Villaphil

AEG has 2 years left on his contract, do we offer him a new and improved one, let him wind down his contract (as we would have done under old regimes, and then lose him for next to nothing), or sell him now, when his transfer value is as high as it will ever get.

So assuming the answer is sell him, we need a ready made replacement, as in a player that could come in and do a shift for a run of games, if needed, but not expecting to consistently appear for the 1st team.

Maybe buy a young player, who has potential, is happy not to be in the first team (initially) and see where his progression takes him.  We don’t want to lose money on him, so maybe get someone in the last year of their contract so they are extra cheap.

Cantwell would appear to be the clubs selection for this role, also his experience makes him low risk.

5 minutes ago, hippo said:

I wonder if there will be a surprise departure ? - not Jack - but I wonder if someone we thought was here for the long haul makes a surprise exit. 

2 years left on El Ghazi’s contract, 1 year left on Cantwell’s.  Seems sensible to sell El Ghazi and bring in Cantwell, I’d expect that exchange to be relatively cost neutral, in terms of fee, given the contract situations, although we’d have to pay Cantwell more than El Ghazi.

The Bailey news also included a comment that we were looking to off-load El Ghazi.

1 hour ago, alreadyexists said:

 

So…. This is either true and he is a genuine target, his agent is angling for an improved contract / move elsewhere, so drops this into the ether, or we’ve released this info as we want to push down the price of O’Neil from Burnley.

#wanttoseehiminavillashirtbeforegettingexcited

7 minutes ago, MWARLEY2 said:

On another note looks like Thierry Small is wanting to come home to Villa. A villa fan from Solihull and mega highly rated by Everton who have had him since 11. 17 on August 1st and could easily come in as no 2 left back as he is incredibly strong already

Did I read he’s Bryan’s nephew ??

1 hour ago, RichiBoi11 said:

I completely agree with the concern on the midfielders getting dominated, but I think the management are looking to aleviate that pressure by having a ball carrier in front of them, rather than a pragmatic player behind them. There's pro's and cons to both and I like a balanced 433, but I think Deano might prefer the creativity of a 4231. Ideally it'd be nice to have a solid option for both systems.

With the centre back I haven't really heard of any youth prospects the club are raving about, but who knows how the younger players are developing. If they believe in a Revan, Bridge etc then someone like Cahill would be ideal to be honest. I just fear that none of them are ready to step up, and we may have to splash out a bit here on some more adequate cover as opposed to a stop gap.

They were fine at the start of the season, when Jack was fit, after his injury we found maintaining possession more difficult.  The issue was the number of times the midfield was run at, during 90 mins, rather than their ability.

With Jack and Emi this season, I expect us to retain possession for longer, which will ease the burden on the midfield behind them.

Anyone else nervous it’s gone quiet because Jack has decided to leave and we’ve then had to re-evaluate our targets ??

50 minutes ago, Sulberto21 said:

I used to have a bookmark in the trainer section just in case someone walked in.

They stuck together pages were the give away, your secret was not so secret.  Sorry if this is news to you. 

To service what that owe and what they want to spend this summer, Arsenal need cash, and they only have so many ways of raising it.  They will pick the least worse method of achieving this.

If selling ESR for £35m up front is their least worse option, then that’s what they will do.  If it’s not, they’ll likely keep him.  This is a cash flow thing, rather than a value thing.

59 minutes ago, mottaloo said:

 

He’d ‘never leave Fred’.

Josh Feeney confirmed by Fleetwood Town, for a substantial undisclosed fee.

3 minutes ago, maqroll said:

That's if he even pays his taxes!

Compare the 2 numbers on the quotes, they are the same.  I believe that was the point that was being made ?

12 minutes ago, Jas10 said:

My criteria doesn’t matter at all, it’s just an opinion and point of view.

I agree with taking a deal on its own merits, I just don’t see this one having any. Not for us, not a good/right for us imo and we’re talking hypothetically, that maybe it would work out and he’d be an asset. No guarantee of that all, it’s more likely to fail and cost us a la Drinkwater & Barkley. Let’s not go through that shit again…

Agreed.  This is where Edens and Lange’s team come into their own.  The emphasis on recruitment has been on using data and personality analysis to identify value when the old school methods don’t.

If they think there’s still a player there, and the data backs it up, they’ll go for it, and won’t be shy in bidding what they think is appropriate, see £30m for ESR as evidence of backing their beliefs.

I’ve been assuming links to Winks are a message to Southampton ref the valuation for JWP, and Cantwell links similar for Arsenal.  

2 minutes ago, birdman said:

Has happened numerous times. I just hope that with more confidence and stature within the group Jack will be more vocal and damand the ball. Mainly though the instruction should be coming from Southgate. Lets hope they analyse such things and ask why they're not passing to the man who can do the damage. 

As good as Sterling was last night his decision making for passes was pretty poor I think. 

I think it has something to do with Jack being our only outlet at Villa and so looks weird when a run of his isn’t picked up.  Hopefully we’ll get used to this next season when Buendia and ESR are in the Villa team too.

Just now, Amsterdam_Neil_D said:

Next Beckham I think.  

Would appear so.  Plays like Gazza, Beckham commercials.

https://www.vogue.co.uk/beauty/article/jack-grealish-curtain-haircut

1 minute ago, Dave-R said:

He most likely won't sign a new contract for a while and really why does he need to when he's under one already, there is no rush.

