david-avfc

It’s a shame we didn’t loan him out last summer, as a full year under his belt in league 1 would have set him up perfectly for a stint in the championship you’d have thought. Seems like he did OK at Cheltenham so hopefully he can step up to another level. Another spell in league 1 would probably be far better than going back to the u23’s but would seem like a bit of a sideways step.

Probably needs a loan out to the championship for a season before he steps up to the senior squad, but another exciting talent

The "original" current badge under Lerner looked like a cat playing with a ball or something. At least they made it look a bit more like a lion in some of the subsequent changes

Yeah he was very poor in his first Premier League spell with Swansea, don't think he even got as many as 8 - not in the league anyway. Shows why some caution is needed with young Archer, hopefully he takes this preseason by storm but if not a full season in the championship is not the worst idea especially if we had the option of a January recall if needed

Think it's a case that he's probably been told how good he is by everyone at the club and all his hangers on which undoubtedly he will already have, friends, relatives, family friends, agents knocking at his door etc, and he probably believes the hype. Even Purslow said Carney is the best youngster in the country so if that's gone to his head no wonder he is maybe expected more, whether that's financial or playing time. On paper it's hard to see how there are many better options than staying at Villa, a known quantity for him who are committed to developing him, have one of the best youth set ups around and have proven with Ramsey that youngsters can make their way into the first team. If he's thinking about moving abroad then that's an interesting one for him as the likes of Bellingham and Sancho and the lad at Bayern who now plays for Germany have proven there is a pathway there instead. I think the club should have sorted this out one way or another ages ago, they should have said if you aren't committing to us, we aren't committing to you and send him back to the U18's until either he renews, or his contract expires or we got a big offer from somewhere else. I don't think he's done enough on the pitch to warrant starting more games and he's played a lot of minutes for someone just turned 18.

To which point telling everyone we were prepared is even more farcical!

I never really got the “prepared” thing, seemed a bit too boy-scout for my liking, and why wouldn’t a professional team be prepared anyway? It never seemed that unique or inspiring or anything to me, although I get that it’s use goes back a long time in our history

I get where you’re coming from but Chuk did get minutes at the end of the season when our season had petered out. Our form before that was pretty dismal around Feb time so throwing a player like Carney in would have been a major gamble as we were at risk of sliding down the table, and actually we did take that gamble just with Tim Iroegbunam instead who personally I thought did well and in my opinion contributed more than Carney in his spells

He’d be an interesting signing, he’d be worth a punt if the price is right but the problem is despite what people are saying we don’t actually know how good he is in midfield - he simply hasn’t played there for Man City in any tangible capacity for anyone to judge positively or negatively. Yes we all know he’s played there for Ukraine but international football is quite obviously a poor guide to assessing PL quality otherwise the PL would look very different to how it actually does

Yeah baffling how one of our best players over the last 5 years, who has 100 PL appearances and nearly 50 international appearances is in the side over an 18 year old who has done nothing

Carney has been given a chance and hasn’t done enough to warrant any more game time than he’s been given. Tim Iroegbunam did a very solid job and deserved his shots in the first team. Ramsey last season was Ok but worked hard and therefore provided a better alternative to the experienced but slow Hourihane and Barkley in certain games, so deserved his chances and then added the quality to his work rate this season, too. Chukweumeka however wanders around the pitch like he’s the best player in the world, which is ok if he’s setting the world alight but he clearly hasn’t. Probably works in the u18’s where he’s surrounding by kids who only have half the technical ability but in the PL they are all top class players so if you’re not on top form you need to at least work twice as hard instead to help the team. Most youngsters go out on loan for a season, this guy seems to be the only one who hasn’t and presumably it’s because of the contract issue. He simply hasn’t done enough here to justify more game time at the age of 18

A very stop start season for Ings, in and out of the team and with varied tactical set ups too. I think if he was our first choice number 9 he’d score 15 goals+. Strikers rely on match sharpness more than anyone else, it’s always going to be difficult if you’re not the main main unless you’re one of those rare “super sub” players. I still believe he was a panic signing, the speed in which it happened and the proximity to the Grealish transfer, with no obvious way he’d actually fit in. Hopefully Gerrard will have worked out how to use him because the constant tweaking trying to force the partnership with Watkins held us back and we can’t continue mucking about with it indefinitely

Considering Burnley signed Maxwell Cornet for €12-15m from the same club last summer you do have to question why we paid €20m for Traore who was out of favour and had come off the back of a relatively poor season. A comparable fee to Cornet would have been OK, personally I think Traore is probably a little better as Cornet mainly stands out better due to being in a poor side devoid of any flair, but considering Traore's declining role at Lyon and that he wasn't popular with fans it seemed like there could have been a better deal to be had. I doubt we'd recoup the €20m we paid to Lyon so would probably be quite a loss if we did sell him.

