moose

Please feel free to correct me on this, but my impression is that a LOT of our recent appointments are NOT Aston Villa appointments, they're "V Sports" appointments of which AV is a part. Read the wordings of the job titles and announcements carefully. Chris Heck doesn't work for Villa, he works for V Sports. We're just the (currently) largest element of a group now. Secondly, American owners generally (because they're drilled on the US model of closed leagues and sports that are only played in the USA) do not consider profit and loss much, they just care about an appreciating asset. This is seriously dangerous in global sport - remember American sport has no promotion/relegation, the player markets are dictated by the franchise holders, etc etc. The power in American sport is held by the owners, this is absolutely not true for the rest of the world but the owners think it is. Todd Boehly is a prime example of a clueless billionaire and we can simply be thankful he doesn't own us, and whilst our ownership seems mostly more switched on, I don't think they're entirely the saviours we've generally built them up to be. Still, we're in European competition, so who cares?

So we're going to monitor "global reaction" to the new badge? Whose reaction are we monitoring? People are either Villa fans or they aren't and maybe if the internet gets filled with randomers from Upper Umbobo saying they don't like it they'll take their views over those of the fans living within 20 miles of the ground? Bonkers. The fact that some clubs are popular in the vast Asian market is because they wear red. Nothing else. Absolutely nothing else. We don't wear red. Yet.

Castore is basically two blokes who decides to make sports stuff. Gymshark is worth hundreds of millions and started by a bloke who I assume had never worn leggings or women's gym attire. So you do have a point there.... how can a kit be any worse than what we're given now by "professionals".

I can't decide whether that shirt looks terrible or awful. Decisions, decisions.

With all these tyre jokes I think I'm going to keep a low profile for now.

Not only is our main shirt sponsor enjoying a lot of negative publicity today (but all publicity is good publicity, right?), but I noticed that our new sleeve sponsor is a spread betting firm and not a "trading" firm. Poor form on both counts for the club, but money talks I suppose.

Any time I think of Far East investors I can't get the fiasco with Vincent Tan at Cardiff out of my head. Maybe next season we'll be playing in red and gold, players will all wear number 8, and the lion on the badge will be replaced by a dragon. I'd rather it's the Americans, maybe then we'll get a sister club in the MLS.

3 of us from Gibraltar will be there.

He seriously does not give a flying **** about anyone or anything You just said he made a £1 million donation to childline, is that not worthy of praise similar to the praise Lerner got for donating money to acorns. Was that action and the knighthood unconnected? You should know that to family and friends I am notoriously cynical. Only just read this, but in answer to this question the donation was basically the purchase price of the "honour". Cynicism not needed.

Lambert on Sky last night said something like "if one guy leaves and we can use the money to make the team better overall, that's fine" I'm not too hung up on any one player wanting to move on, it's inevitable and they're not Villa fans they're just young guys wanting to make enormous amounts of money. Can't blame them, don't blame them. Anyhow - remember last summer when everyone moaned about us signing a bunch of lower league and unknown foreign players? Who's to say with a £30m fee coming in for one player that we can't spend less than a third of that on a replacement for the one leaving and a few million here and there for some other improvements. Add on the fact we'll get a number of overpaid slackers off the books this summer we'll be quids in. Randy can start to repay his loans with the additional Sky money and Villa will end up with a load of young players with transfer profit potential, no debt, and hopefully a sustainably good squad built around getting the best out of a team rather than relying on one player.

It's plan with more holes than our defending against set pieces.

I think Given's £50k, Hutton £40k. Not sure about the rest. Wouldn't be surprised if it's over £200k/month (and the figures quoted always exclude things like employers NI, so add another 13%-ish)

My professional view is that Lerner's far too reliant on people who used to work for him (YCRTA "yes men") which is not exactly a great position to be in. I'd have a non-executive Chairman, an ambitious CEO with football industry experience, a CFO who's level headed and able to appreciate the fine line between seeing expenditure on players as a cost and an investment, a COO who can handle all the back-office requirements, and two independent non-execs who were selected for specific knowledge and experience whether it be football or not (I'd actually have one who was experienced in turnaround situations right now). I just don't have the impression that the board are listed for any other reason than to make it look like we actually have one and it's really just Lerner and Faulkner asking Russell to sign some cheques.

I'll still have my season ticket if we go down - and probably go to more away games than I will to this season. I'd reckon we'd get an average of around 25-30k for most games, with a few exceptions like playing some right no-hopers on a Friday night televised match but they'd get compensated by the bluenose derby. I also think we'd see a significant amount of away supporters coming to VP which would boost the number.

The Prem's been around 20 years. It's like saying you think we'll stay up because we won the European Cup. It's the here and now that matters, not history.