Unless Grealish or his Agent are really wanting an improvement on the old contract, then I'm not sure it will happen for a while.

Now if Grealishnext season is apart of the team that ends up getting is qualification to Europe then sure there is also something to suggest there's a reason why a contract talk should take place. As it stands from when he last signed a contract to now,, not much has changed has it apart from some media talking about clubs wanting to sign Jack and that could be false news.

I think what he delivers for Villa on and off the pitch is chalk and cheese between this year and last year (when he signed his contract).  Not to recognise that is a sure way to lose him.

16 minutes ago, sidcow said:

Anyone got a Telegraph subscription. They've run something today about Villa being hopeful he'll sign a new £150k pw contract. 

I have to pinch myself with Jack.   It's like a perfect storm. 

One of the best players in the world. 

Absolutely Villa mad, beyond mere fanhood.  Plenty of players not even as good as him have walked out on their clubs at the first opportunity, see Rooney - once a blue always a blue. 

The richest of rich owners who are determined to keep him and grow our ambitions with him. 

We've been truly blessed by circumstances, never in our modern history would be have kept him even this long before. 

Do you think £150k pw is enough, I had assumed £180k - £200k if we were serious about keeping him.

At the end of the day it’s all about whether at the end of his career he wants to look at some Premier League medals and potentially a CL medal, or a statue of him outside the Holte End.

Let’s hope he has a chat with Alan Shearer who made that choice when leaving Blackburn.

I suppose the biggest difference was that Shearer had already got a Premier League medal in his back pocket…

Barely coherent ramblings…..

Thinking back to pre Grealish injury and what were my concerns then….

We were great on the counter attack, which is why we performed against the top teams, but against the weaker teams I never felt like we could stifle a game, once we were on top.  The Burnley game springs to mind.

So how do we go about improving there??

Maybe we need to upgrade on Luiz or McGinn to steal back possession better when we do lose it ?

Maybe our front 4 need to retain possession better - See Buendia and potentially ESR signings

Maybe an out and out DCM in those games would free up the rest of the midfield to concentrate on breaking down the opposition, whilst protecting against letting the opposition back in.

1 hour ago, Villaphan04 said:

Tammy would be great if we get him on loan w/option to purchase. Gives him a year with us to figure out if he works in our current squad and would be a good signing. In the era of FFP though, I just think spending 40m on a position where the player we are buying is not a clear upgrade (and is arguably a downgrade) just makes no sense to me. 

I would actually lose a little bit of faith in the transfer team if Tammy @ 40m  is the best value striker we can find (because there sure are many others out there that wouldn't come close to that price tag). 

Don’t we employ a lot of people for us to see value in the transfer market, where others don’t.  Can’t see an option on Tammy, he’s either 100% yes or 100% no.  We either back our judgement or we don’t.

5 hours ago, nick76 said:

You cant say factually the rumours arent true.  You are just guessing like the rest of us so you are being disingenuous in that comment. 

Wilson has played 254 out of 257 as a striker, so dont try and fit moving position into your narrative because it isnt true and unknown about playing our wide.  You are just asserting that because he has pace.  Wilson is a striker, end of! 

Wilson is 29 years old, no resell value and hasnt played at the top end of the table.  Tammy has played at the top end of the table, load of experience and only 23 years old so has plenty of resell value if he didnt work out here in a couple of years time thus has a value of 40m. 

Have you checked out the length of Wilson’s contract ?????!!!!

Just putting it out there... we may want a plan B, and in that scenario an additional striker, with a different skill set to Watkins rather than exactly the same but slightly worse, may be the way forward ???

11 minutes ago, allani said:

It's Thursday.  Why haven't we announced a new signing yet?  Sack the board!

Just waiting for Man City to say they won’t go above £100m for Kane, then Spurs will announce they’ve accepted a £120m bid for Kane, from Aston Villa.

Then it’s a waiting game, whether any of the big boys are willing to pony up £120m.  If not, then Kane has a decision to make, stay at Spurs for another season where Levy has done him dirty, or come to Villa.

4 hours ago, rayk said:

The problem with ESR is we did a job on Arsenal last year with Martinez so with any future transfer they will (a) be more reluctant and (b) demand their pound of flesh in return via an inflated transfer fee.

So unless we’re spending Jack’s transfer fee I can’t really see it happening.

Or use it against them, make them pay an eye watering amount to keep ESR because they can’t be seen to lose out to us twice, then sucker punch them with a £40m+ offer for Saka.

17 minutes ago, RicRic said:

Seen this on twitter Julian Alvarez from River Plate, I've never heard of him like many id assume.. wonder how reliable it is.

Aside from that i think many of us don't understand or shall i say underestimate our vision for the future just based on the level we seem satisfied with, believe me it is looking very exciting and im not saying this for fun but we are following in the footsteps of Man City as far as the new generation of clubs are set up, we should stop putting a cap on the type of players we can go for and also looking at certain level of players.

Villa have now crossed the border in terms of players we sign and look for, we are now stepping into a territory we should have been a very long time ago but we are going to be upset about not signing the likes of Griezmann and Co In a couple years time believe me... you can see it now the way we are going about our business we are willing to get whoever to take us to the top and spending the money heavily 

Done and dusted according to Wiki.

31 minutes ago, osmark86 said:

wouldn't that also work the opposite direction if an otherwise good player has a poor run in the international tournaments?

‘He looks shit, let’s buy him’ kind of thing?