I'd like to keep him around as a squad player, he is a maverick and although he can be infuriating at times he is also capable of great individual moments. I don't see why he couldn't be used as a wildcard attacker off the bench or as a rotation option in the squad.

€4m after a serious long term injury, one year left on his contract and probably wasn't quite good enough anyway, not the worst business in our recent history. Good luck to him, I always liked his work rate and desire even if he did lack some of the natural talent other PL attackers have, although no one can deny he scored some important goals for us and his ability to be in the right place in the right time is a very underrated quality

I think there’s a difference between being clever and being speculative. Some fans seem to be envious of Brighton because they’ve signed a bunch of South Americans or young Europeans that no one has heard of. That’s different to “moneyball” which is using data analysis in a clever way as a main scouting tool to uncover under-appreciated players who pass under the radar. Brighton do seem like a solidly run club, but as is always the case the grass isn’t always greener and Brighton have had their fair share of poor signings alongside some better ones, as per all clubs. They probably have a long list of flops which none of us can remember because there’d be no reason for a villa fan to remember a crap player from Brighton.

I don’t think signing West Ham’s cast offs is going to get us anywhere. If he was good enough he’d have started more than 2 games in the last 2 years for them

Is that the same Barcelona that paid €35m for Trincao, €35m for Malcolm, €80m for De Jong, €130m for Dembele? That’s just players under 21, doesn’t include the hundreds of millions they’ve wasted on older players too

Needs to be given a real shot in preseason alongside first team players to see how good he is in a proper team. There’s a huge difference between the PL and championship where the top scorer got 40 goals or against European minnows at u21s, but he has shown a remarkable ability to step up to the next level when given a chance. Think it’s too early to say if he needs a loan or if he can step up until we see more of him in claret and blue - the next 2 months are the perfect opportunity to test him out

I completely believe we need strength in depth, but it should be remembered that the league position is going to be driven by the players who play the most minutes, not the ones watching on from the stands, and therefore that’s where the priority should always be. An expensive back up left back is a “nice to have”, not essential and I can’t see it having a material impact on our league position in most cases, as there is no tactical gain in switching that position and fatigue is unlikely to be an issue. The only exception is if there is an unexpected serious injury which is why you need someone competent but you can’t over commit to that one possibility. £18-20m might not sound like much to some fans, but some basic maths will tell you only 5 players in that bracket and you’re up to £100m, a hell of a lot of money for players who probably aren’t going to make a particularly tangible difference to our final league position

and why pay £18m for a 20 year old who isn’t going to develop whilst they’re sat on the bench for several seasons, or indeed why pay £18m for a back up left back at all

We’ve always had a decent academy, lots of football league players started out their careers at villa, but we always seemed to lack the ones with that extra bit of PL quality. Seems like that’s now maybe changing. I often wonder if the likes of Kevin MacDonald etc were the problem, the old guard from previous era’s who didn’t know what it meant to be a 21st century PL footballer - the accusations of bullying suggest he was rather old hat - but seems like we’ve now refreshed things behind the scenes and are trying to operate the academy in an elite and modern way, I can only see it continuing to be a success

The release clause would only force them to accept our bid at the agreed value, the new club would still have complete discretion whether to accept or reject any bids from a 3rd party club at any value, and of course the player would still have to agree to the switch anyway

Overhyped “young” (now 25/26 I believe) English midfielder who happens to play for a fashionable London team. Never seen what he really offers, 18 starts for them in the last 2 years sums it up

Lots of digital related stocks shot up during covid because they offered a solution to physical restrictions during lockdown, and now have since come back down so I wouldn’t read too much in to their share price as it’s the same story for basically any company which did well in that period, and on a day to day back the share price would make no difference to their operations. With inflation escalating higher and concerns of a recession looming later in the year it would be logical to expect the second hand car market to slow down as consumers tighten their belts. Add to that the return of physical showrooms and dealers too, it’s a tough mix. So it makes sense to cut back now in advance of that - in many ways recessions are caused by self fulfilling prophecies as business lay off workers in anticipation of a slowdown which in turn actually causes the slowdown. I actually bought my last car through Cazoo during lockdown and I can vouch for them, it was a good service and I felt like I got a reasonable deal. But I knew exactly what I wanted, so maybe doesn’t have universal appeal but to me it did feel like the future of car buying unlike having to haggle in a car park with a dodgy dealer who’s telling you your trade-in is only worth half as much because of all those dents and scrapes you can’t see. I would expect they’d separate out operational spending with marketing spending (ie sponsorships) at least for now as for example in my case, I’d have never purchased my car online without knowing who Cazoo were from TV and sponsoring Villa so the marketing element is probably still key for them