Álex Moreno

[DaveAV1]

37 minutes ago, Tayls said:

Im confused. Why aren’t they calling him shit and happy to get rid? 

Because they’ve never heard of Wolverhampton let alone been there. 

[Johnnyp]

No issue with Moreno coming in but it’s this mish mash “ 1 pick one, you pick one “ policy we’ve operated for years now. Moreno clearly would be an Emery signing. Then we’d get a Samatta type from some club in Belgium. Crazy shite. I get that a sporting director ( is that what Lange is ) is the way of modern football because a manager’s get bounced about quickly now if it’s not working. Give the whole thing to Emery or don’t give it to him at all. 

[PieFacE]

12 minutes ago, Johnnyp said:

No issue with Moreno coming in but it’s this mish mash “ 1 pick one, you pick one “ policy we’ve operated for years now. Moreno clearly would be an Emery signing. Then we’d get a Samatta type from some club in Belgium. Crazy shite. I get that a sporting director ( is that what Lange is ) is the way of modern football because a manager’s get bounced about quickly now if it’s not working. Give the whole thing to Emery or don’t give it to him at all. 

I completely understand the sentiment behind this. Our approach to transfers is rather strange. 

[Tomaszk]

7 minutes ago, PieFacE said:

I completely understand the sentiment behind this. Our approach to transfers is rather strange. 

It's incredibly supportive to managers. Almost too supportive.

No way should Gerrard have been allowed to sign Digne and Coutinho. 

The approach feels wrong. Managers don't get to tear up the playbook. Do we even have a playbook?

Someone like Emery should be given more leeway than someone like Smith who should be given more leeway than someone like Gerrard.

[HalfTimePost]

Completely agree. Our transfer set up is atrocious. Lange should probably go imo, whether he’s good or bad. Either we want a DoF or not and it doesn’t appear he’s strong enough with Purslow or the managers, we end up with a weird hybrid approach. Also happy for Purslow to leave or change his role to allow Lange to do this thing as a DoF
 

But for me, the two together isn’t the answer.

[GingerCollins29]

I've never really understood the set up. IMO, Emrry should tell the scputs what he's looking for, the scouts/Emery create a shortlist, then Emery picks his preferred choices. Lange/CP negotiate and NSWE pay up. Why is it not that simple?

[DaveAV1]

Purslow’s the problem with his love of the limelight. Early Dean years he’s on the side lines slapping players on the back. Ridiculous behaviour for a CEO. The whole Gerrard fiasco was beyond a joke, getting him in when he was never qualified to manage a Premiership club and then allowed to rip up the transfer policy. Je continued to back him right to the end even when it was obvious that he was out of his depth. I think that’s what made the normally calm Nas so furious.
 

Most things that the club has done under NSWE has been calm and measured but that night I think Nas really lost it. I believe that since then lots have been going on behind the scenes. I’d imagine that Lange will most likely be gone by the summer and I wouldn’t be surprised if Purslow shared a cab with him. As others have said we don’t really look like we’ve got a clear policy recruitment wise. We may be happy to let Unai take the reins but the days are gone when a manager does that. Big involvement from him is of course fine but he’s the coach he hasn’t the time to do all the other stuff too and I’m sure he’d agree. Big changes coming. 

[Laughable Chimp]

I never really liked the DoF approach. If you sign a manager, you try and sign the player he wants. Other people shouldn’t be able to force the manager to sign other players that he doesn’t really care for. 

Whilst yes I recognize there needs to be limitations on a manager’s spending, that can still be accomplished without a proper DoF. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Tomaszk]

3 hours ago, GingerCollins29 said:

I've never really understood the set up. IMO, Emrry should tell the scputs what he's looking for, the scouts/Emery create a shortlist, then Emery picks his preferred choices. Lange/CP negotiate and NSWE pay up. Why is it not that simple?

This is what they claim, but it's clearly not the reality.

Lange didn't come to Smith with Ings. He didn't come to Gerrard with Coutinho. I very much doubt he's come to Emery with Moreno.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, Tomaszk said:

This is what they claim, but it's clearly not the reality.

Lange didn't come to Smith with Ings. He didn't come to Gerrard with Coutinho. I very much doubt he's come to Emery with Moreno.

Agreed. The club and Lange will surely be scouting and watching and compiling a huge list of players and their progress and positions and potential availability and cost against identified areas for improvement or strengthening in the future, short and longer term. But when a manager arrives, I guess they’ll talk and he will say “I know [this player] he played for me, or against me and he’s really good at this thing and that thing, and he would fit in with the plan we agreed when I was appointed…” and he’ll go on the list, and others might get taken off “I know him from…and he was trouble…” or whatever.  So the watch list will get revised as circumstances change and managers change. Digne and Couthinho were clearly Gerrard influenced signings, and we’ll get Unai Emery influenced ones next window.

