VillaJay

Looked good with buendia, Coutinho and Bertie on the pitch. Keeper stopped at least 2 goals

David is similar to Watkins, however Watkins has proven he can get double figures in this league and I'm not convinced David is a better player than Ollie either. If we sign a new forward, we need someone with a different skillset, a forward player who can hold the ball, with a good touch and score goals (Kienan Davis can do 2 of them well!) Hard to find a player like that but David doesn't look like a natural footballer to me.

Played 37 and scored 14 last season and his overall game was good. Has scored 10 in 31 or 29 games worth of mins this season, another couple of goals and it will have been a decent finish to the season for Ollie, despite a slow start. As a comparison Ivan Toney is the same age, has scored 12 this season and 5 of those have been pens.

Very clever player who has to play when buendia plays. Buendia is brave, he tries forward passes and through balls that Ings movement thrives on. The goal he scored yesterday was the simple type of goals that we don't usually seem to score before this season.

Could be great, will probably be decent, might be good, he's not good enough to start in this side right now so not sure how good he could be, but if we get a good fee and sell on, our academy is doing its job.

Very good player, and very much the same player he was at Liverpool, he always was a top player who hit purple patches, but drifted in and out of games. Liverpool did brilliantly on the deal to sell him, however Suarez was always a better player. I'd buy him for 33m if the wages are 150ish, he's a good player but needs much better around him to get the most out of him. I wouldn't be disappointed either if we didn't buy him.

I can understand the concerns around Gerrard, our performances have been been inconsistent and fairly dull, bar the Leeds and Southampton games. However, this team has proven it's a mid-table side time and time again, as much as I like the current villa team, they're a likeable bunch, but they're not good enough to challenge the top 6/7 as it stands, and Gerrard I believe sees this, he's used to being in the mix at the top and whether he's good enough to get us there, I don't know, but in order to progress we need to spend and spend on proven quality, otherwise what's the point finishing midtable pl. The best season outside of the 95/96 season I've enjoyed was the season we were promoted from the champ, we achieved something huge, bouncing around midtable is dull and I hope and expect our owners and manager have bigger ambitions than that.

He's a good player, works hard and if we created 5 chances a game for him he'd score 20+ goals in a man city team. Bet we're not that team and his first touch and hold up play are poor, his work rate is top class, he will probably/hopefully hit double figures this season (10). A good player, but if we want to finish higher than 11th, we need better starting, and the same goes for about 5/6 others.

Great post and there's parallels to Everton a few seasons ago, they brought in ancellotti a proven winner and still look where they are now. A proven name is no guarantee. I'm pretty neutral to any villa manager the last 20 years, but Gerrard deserves a chance to build his own team. Our core players are overrated, and are proving so now. I believe Gerrard will shake things up in the summer and overhaul the first 11, the likes of Matt "Roberto Carlos" Target will be sold and rightly so, we have a mid table team and if the board and manager are serious about progressing we'll be ruthless in the summer and move on most of our starting team. We will finish somewhere mid to lower midtable and thats the reality of the quality of this team. You shouldn't be surprised, if thats how we perform and finish. Our owners, CEO, and manager are proven winners in their respective careers so far and will want and expect better. If Gerrard fails, so what, we're not going anywhere with this current team anyway. But he'll try raise standards and expectations.

Ollie is better than Toney, Ollie had a good season last year and scored 14, he's on 8 in the league this season and I believe he'll get close to that again. The days of the 20 goal a season striker are rare and other than Kane, not many hit those type of numbers, most are mild inflated by pens, including Toney. Can we improve on him, of course, but I'm not sure who, that is realistic. He's barely had any service all season, yes he misses chances, but what striker doesn't.

If we're in for him, we have as much chance of signing him as anyone outside of the traditional too 4, and Leeds would snap out hands off for 60m! A ver good player who would improve us, but at 60m! What's the point of our scouting setup! I understood Coutinho and Digne, those deals made sense, but for 60m I'd expect one of the best players in serie A or la Liga who would improve us. is he better than what we have in midfield? Yes I believe so, but not at that cost in which we could improve numerous areas of our first 11

Puts in 100% and is obviously a good enough pl player, but of all our midfielders, Ramsay is a better footballer with a higher ceiling, Luiz is a better footballer, so is Sanson. None of them, work harder than mcginn, but with our owners and expectations, we'll never finish higher than 10th with mcginn as our starting midfielder. If we get a good offer, now is a prime time to sell, sentimentality will keep us mid table, where we are right now.

Based on all SG's comments, he rates him, and speaks well of him when asked. Our best player yesterday In an overall poor team performance. I don't believe all the anti Gerrard critics that use Sanson as a stick to beat him. He deserves more starts and Ramsay who I'm a big fan of, has been poor for a few games now, Sanson deserves to start our next game, will be interesting to see if he does, if not, I'll start believing in the SG has his favourites brigade.

Der Hammer

Well run clubs don't go scrambling around buying players on deadline day. If an opportunistic deal comes available, I'm sure we'd move on it. This has been a brilliant window for us and anyone that says otherwise is talking rubbish. Someone put this on here the other day but over the last 2 windows we've bought: Coutinho, Digne, Leon Bailey, Danny Ings, Emi Buendia and more. No other club in our league has been as ambitious in that time.

There is just no way we are loaning Targett to Newcastle unless it's hugely beneficial to us, I trust the board on this. As mentioned, it's either a huge loan fee or mandatory purchase and we have someone else coming in to the team.

We've already got a lot of players bought for reasonable fees that have and could improve to become bargains - Luiz, Cash, Konsa and Sanson added to our youth prospects who are some of the best in the country. Gerrard will want to push on and add proven quality to the group like Digne and Coutinho and those players cost money. I'd expect we'll be in for Bissouma in the summer again once he has 12 months left on his deal. Will be a big ask trying to sign him then.

If we can't get our primary targets this window, there's no point signing players who don't improve on our starting 11. Chambers will cover CB/RB and DM until Nakamba is fit and I'm sure we'll look at a DM in the summer window. Overall it's been a very good transfer window.

I believe that "journalist" as much as any "expert in the transfer market" what type of clown puts that in their twitter bio! Bentancour will stay at juve.

I believe we're very interested, but outside our budget this window. Top player who would improve us, however there is definitely similar if not better talent to be had around Europe for considerably less than a potential 50m. FWIW he's not a dm either, he's a box to box no.8 who's much better at the defensive side of the game.

That's how I see it too, in an ideal scenario, every player we buy is if the quality to push our current starters out of the team. However we need to team and squad build over time, and this is a really clever signing. If we can get a top DM in before the end of the window it will have been our best window in 25+ years. We can then in the next window look to buy 2 top quality players capable of replacing our current starters.

This is a really smart low risk signing and he's got that unfulfilled talent/potential that could see him move up a level and potentially challenge as a starter in this team. Good age Played more pl football than mings and konsa Technically very good and potentially our most technical defender Covers 3 positions competently 3 International caps, played 30+ times in Europe, CL/EL experience He cost nothing or next to nothing in transfer fee Actually has some really good YouTube videos for a defender

I had a listen too, and I agree, he seemed to be stumbling for words and contradicting himself and didn't seem too sure or in control of what he was saying. I rate Luiz and honestly don't know if he will sign a new deal if offered, but if the club know he won't, he should be sold at the peak of his contract value which is right now. Either way I'm more confident that preece knows less than I do!