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Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda


HKP90

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Nilis is the one that still stings the most.

The Bomb Squad players

Carles Gil

I was really rooting for Michael Bradley

JPA is a great Villa player but he'll never be in a neutral's list. He "coulda" and "shoulda" been an even better player in a Villa shirt. He set his own high bar.

Collymore as well. Shoulda been bigger.

Marcus Allback

Benteke. Coulda been still banging them in for Villa had he not left 

 

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1 hour ago, cheltenham_villa said:

Dont think he was a flop. Scored a decent number of goals.

Yeah, no way did Bent flop at Villa. He was a scoring machine when we desperately needed him to be.

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3 hours ago, lexicon said:

Not a player, but Houllier. I think had he not had health problems he would've sorted out the team in the summer and we'd have transitioned into a decent outfit that could play football, getting rid of the arseholes in the team and modernising somewhat. All went south from there under Lerner.

A good shout.👍

Another manager that we chose to sack in 1964 following ill health, who might just have gone on to do for us what he did for Manchester City, had we stuck with him is Joe Mercer. He brought them up as Champions in 1966, the season before we were relegated and then won the title with them in 1968. 

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Freddie Bouma. I felt like we only got one season of class out of him before that horrific injury. I didn’t get why we didn’t give him more of a chance to bounce back rather than just ship him back to psv (where he continued to be awesome). 
 

Someone mentioned Matthieu Berson. So much pissing around trying to get that transfer done for two seasons, looked kinda handy when he came on but was never really given a chance.

Adama Traore? Obviously ended up being the right move for us as Uncle Albert was indispensable in the championship which is what we needed, but what could have been if we had kept him. 

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1 hour ago, Spoony said:

Freddie Bouma. I felt like we only got one season of class out of him before that horrific injury. I didn’t get why we didn’t give him more of a chance to bounce back rather than just ship him back to psv (where he continued to be awesome). 
 

Someone mentioned Matthieu Berson. So much pissing around trying to get that transfer done for two seasons, looked kinda handy when he came on but was never really given a chance.

Adama Traore? Obviously ended up being the right move for us as Uncle Albert was indispensable in the championship which is what we needed, but what could have been if we had kept him. 

Adama isn't all that - 0 goals or assists this season IIRC

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5 hours ago, lexicon said:

Adama isn't all that - 0 goals or assists this season IIRC

Adamas going to be like that wild woman you had great sex with in your early 20s, a massive "what if" for the rest of your life even though she's since bounced round several other men and deep down you knew she was no good

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7 hours ago, maqroll said:

Yeah, no way did Bent flop at Villa. He was a scoring machine when we desperately needed him to be.

Not sure how people could look at my post and think I was saying he was a flop. I meant we should've signed a Bent type e.g. him in 2009 January window rather than Heskey or 2010 window and perhaps those two seasons would've played out differently e.g. we make top 4 in one of them.

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1 minute ago, VillaChris said:

Not sure how people could look at my post and think I was saying he was a flop. I meant we should've signed a Bent type e.g. him in 2009 January window rather than Heskey or 2010 window and perhaps those two seasons would've played out differently e.g. we make top 4 in one of them.

Yeah, the Bent we signed wasnt the Bent that we wanted him to be when he was 3-5 years younger...

But the one we signed from Sunderland for a record fee was important for us at the time and scored some vital goals for us, to be fair!

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Mine would be Laursen and Mellberg should've played way more as a CB duo.

Must've played about 15 games together. Hardly anything until start of 2007 with all Laursen's injuries and finally we got a full season out of him in 07/08 O'Neill decided to put Mellberg at right back and have Knight and Davies as options alongside Laursen.

We were good that season but still conceded over 51 goals which was way more than any team around us in the table. Then we sold Cahill and Laursen got his final injury about a year later.

Sums up the MON era a bit, wasting endless money on short term fixes at CB when with a bit more foresight we could've just had a duo of Mellberg-Laursen, quality RB signed and then Cahill waiting when one of them got injured and we'd have been sorted there for a few more years.

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2 minutes ago, DJ_Villain said:

Yeah, the Bent we signed wasnt the Bent that we wanted him to be when he was 3-5 years younger...

But the one we signed from Sunderland for a record fee was important for us at the time and scored some vital goals for us, to be fair!

Loved his early cameos for us but the problem was losing Young and Downing in the same summer. Bent not the type who could create goals for himself and he become far more ineffective in general play in 11/12. That said him being dropped for Benteke in 12/13 still caused a big stir at the time but was one of the few major decisions Lambert got spot on.

Aubameyang's situation at Arsenal in last few months reminds me so much of ending of Bent's time here.

Always felt Defoe would've been the perfect striker for us around that time given we still played 4-4-2 and he was livewire from crosses. Should've got him when he was benched at Spurs in 07/08. Even after that Pompey had their financial meltdown the following year but he went back to Spurs.

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Mark Draper.  Was a really sought after player, and started well with us but then tailed off very quickly.

Already been said but Curcic.  One of the best debuts I can remember, but then went mad as a box of frogs.

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1 hour ago, VillaChris said:

Not sure how people could look at my post and think I was saying he was a flop. I meant we should've signed a Bent type e.g. him in 2009 January window rather than Heskey or 2010 window and perhaps those two seasons would've played out differently e.g. we make top 4 in one of them.

I actually didn't read your post, sorry.

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