Only2McInallys

We have made a number of signings and will probably make a few more.

Will it be successful ?Nobody knows.

We are building a new team,in a new league with a manager who has never managed in this league.

Things I can be certain of:Grealish will shine,McGinn will give 110% and Smith can get players playing better than than they have done before.

Will Wes score goals,Will Konsa be able to cope,Will Jota recover his Brentford form,etc I don’t know.

I would take 17 th now.There is one priority this season don’t get relegated.

I do remember the Juventus team that knocked us out of the European cup in 1983 it had Zoff,Gentile,Tardeli,Platini,Rossi and Bettega.

My main memory of that game that for very long periods we didn’t touch the ball.

The fee for Mings appears high but he is a known quantity to us and hence a much lower risk.We need a partner for him and maybe this is where we need to be more economical.Talk of Webster for 25 million seems too high for us.He has had 1 season in the championship against championship strikers.

I thought Dawson for 5 million was a perfect fit for us but he has gone to Watford.

The cntreback position could be filled by someone experienced  and even 30+

7 hours ago, Monsieur Hazdazler said:

This kinda thing concerns me for the window but the season ahead, Smith has plenty of support, but I’ve seen a lot of people saying they expect us to finish mid table or some have said even top half. I think there needs to be something of a realistic removal of the rose tinted specs...

1) we came up through the playoffs so statistically are the most likely side to go back down

2) we went up with a lot of loan players, many aren’t still with the club 

3) we are having a significant squad turnover this summer 

We are clearly doing some well thought out work in the market, not scatter gun, focused around a preferred playing style which is a huge plus. However given where we finished and squad turnover we have a long way to go to survive in the league this season. We could do really well, but there’s an awful lot of variables at the moment.

My biggest concern is opinion turns against Smith if we start poorly, I hope we are better than that, but judging on people’s expectations I am somewhat concerned some fans will end up making things really tough it it starts badly. Even if we went down I’d want to seen Smith continue, no question, I think people are underestimating how challenging it is going to be this year given the situation we are in.

Completely agree with this.

I expect us to start badly but improve as season progresses.I think if people are prepared for this and fans give Smith time to get things right we can avoid relegation next season.

He played for us like it mattered.He also was extremely talented his dead ball delivery was excellent.

Strangely this is rare.Mcginn is another example of a player you feel is really giving their all.

For a team to be successful you need at least five players like this last season we had  McGinn ,Mings,Grealish ,Abraham and Hutton?

I would love him to come back but after he has signed a new contract that now seems unlikely.

If Webster is worth £30 million.

Then Dawson costing£ 5.5 million is very good value for money.

We can’t be spending £15 -£30 million on all the players we need.

This is our first season back in the premier league for 4 years.We need to be pragmatic about the amount of money we spend.

Our  priority is not to get relegated anything else is a bonus.Look at Burnley they sometimes take experienced players just to fill a position for a couple of years.Some people are expecting major signings in every position .I think this is a mistake.Every transfer is a risk.We have spent huge sums on some players that have been disasters.Taking on a experienced player like Dawson whose transfer fee is small and lives in the the area and has premier league experience makes a lot of sense to me.

We need other striking options ,look at Glenn Murray for Brighton ,we would benefit from an experienced player to chip in with goals.

The decision to keep Whelan for another year is just based on our situation at the moment where we are having to recruit a lot of new players in a short space of time.If we had a full squad it makes sense to let him go.

Also it’s quite unusual that after having such a successful season ,we let most of those players go.Are we in danger of losing the momentum that we gained towards the end of last season?

I do think we need some experienced premier league players.

I was surprised Whelan was let go because he knows the other players,knows the system and would provide some stability .

Everybody is looking towards big statement signings but as we saw with Norwich last season  with Pukki you don’t always have to spend big.When we took McGrath and Merson both were looked upon as being over the hill.