To all those who go on about Premiership clubs getting all that money, which we wouldn't if relegated, don't seem to consider what those clubs are going to do with the money. Wigan? Well their financial situation isn't fantastic as they're propped up by the continued input from DW. If the club gets more income the only thing that happens is that DW doesn't need to prop the club up quite so much, not that they spend more. That would only happen if DW continued to fund their losses, and I'm going to hazard a guess that he'd actually prefer the club to be sustainable than increase spending to match income. I am sure the attempts to introduce FFP are a way of the league saying "DO NOT SPEND MORE" and that this "windfall" of TV money should in fact be used to create a buffer for clubs in the future, not frittered away on what will inevitably turn out to be a grossly overpriced transfer market as every club in Europe and beyond suddenly doubles the prices it demands for transfers to England. I'm not saying I WANT relegation, but if it happens I wouldn't dwell on it, take it personally, etc etc. I guess however that being away from the area I don't get subjected to any ribbing and piss-taking that Midlands based fans would inevitably be subjected to by workmates and friends. Perhaps in some instances, it's the fear of having the mick taken out of them for supporting Villa that's creating this fear of relegation in the first place. It would help if we didn't bother singing songs about the bluenoses, but I seem to be in a minority on that front. Sadly.

Wouldn't be at all surprised if we drop, but in some respects it'll get rid of the "but we're a Premiership club" cack that people spout, given our younger players (ie the whole squad) a chance to compete at a lower level and get a winning mentality, and in some respects it'd be a nice change of scenery. Most people seem to forget that the Premier League is pretty much a closed shop at the top - what do you want to see, another season of us struggling against clubs with open chequebooks or a season or two playing other teams who are chasing a promotion? Relegation is not the end of the world.

I reckon we'll stay up by virtue of three teams being worse.

We've needed a striker like him for years, now it''s up to him to prove he can perform reliably. Great showing yesterday, let's hope those performances give him the confidence to push on.

Was a little worried when I saw his name in the starting line up as it's a lot to ask for a young lad to make his starting debut against Man U, but I felt he handled himself very well, although the third goal could have been avoided if he'd been a yard quicker. On the whole though, the first half attacking flow from United pretty much centred around Rafael/Valencia down the right and they didn't get anywhere did they?

Regardless of the quality or potential of Bent, I simply don't think he fits into the PL way and for that alone I reckon he'll be on his way in January if sonmeone offers enough. I note that the media were reporting yesterday that we'd listen to offers for our "high earning players" but then only mentioned Given, Hutton, Warnock, and Dunne. Anyhow, back to DB, if you look at the work put in by our attacking options yesterday it was leagues ahead of anything DB would do. He just trots around up front waiting for the perfect pass or cross. Benteke, Gabby, and Weimann yesterday all put in a huge shift and given one of them scored twice and the other two provided one assist each you can't argue that they're not doing their job. PL's view is that we need a young and hungry team - Bent is a player who probably thinks he's already proved himself and therefore doesn't quite have the "hungry" tag. Sure if we sell him he might go a relegation rival but then again who knows where the money from his sale would go - another young and hungry PL find from the lower leagues or abroad?

Yeah well I guess that serves me right for goading the Man United fan sat right behind me in the middle of the Trinity when our second went in. Overall I don't think anyone had a bad game, not anyone in a claret and blue shirt anyhow. Man United looked weak at the back and we could have well gone into a 3 or 4 goal lead before the comeback kicked in. I know there's been lots of "if we play like that every week" comments but erm... why HAVEN'T we been playing like that every week?!

Do you not think city fans smiled when they won the league? Do you not think any of them are smiling drinking in madrid about to watch their team take on real madrid in the champions league? So I can't get a feel good factor from my own team because another team is better off? I see.

Joy.

Read this thread regularly, thought about commenting, and am glad I hadn't really put my 2p in. I turned up on Saturday and saw our previously second choice keeper pull of a few blinding saves and cause the whole Holte End to chant his name even when he just caught a cross, , a previously "league one quality" right back chest the ball down for a phenomenal volley into the back of the net, a raw 21-year old Belgian get heavily involved up front and chase down an errant back pass for a goal (who last did that kinda thing for Villa?), a little-known Australian who's plied his trade in the Dutch league run himself into oblivion for 70-odd minutes chasing down every loose ball and pushing us forward into attacking positions, a £3m central defender get promoted to team captain in his 4th Premiership match and show everyone how much it meant to both him and the team by leading by example, and more than anything else I watched a Villa team being praised, guided, supported, comforted, and challenged by a manager who has put faith in players that other clubs might have shied away from and watch it bring an enthusiasm back to Villa Park's crowd that's been sorely missing for a good while. Man City's unlimited millions and signing players on £200,000 a week? **** 'em. Nice if they can do it - but what I got from watching my team at the weekend was a massive smile, a spring in my step, and a realisation that Paul Lambert's vision is probably going to make watching Villa an exciting roller-coaster of a ride that could take us absolutely anywhere. Not blind love, maybe blinkered at worst.