Jesus Garcia Pitarch

[Dave-R]

9 hours ago, thunderball said:

The problem is transfer windows are such scrum it’s difficult to know exactly what happens, there are so many complications.

One thing I will say about Suso, he had to plan for Championship and Premier League. As the 3rd place promotion team we were the last to know our status and also the least attractive prospect to potential targets. We had the most amount of business to do due to ageing squad/loans/ends of contract in an inflated market. He got 90% of our business done very early, much earlier than most, so we had a decent preseason, and I think the prices we paid even now seem good value in a rising market.

In January, he also did more business than any other PL team, and I think he did ok.

Now not every transfer works, so his odds on failure will be more notable due to sheer volume of players. And for players to prosper they need the correct coaching, introduction and integration, no of which is down to him. Dean signed off every player, they didn’t close any deal without his blessing.

Hindsight is great, but I genuinely think that no one is a dud, Jota looks just short PL ability but again he’s hardly had a chance in a pretty changeable set up. And I know Wesley is marmite, but his goal return, in a team that doesn’t really feed our forwards, is good, certainly good for a 22 y.o. and better than other teams big money summer striker targets. But successfully integrating 12 young players into a super competitive league where even the manager hadn’t experienced before, is a challenge for everyone.

Just remember Suso’s brief in the biggest, most competitive market of all: 12 players minimum, average of £10m and low wages, under 25y.o. and ability to add value, must have “the right personality” I.e. Dean and Purslow has to meet them and ensure they were not disruptive. I think he did ok.

Final word on Maupay: I think this was a deal that was meant to happen but agents inflated the price/wages. I think we held out for ages but also had another option which failed to materialise on deadline day. Yes in hindsight perhaps we should have paid the money but the cost of a player is the transfer fee plus agents fee, plus wages amortised over the length of the deal. I have read wages (high) and agents fee (I have read £6-8m) was the sticking point. Brighton needed him more and didn’t need as many players, they swallowed hard and paid the money (same with Bowen to West Ham, another mad deal).

When we dropped out the Maupay race though the Maupay price dropped by about five million. I'm pretty sure we could of gone to brentford and got him for 17 mill which was 2 mill more than Brighton paid for the lad. Either way it was at the time a no brainer fetching that lad here and we severly messed it up in my opinion. We could of possibly saved money especially in the long run as we may not of meeded Samatta. We were desperate downthe line for a striker not just because the one we bought got injured but because we chose wrong as well.

In a way the Maupay saga kind of spelled out the type of player we needed and certainly spelled out how much we missed the point in signings, we messed up and chose wrong on multiple occasions.

Edited March 15, 2020 by Dave-R

[sharkyvilla]

I'd be very surprised if they just gave up on Suso (and Smith) already.

[Tomaszk]

6 hours ago, sharkyvilla said:

I'd be very surprised if they just gave up on Suso (and Smith) already.

He's blown it Suso. Dashed his record with so many bad signings.

Smith has the promotion on his record to give a bit of positivity back.

[kurtsimonw]

4 hours ago, Tomaszk said:

He's blown it Suso. Dashed his record with so many bad signings.

Smith has the promotion on his record to give a bit of positivity back.

Works both ways. We weren't really going places until Suso bought in a few players last Jan (notably, Mings). He's created a squad capable of PL survival.

Unfortunately he's been cuffed with a coach that's incapable of keeping us up IMO.

[sharkyvilla]

I think only Trez and Wes are duds at the moment apart from the loans. Wes should get better though but Trez is probably as good as he will ever be.  Most of the others have a lot of scope for improvement or were cheap squad filler. I'd be intrigued to see what names are on the target list for the staying-up scenario. 

[villa4europe]

17 hours ago, Dave-R said:

When we dropped out the Maupay race though the Maupay price dropped by about five million. I'm pretty sure we could of gone to brentford and got him for 17 mill which was 2 mill more than Brighton paid for the lad. Either way it was at the time a no brainer fetching that lad here and we severly messed it up in my opinion. We could of possibly saved money especially in the long run as we may not of meeded Samatta. We were desperate downthe line for a striker not just because the one we bought got injured but because we chose wrong as well.

In a way the Maupay saga kind of spelled out the type of player we needed and certainly spelled out how much we missed the point in signings, we messed up and chose wrong on multiple occasions.

the problem there is the belief of what we could have done and the disbelief that we didn't 

that's a narrative you've formed yourself (largely thanks to the media, social media and VT) and are now judging suso by it

as normal with this thread the truth is we simply don't know

[Wainy316]

I'm more gutted about us not pulling then trigger on Benrahma than Maupay.

[thabucks]

I wonder if We could tempt Dan Ashworth from Brighton to replace him? 

[Tomaszk]

10 hours ago, kurtsimonw said:

He's created a squad capable of PL survival.

Is any squad capable of PL survival then? Would have been useful if he'd filled the squad with players who have some good fundamentals and can improve.

Replace Smith with a realistic manager you'd prefer and where are we? Still in a relegation battle IMO.