The other problem with big signings is the risk of it not working out .Our record for buying big money strikers is appalling Hogan,McCormack, Balaban,Kosac,Bent,Cascarino etc

I have not known such enthusiasm for season tickets for many years.

All we need now is a team to watch.

There are probably a number of factors why we haven’t signed as many players as fans want.

Any selling club is going to demand the highest price for any player we are interested on right now.They know we have a number of positions to fill and they know we have premier league money and wealthy owners.Very little transfer business is being done now as most people are on holiday.

If we want transfers to go through now we are going to be paying over the odds.I think we should be patient ,the fees suggested for the Brentford players seem inflated .We should see is anybody else interested .?If not, 20 million seems too high.

Buying any player is an important decision and reckless spending in the past has weakened usMcormac ,Lansbury Tsisbola ,Hogan etc

I believe we have a ”matching offer “deal with Mings.It would make sense for Bournemouth to see if any other club is interested in him.

That might explain the delay.Also they know we are keen to do the deal quickly and by delaying they may be able to get more money from us.It might be sensible for Villa fans not to show their desperation for this to happen as this is probably inflating his transfer fee.

I will always be eternally grateful to the WBA board for sacking Moore and not replacing him with a proper manager.

We got through that semi final mostly due to poor discipline from their best players and I believe they would have beaten us if Brunt,Gayle and Robson Kanu hadn’t been sent off.

A lot of their recent success is due to having a very good manager and a very good scouting system.

I could see their manager being poached by a Champions League club(maybe Chelsea?)and he would be very difficult to replace.

Theres Norway We should be signing Maupay

The kind of striker we need to sign is someone who is Hungary.

Inspired transfers is there a formula ?No

Young or old ,championship or premier league experience ,English or foreign ,huge transfer fee or free transfer,previous injury or personality flaws.

Some of our greatest players-McGrath Man U reject ,alcoholic old probably the best defender we have ever had

Merson- alcoholic ,drug addict,etc brilliant player for villa

Pukki for Norwich 29 or 30 journey man top scorer in championship 

Dave Mackay for Derby 73/74 very old but led Derby to title

Probably the main ingredient they all share is mental will .

Its personality and inner drive that separates great players from the rest.With ability.

Out of the players that have been mentioned on this thread there is only one who I think fits into this category .Milner.

As regards the other players eg the Brentford posse I don’t know.

55 minutes ago, VillaChris said:

Problem is lots of teams ended last season strongly from mid table.

Everton finished up last year in great form. Played Liverpool, Man. United, Chelsea and Arsenal all at home in last six games and didn't even concede a goal. They were poor defensively for much of last season so if they've fixed that they'll be challenging for 6th.

Wolves will dip a little given they'll be in europa league but got some fantastic players, particularly in midfield and also a deadly striker in Raul Jimenez. They're an example of a side who came up with a strong core and made signings to significantly improve the first 11, big example to us. A huge threat away from home as their results show.

West Ham. Odd team, wildly inconsistant but have good quality in final third in Felipe Anderson and Aranutovic if he can be bothered. Seem to have finally improved at Olympic stadium, beat Arsenal, Man. United and drew with Chelsea and Liverpool there last season.

Leicester City. I think appointing Rodgers was a great managerial signing for them. They were comfortably beating Arsenal in the run in and have lots of exciting players in final third like James Maddison and Harvey Barnes. They could well have gone after McGinn if we hadn't gone up.

Palace. Another team brilliant away from home although will dip massively if they lose Zaha and Wan Bissaka.

Newcastle. Depends on this takeover but already got a fantastic manager in place.

It will be very very tough to finish top half so that's not a priority to me. To me we need to finish above the other two promoted teams and Brighton. I think way they ended last season and Potter being a gamble with his style they're the obvious established team who could well get relegated like Stoke and WBA in years before.

Then I have a feeling Bournemouth might be on decline and Watford could also struggle after losing the cup final the way they did (similar to us in 2015).

I would say though there's not 6-7 obvious relegation candidates unlike last few seasons, basically last season was just one relegation place in play with how bad Huddersfield and Fulham were practically from the start.

