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Marlon Harewood signs


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Martin O'Neill has added his 2nd new face to the Villa squad by completing the signing of West Ham striker Marlon Harewood. 27 year old Harewood has signed a 3-year deal with Villa and will look forward to joining back up with close friend Nigel Reo-Coker as the 2nd man to cross the claret & blue divide this summer.

Harewood looked all set to join Wigan Athletic until an 11th hour bid from Villa caught his attention, and the lure of playing for Martin O'Neill and for Aston Villa was too good to turn down.

Fan reaction to this news has been very mixed but with Harewood prepared to fight for his place and having scored goals everywhere he has been, he will be a timely boost to a Villa squad who only recently lost the services of 2 physical strikers in Chris Sutton and Juan Pablo Angel. Harewood will add a significant amount of pace and strength to a Villa line whose only other physical presence is John Carew who we at VillaTalk reckon will be his main competition for a place in the side.

It is expected that Villa will continue to add new faces to the squad with a fit rightback still the glaring omission in the squad going into next season.

A profile of Marlon Harewood will be in place soon

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Someone posted this on an Irish board but I think its a very good point:

we have given West Ham £12.5m in the last few weeks and they have spend £14.5m on arguably two better players in Scott Parker & Craig Bellamy.
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Someone posted this on an Irish board but I think its a very good point:

we have given West Ham £12.5m in the last few weeks and they have spend £14.5m on arguably two better players in Scott Parker & Craig Bellamy.

It's a very good point if you of the opinion that Parker and Bellamy are better, I for one am not.

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we have given West Ham £12.5m in the last few weeks and they have spend £14.5m on arguably two better players in Scott Parker & Craig Bellamy.

whoever said that has a very very good point

To think we were laughing at bolton for signing or misfits, then we go and do the same as them with west ham, a team who should have been relegated.

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Arguably two better players. Arguably is probably about right. I seem to remember a lot of people posting anti-Bellamy on here, and let's face it he hasn't set the world on fire at his other clubs has he? How long has has stayed at each one? And then you have Scott Parker. Arguably a good player, but Newcastle didn't want him, so why is have Wham spent their money on him?

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Someone posted this on an Irish board but I think its a very good point:

we have given West Ham £12.5m in the last few weeks and they have spend £14.5m on arguably two better players in Scott Parker & Craig Bellamy.

It's a very good point if you of the opinion that Parker and Bellamy are better, I for one am not.

ANd neither am I

The compariosn also fails due to the fact that Bellamy and Harewood will be playing different roles

A better comparison for Harewood is Chris Sutton.

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You know, people really need to get a grip.

I'm no great fan of Harewood - I think he's properly placed as a squad player at this level. But there are two things about this transfer that make it something of a coup for us:

1. Strikers who can play a power game, score some goals, *and* have decent pace for the Premier League level do not grow on trees. While Harewood doesn't have all the attributes required to be a top shelf starter, he is not devoid of important talents.

2. We just brought in those talents AS A BACKUP TO CAREW. This, IMO, was the second-hardest task facing MON this summer (right back is #1). We are basing our attack around Big John, and we need someone similar to deputize if (when) he gets injured or when the fixtures come too close together. Harewood is about the best you could ask for in this regard. He has similar capabilities (without the flair, admittedly, but what do you want exactly?), he has scored at this level of play, he's under 30, and he didn't cost the moon.

For those of you who think this reflects badly on the club's ambition, I ask you: if we're willing to lay out 4 million for a solid backup, what do you think we're going to see within the next six weeks as we fill out the starting squad?

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...then we go and do the same as them with west ham, a team who should have been relegated.

Oh you mean like when we signed McCann and Sorensen from a team who DID get relegated? You do occasionally get good players playing for poor teams... and as others have figured out, Harewood isn't being brought in as a "bloody hell" signing.

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Marlon's now a Villa player so true fans will cut out the negativity and get behind him. He deserves our full support.

All I've got to say is thanks for signing for Villa Marlon and for showing a willingness to fight for your place.

Score a couple of goals and you'll be a hero.

Welcome to Villa and good luck!

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Of course now he's signed the vast majority of fans (i.e. not the mindless idiots) will support him and hope he succeeds here, and rightly so, but that doesn't mean to say these fans will be happy at the signing or rate him as a good enough player

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If we had already bought a quality right-back, midfielder and perhaps goalkeeper and then picked up Harewood, I suspect we'd all be sitting back and nodding our heads happy that we'd picked-up a half-decent player to fill out the squad. Somehow, I don't think there would have been very many complaints if he'd been our 6th signing instead of our 2nd (assuming that 3rd-5th were generally considered to be quality).

Our squad was thin last season and since then we've lost McCann, Samuel, Hendrie, Sutton, Hughes, Davis...and probably Djemba Djemba. I am sure that MON and everyone else knows that our squad is way too small right now and that they're busy working on rectifying that as I speak - I can't imagine that someone as shrewd as MON would even consider campaigning the first half of the season on a team that small. The Harewood signing came quickly and virtually out of nowhere. A few pundits had connected us with him but I suspect that was luck rather than judgement. Likewise, our next signings could be similarly quick and unexpected.

Personally, as much as I would love to see us get Wright-Phillips - as much for image as anything else - I really don't think it's going to happen. Luke Young is a possibility, but I think MON will assemble a very solid team that will finish next season somewhere between 8th-6th and have some good cup runs. Perhaps my expectations are too low, but if that happens, I will be happy. The following season I will want Europe, however, as will MON and Mr Lerner I suspect.

With regards to Harewood, I think he is a good player. A good old-fashioned centre forward. He had a rough season last year but so did almost all of a West Ham side that had been very good the year before. I like Carew a lot, but I don't see him being at Villa in 2 years time as he tends not to stay with clubs for very long - either by his choice, the club's, or by mutual consent. Last season, if we didn't have Carew, we lacked strength up front and our attack became dangerous but one-dimensional. Harewood gives us that strength and I believe he could easily be with us for another four years. I don't believe he's a 20-goal a season player, but I do think he's a very welcome addition to the squad.

Now...roll out our right-back, midfielder etc etc.

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I am new to this site but been a villa fan 20 years. I feel that we should get behind Marlon and Reo from the start. I think they will be good additions to the squad and I trust MON knows what he is doing. Might not be the superstars some fans were dreaming of but I think given a chance they might suprise a few people. I for one will back anyone in the shirt if they give all they can. Up the VILLA

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Welcome to the site danhar. For what it's worth, I don't think anyone has complained about getting NRC. Most people see him as perfect for us.

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