He's made Smith's job incredibly difficult with these buys. I'll be giving Smith more credit than him if we stay up. And I say that as someone who would sack Smith if we do survive, don't think he's good enough for the PL.

Suso has made Purslow's job incredibly difficult by buying players who we won't be able to sell for more than what we paid. If we stay up we probably need another 5 starters to finish above 16th. 

[DCJonah]

So he's been talking to the press about the season needing to end and the club have distanced themselves from his comments. 

Don't think he's in the good books.

[Demitri_C]

Oh dear he is a goner 

Another payoff. I think we need to get brentfords sporting director 

[villa4europe]

He's said the league should finish now, there should be no relegation, Liverpool should win the league and that most clubs agree with this

The club have distanced themselves from it but it's hardly some way out there opinion of a mad man 

[Zatman]

40 minutes ago, Demitri_C said:

Oh dear he is a goner 

Another payoff. I think we need to get brentfords sporting director 

Yes sack a guy who has worked well for Valencia and Atletico giving patience and replace him with a guy who double jobs with Brentford and a Danish Superliga side.

Classic Villa response then when we hire this guy we will then be declared as lacking ambition

[Demitri_C]

1 hour ago, Zatman said:

Yes sack a guy who has worked well for Valencia and Atletico giving patience and replace him with a guy who double jobs with Brentford and a Danish Superliga side.

Classic Villa response then when we hire this guy we will then be declared as lacking ambition

Nonsense.

Brentford the club who find gems like benerema watkins maupay konsa and sell them for massive profit.

While suso brings in massive flops like wesley and trez but anythjng to have  a moan? 

[Aston_Villan4]

1 hour ago, villa4europe said:

He's said the league should finish now, there should be no relegation, Liverpool should win the league and that most clubs agree with this

The club have distanced themselves from it but it's hardly some way out there opinion of a mad man 

Seems odd for Villa to distance themselves based off that comment. It's not like he was criticizing the team.

[Tomaszk]

1 hour ago, Zatman said:

Yes sack a guy who has worked well for Valencia and Atletico giving patience and replace him with a guy who double jobs with Brentford and a Danish Superliga side.

Classic Villa response then when we hire this guy we will then be declared as lacking ambition

Yeah, don't think he was rates at those clubs either. Or if he was it was 15 years ago, when the game was chatting with agents, not analytics.

[Zatman]

2 minutes ago, Demitri_C said:

Nonsense.

Brentford the club who find gems like benerema watkins maupay konsa and sell them for massive profit.

While suso brings in massive flops like wesley and trez but anythjng to have  a moan? 

Suso also brought in Konsa who cant get a game here, as for the rest only Maupay has been sold and has been average at best. His goals record is not that better than Wesley who has been injured for nearly 3 months

Suso has helped oversee 2 teams to win La Liga titles that arent Real Madrid and Barcelona

[Dave-R]

8 hours ago, Wainy316 said:

I'm more gutted about us not pulling then trigger on Benrahma than Maupay.

There's that to, it's looking like a long list of players we could of had like Maupay, Benrahma, Bowen, Lolley and so on and we went for second or third best to them. It's clearly not been good enough the recruitment and those responsible should be held accountable. 

[Dave-R]

7 minutes ago, Zatman said:

Suso also brought in Konsa who cant get a game here, as for the rest only Maupay has been sold and has been average at best. His goals record is not that better than Wesley who has been injured for nearly 3 months

Suso has helped oversee 2 teams to win La Liga titles that arent Real Madrid and Barcelona

Would Maupay of scored more here than at Brighton, who knows, we will always be asking that question, I just wished we'd of took the chance on him.

As I said in another post, if we'd of had Maupay and he'd of been a success maybe we wouldn't of gone and spent more on another striker. However I do like the thought or did of having Maupay and Samatta at Villa.

[Dave-R]

8 hours ago, villa4europe said:

the problem there is the belief of what we could have done and the disbelief that we didn't 

that's a narrative you've formed yourself (largely thanks to the media, social media and VT) and are now judging suso by it

as normal with this thread the truth is we simply don't know

I have not blamed suso for it, someone is to blame though and i wished we knew who had made so many of these very underwelming signings.

Regardless of the covid19 outbreak and the uncertainty of how this season will go, we still have a bunch of players who need to turn the heat up. If the rest of this season is to be played then I highly doubt they will make a great escape from what is looking certain relegation.

If we'd of had Bowen, Phillips, Maupay, Lolley and a few other, we would no doubt be in a better position in the league, not to mention all feeling much more confident in our players. In fact I still dream of those players we missed and all it would of took were to meet clubs fees, but we had to try do this a different way. What we should of done is kept more of our players from last season and fetched in the targets we wanted instead of culling an entire squad pretty much. The mistake was made already when we brought a ton of zero experienced players who look like they will struggle at even championship level at this rate. If we had of just fetched upgrades in I think many of us would agree we wouldn't be sitting in the table where we are now. Would we of been better spending 150 million of six players instead of around 14, yeah id say most certainly. We'd of had players already embedded and a solid group for the newest signings to just jump straight on in and start working.