Agree.I just think talk of midtable finish now is wildly optimistic and may be counterproductive if we start the season poorly.

We are going to lose a lot of games and in some cases Man City, Liverpool etc very heavily.We need to manage expectations now.

Our main priority is to beat the teams around us Brighton,Sheffield united.

Recruitment now is crucial but I don’t think the owners will spend recklessly.Its too big a risk if we get relegated again.As long as we stick by Smith and give him time I think we will be ok.

The really scary thing is how are we going to replace him?

They say the really great players like Keane and Vieira you need two players to replace them.

If that’s the case how many players do we need to replace Micah?

52 minutes ago, av1 said:

Of course its going to be tough, but l if we are clever in the transfer market we can be better than at least 5/6 teams imo. 

I may be accused of being blinkered, and as i say I'm certainly not niave to the size of the task, but imo we are an immediately more attractive proposition to players than the likes if Bournemouth (see Mings), Southampton, Brighton, Norwich, Sheffield United, Palace etc. 

Tough, yes. But i think we can be more optimistic than simply finishing 17th. 

The big advantage teams like Bournemouth,Palace and Burnley have is they have been playing in the premier league for the last 2or 3 years and have mostly settled sides.Many of our players have no premier league experience Steer ,McGinn El gazi and even Jack hasn’t made many appearances.

So we have half a team currently with minimal premier league experience.Its not as if this year we have performed well over the whole season .We have managed to do it in short bursts.

In the last 5 years 1 team who came up by the playoffs has avoided relegation and that was Huddersfield who went down this year.

Our main hope is Dean Smith.He has taken a very disjointed team and created a strong team ethic and with a winning mentality.

The law of averages says we should be relegated next season.Dean Smith doesn’t follow the law of averages.

Some of the decisions made during his reign were unbelievable.Our wage bill last year was 71 million.Almost double the average and 20 million more than Wolves.Burnley in the premier league have a wage bill of 40 million.The wages given to McCormack,Hogan ,Lansbury were ridiculous for the championship.

Our problem is going to be offloading some of these players due to their wages and what other championship clubs will pay them.

I think when we join the premier league we are in for a bit of a shock.

The top  6 are now considerably stronger than they were in the past due to improved finances and this is evident from our dominance of the European competitions.I don’t think we will get many points here.

Teams like Leicester,Wolves and Everton have invested heavily and are at the moment are 

  better than us.Watford and Bournemouth seem to be extremely well run and have teams that will probably beat us.

The newly promoted teams both beat us,Sheffield Utd convincingly.

I think talk of 45points plus and finishing mid table is overly optimistic.Our priority next season is to avoid relegation and I think it’s going to be close.We finished the season very strongly but some of our key players won’t be with us Axel or Tammy.We are letting go of a number of players and recruiting at least 6-7 new players.Achieving consistency with so many new players is going to be difficult.

I think we need to be careful what we wish for.

We were relegated because we had an incredibly rich guy who for various reasons pulled the plug.

Big spending now is only going to lead to problems in the future.

We have a manager with a track record of taking young players and making them better.We have seen it for ourselves this season.

We should aim for a sustainable future.Make our best loan signings permanent El gazi, Mings and Hause and do some clever scouting.

Talk about Milner, Delph and Benteke is madness.The wages of these players would be huge and would upset dressing room harmonie.

Our biggest priority is getting a couple of strikers.To do that on a budget is a great skill .

This has been a remarkable season.

The bond between fans and players has not been better for many many years.

This group of players have given their all(110 %)and its great to see players who haven’t featured much recently caring so much.

Relegation overall has been good for us.The fans have rediscovered their love of Villa,we have played some of the best football I have seen for a long time(Brian Little team?)and we some so many players we can be proud of.

Dean Smith has done an amazing job he has taken a group of players who were struggling ,got them playing attractive attacking football and promoted to the premier league .Incredible.