be in for Ribery but that logic carried over then most of the French players would be available for a croissant and a six-pack of frog's legs.

And Robinho would be the most expensive player in the world. MON stated he would want £75m for A Young, what do you think he will want for Milner? I reckon it will be alot more than even M City will offer.

Holland

Milner's experience in this world cup should be a warning to him about football teams whos expectations are far greater than their actual ability. The sorts of pressures that these City players are going to be under over the next few seasons will be imense.

One day man city may become this all powerful club, but it will take more than millions of pounds and theres going to be alot of careers either ruined or damaged with this wild spending in order to win things. If you dont peform for one game or may be two, then your out! Sit on the bench or play for the reserves, the owners wont be bothered, they dont need to be, their so rich.

Man City are just the latest team to take advantage of the flawed Premier League system. The team with the most money nearly always wins, its only the colour of the shirt that will change. UEFA, to their credit, are trying to change this.

I don't think he will go to Man City, more chance of Man Utd IMO

I think rednose has to find a replacement for scholes this year, and Jimmy helps to plugging this gap - not the same sort of player as scholes, for instance he can tackle, but part of the way there.

Pity their skint then, they wont be buying any £20m player, let alone £30m+ one, imo.

Or, they buy Milner next season when he only has one year left on his contract, and Scholes officially retires. Would be good business from their viewpoint.

manure will shift a few players this summer, they will easily be able to afford 30m.

Who are they going to shift that will raise enough money (£30m) without having to replace them, a first team player?

I don't think he will go to Man City, more chance of Man Utd IMO

I think rednose has to find a replacement for scholes this year, and Jimmy helps to plugging this gap - not the same sort of player as scholes, for instance he can tackle, but part of the way there.

Pity their skint then, they wont be buying any £20m player, let alone £30m+ one, imo.

Rooney is a coiled spring and fingers crossed he will explode on the Germans.

I think he will and if he doesn't then it will go to penalties. The thing about us now is even though we have not played that well, we have only let in one goal and that was an almighty f**k up.

James looked steady, Terry looked better and upson got better as the game went on. Barry was, imo, our worst player, but should start to get match fit. Gerrard looked lively and even lampard started to look for the ball. Rooney started to show glimpses of what we all see week in week out in the PL. Defoe is a goal machine, little else to his game, but he just knows how to score and thank f**k for that.

If i was the german coach then i would stick a player very close to Milner and try and stop the supply into the box, its then we will see what the rest have to offer, but then again cant Milner play on the left side as well?

If we are gonna win then Milner's gonna be a big part of this team.

Germany will know we are a real danger, but which England will turn up?

I think perhaps people are overstating MIlner's performance in yesterday's match. He was very good, yes, but largely by comparison to an underperforming England team as a whole. I don't think we could be adding too many zeroes just for now.

He was Englands most creative player, from the right wing! As we all found out last season, his best position is in the middle of the park. If England play him there, we will see him at his best.

"Since I've lost the armband nothing has changed for me," he said. "I was born to do stuff like that and I will continue to do that in the dressing room and on the training field. No one will take that away from me."

WTF is going on then? I just cant see who the captain is. Terry seems to be forcing his way into the position? Press conferences, newspaper interviews, at training, in the dressing room. Its seems to me like hes part of the problem. How will Gerrard react to his behaviour? How will capello react? the other players, swp, barry all the other players will have opinions on his behaviour...its a f***in nightmare.

Theres trouble in this camp and this confirms it to me, were as good as out unless some players are f***ed off out of the squad and it becomes united.

If terry is the problem then he has to go, despite us then relying on Dawson and Upson, Capello has no other option.

Something apparently might or might not have happened in the camp non too long ago which could have pretty serious implications for those involved. Don't quote me on it though, not sure of how reliable the person is but they've had some decent info before

I think you may have it, they looked dis-jointed, reckon it could be a Gerrard - Terry thing, the captaincy decision has split the team? Another thought is the bug that Milner had, has it spread through the team? If it did i guess it would be kept quiet and the performances from certain players, Rooney may support this view, he never seemed to have his usual energy levels, no passion, very strange im my view.

The question of Lampard and Gerrard, well at club level they with midfielders who are considered to be the best at what they do, break play up, put their foot in, tackle, who plays this role in the England team? I cant see any of our midfielders in the squad that would be considered even half decent at doing this part of the job, perhaps Gerrard could do it but hes out on the wing............Could we play a defender in the middle?

Lennon, swp, exciting to watch when they fly past players but they have no end product, they need to get the ball in the box quicker, not beat 2 men then lose the ball, just get the f**kin ball in the box.

We have to win against Slovenia question is how? Play rooney on a wing and put Defoe and Crouch in the middle? Then get crosses into the box.

I cant say im surprised at these performances, we never looked convincing to me even in qualifying. Fingers crossed though, we could do it as we always seem to in the last games in group situations. We are so lucky we are still in with a chance to qualify after playing so poorly in these last two games, perhaps its an omen.

I would rather take a chance on ryan babel, right price and he has more to his game than Kuyt, although his attitude or percieved attitude maybe a problem.

Babel? Christ no. I'll take Kuyt every single time. Babel has precious little to his game.

I would agree with "Babel has shown precious little to his game" Perhaps this world cup will be his opportunity to show what he has, I have seen him in his early days and he definelty, IMO, has plenty to show.

Guess its all opinions at the end of the day, he does however have plenty to prove. Either way kuyts a no go and its the Babels of this world that may be attracted to Villa.

I would rather take a chance on ryan babel, right price and he has more to his game than Kuyt, although his attitude or percieved attitude maybe a problem.

Dolye for around £12m sounds good to me, can see us having to pay more though, prob £15m. Reckon he could teach Gabby quite alot tbh, hes a very inteligent player and in the right team he should score quite a few more than he did at Wolves. I know MON favours a big man up front but I think this makes Gabby less effective as the knock ons for gabby to run onto are covered by most of the oppositions defense (heskey and carew are pretty static)

I do think we are missing a striker and its gonna be hard to get one that can push us on to the next level, can see either Carew or Heskey leaving.

Well it may well be " the way you remembered it" but that does not make it right, does it?

Article with quotes

The fact is Milner was promised something that Newcastle never delivered on, more money, when he signed his new contract the year before. Keegan made this promise and the board backed out the year after he had made it.

Keegan was furious and so was Milner, he slapped in a transfer request. Newcastle did not offer the money promised to him even after that, despite having the chance to.

It cost Newcastle Milner and Keegan IMO.

Milner will do the right thing within reason, he will stay another season unless MON decides the money on offer is so great we cannot turn it down, we are a business after all.