Jas10

Yeah the prices don’t quite make sense, certainly don’t think Odoi & Kean are worth that much! Fati likely worth more. Just interesting to see which young players are rated as the next big talents and whether we could get any in.

There were reports or rumours that we tried to get Kubo on loan. Never heard of Kabak & Kulusevski. Same with Hamed Traore & Badiashile. Szoboslai is another talented youngster I’ve seen mentioned a few times. Sessegnon on loan has been suggested a few times (not played much at Spurs?)

Would any of these guys be attainable? Bottom of the list? I don’t watch enough football these days to form much of an opinion tbh. Villa is my sole/primary focus nowadays.

I really hope so & shut everyone up with some stunning signings out of the blue!

Yes, I’ve been stating repeatedly that we really have no idea (yet) as to what our transfer strategy is. Best not to pay too much attention to the speculation and online BS and wait until bids are accepted and players are bought in. As just mentioned, the fees aren’t so relevant but the quality of player is. What if Jack gets injured? We need options and an upgrade in quality as we relied too heavily on Jack and struggled to stay up. We need a substantial upgrade in attack at least & don’t just want to be scrapping for survival again.

Neither of us were going into specifics, just that we’d rather sign top quality players (whether they cost 10, 20 or 30 million) and youngsters with massive potential rather than squad filler or options (pointless spending big on aging players on high wages too). We need major improvement to push on and the fact that we barely stayed up shows just how lacking our squad is. Plus, we need to be less reliant on Jack and have other ways of creating and scoring goals. He will tire of carrying the team and the vast majority of attacking play unless we add genuine quality to help him out and convince him to stay and demonstrate that we are heading in the right direction. It’s up to the club and scouting department to find that kind of quality and bring it in. Of all the links, I would be happy with Benrahma & Buendia (each would likely cost 20-30m) and Edouard looks like he’d be a great signing too. We’re going to have to spend big because we are so lacking in quality.

Exactly

My first thought, from looking at that , is actually that we’ve barely paid huge fees for top players... that needs to change ahead of this season really, if we want to be a force.

Makes sense, we have pissed so much money up the wall over the years with no return e.g. Richards, McCormack, Nzogbia, Hogan, Lansbury & many many more (too many to list!!!). We’ve actually been doing it for decades! Remember the likes of Sasa Curcic? Habib Beye? Only it’s cost us a hell of a lot more recently... Should start a thread ranking our most useless players ever! I’m sure it would beat the Rashica thread Just imagine where we’d be if we’d have used those funds more wisely...

No real objection to this but would have much preferred Martinez (if possible). A younger, more long term signing who can be a key part of the team for many years... I just hope we aren’t focussing on short term signings as the recent (probably BS) links seem to indicate.

Yeah I’m much more eager for us to sign Benrahma (or a similar player). Not overly fussed about Watkins, would just like to see an exciting & ambitious move for a talented young striker such as Edouard or an as yet unnamed or unlinked player. Still hoping for some surprises and proof that the press and “ITKs” know F all.

Exactly

We haven’t bid for him so I wouldn’t be concerned at this point. Hell of a lot of bs out there (online). All we can do is be patient and wait and see.

He doesn’t score goals mate, can’t see him coming even close to double figures. Would need a few seasons at a lower level to develop, certainly not a PL player and I’d be very disappointed if he ends up getting minutes for us this season (meaning we failed to strengthen). He has decent attributes but a striker has to be able to score and he doesn’t possess that ability (yet). He needs a couple of seasons in the championship and then we can see what he’s really made of. As I stated earlier, we can’t afford to be sentimental. We need top quality and reliability if we really want to progress and compete at this level. We barely survived and need major improvement & enhancement. Again, no passengers.

Absolutely

It would be a complete contradiction to Purslow’s statements about the profile of player we are pursuing (young, hungry, high potential, increase in value - similar to McGinn, as he stated). Edouard would be a better fit, for example. I agree, it’s more likely to be a failure of a signing & waste of funds rather than a success and we’ve had plenty of those over the years... Even if he gives us one good season, that’s not enough. We should want to improve drastically not slightly.

Those are the main/only real issues though... and many of us thought we’d be signing better, younger, higher potential forwards than him. 20m is just way too much as well and I personally can’t see him making a massive contribution unless he hits top form and is relatively free from injuries for a season or two. It’s not just about being better than our existing strikers (not difficult), it’s about getting players in who can take us forward by a few levels. We don’t want to be struggling at the bottom of the table. If the fee was lower and wages reasonable then there would be hardly any objection but signing Wilson as our main striker hardly generates much excitement or optimism. Hopefully we’re not actually interested but, judging by statements from the owners regarding our ambitions, I would’ve thought we’d be making much more shrewd, exciting & ambitious moves in the transfer market. Obviously if he comes in, we’ll (have to) back him but many of us were hoping for better. All we can do is wait and see, I certainly won’t be making any judgements until we actually get a few players signed and don’t want to pay too much attention to the speculation.

They would have quoted us 20m (as usual) though

I wonder how many other sides have such a poor record with signings and struggling to offload overpaid, unwanted players... we must be one of the worst, ever. The amount of wasted money just doesn’t bear thinking about does it? I really hope those days are over and the players we bring in only improve us. Obviously difficult to have a near perfect record but maybe we can do drastically better...

Agreed but not for free, we should be able to get modest fees for them.

Yeah would’ve much preferred Martinez, if he was gettable, as a good long term option. At least Romero would be an upgrade on Nyland, Steer & Kalinic.