[KMitch]

5 hours ago, GingerCollins29 said:

I've never really understood the set up. IMO, Emrry should tell the scputs what he's looking for, the scouts/Emery create a shortlist, then Emery picks his preferred choices. Lange/CP negotiate and NSWE pay up. Why is it not that simple?

The problem is that most football managers think short term and right now vs building for the future and the club is left holding the bag when signings don't pan out...  This approach ends up putting pressure on the club to overspend on the manager's preferred players on bad long term deals to get them in the door to keep the manager happy, then you can't shift them if they turn out to be shit or the manager gets the sack and the new manager doesn't rate them...  Not the manager's priority...  They're judged on the here and now and not the future by the media and the fans...  Look back at our last "successful" era under Martin O'Neill who ran a similar model to what you're proposing...  Remember Habib Beye, Nicky Shorey, Nigel Reo Coker, etc.  All these players we paid a lot of money for at the time on very lucrative long term deals who were riding the bench and couldn't get anything for.  Part of the reason he threw his toys out of the pram when Randy told him to sell some of his deadwood before he gave him even more money to spend on players he wasn't going to play.  

This is where a DOF comes in... They don't answer to the manager/head coach, their job is to protect the club's interests long term and make sure we're recruiting sensibly and buying players who will in general grow in value with good coaching, while fitting the style of football the club has defined...  Smith himself preached a lot about this when he was here, but priorities seemed to change to the "win now" model under Gerrard and we started buying players in or past their prime to get us into Europe on a timeline quicker than Smith was promising...  I'm guessing Gerrard's team sold the board on a plan for spending on quality in a few key positions and we'd gatecrash Europe ahead of schedule, but that never happened and we're back to the drawing board again.  Who knows what the direction will be under Emery, but my suspicion is that it will be somewhere in-between Smith's long term vision and Gerrard's short term here and now goal (2 seasons before we're in Europe regularly).

Edited January 7, 2023 by KMitch
Engrish

[WallisFrizz]

I get the impression that Villa are more agent driven than data/scout driven. The fact that Moreno was linked with Forest last summer makes me think his agent has been touting him around the PL clubs. 
Weston McKennie is another who clearly gets touted round by his agent and we are always “interested”. 
The Joao Felix rumours were similar.

It seems like there is an element of who do we know is available and looking for a move in this window with our signings rather than any long term scouting. Must be hard (and frustrating) to do long term scouting though when your manager keeps changing.

[Laughable Chimp]

9 minutes ago, WallisFrizz said:

I get the impression that Villa are more agent driven than data/scout driven. The fact that Moreno was linked with Forest last summer makes me think his agent has been touting him around the PL clubs. 
Weston McKennie is another who clearly gets touted round by his agent and we are always “interested”. 
The Joao Felix rumours were similar.

It seems like there is an element of who do we know is available and looking for a move in this window with our signings rather than any long term scouting. Must be hard (and frustrating) to do long term scouting though when your manager keeps changing.

Even before the Lange days. The numerous signings  in the Belgian league suggested we had a link there.

Edited January 7, 2023 by Laughable Chimp

[Delphinho123]

 

 

[Villaphil]

Any chance Emery is thinking of being able to stack both Digne and Moreno on the left hand side, rather than just ditch Digne.  Maybe it’s horses for courses at left back, but with the ability to stack both when called for ???

[gwi1890]

Just now, Villaphil said:

Any chance Emery is thinking of being able to stack both Digne and Moreno on the left hand side, rather than just ditch Digne.  Maybe it’s horses for courses at left back, but with the ability to stack both when called for ???

Yes definitely 

[CVByrne]

1 minute ago, Villaphil said:

Any chance Emery is thinking of being able to stack both Digne and Moreno on the left hand side, rather than just ditch Digne.  Maybe it’s horses for courses at left back, but with the ability to stack both when called for ???

Oh for sure. People for some reason are having a go at Digne when his attacking output is still very very good. He's like top 20% of all Left Backs in top 5 leagues for assists, expected assists, shot creating actions. Our left hand side is a little defensively weak because we've our attacking FB in Digne with an attacking 10 in Buendia playing in front of him. Ideally Digne needs McGinn there or JJ who are experienced in covering the full back space. 

Similar to the Cash / Young experiment on the right side. I can fully see Digne and Moreno in same team and I think we could often see it with a substitution where one comes on to play LM etc..

We all like how Cash and Young are competing on the right. We now get that on left as it seemed clear to me with Digne starting all the games Emery didn't rate Augustinsson at the level of Digne

 

[Delphinho123]

39 minutes ago, CVByrne said:

Oh for sure. People for some reason are having a go at Digne when his attacking output is still very very good. He's like top 20% of all Left Backs in top 5 leagues for assists, expected assists, shot creating actions. Our left hand side is a little defensively weak because we've our attacking FB in Digne with an attacking 10 in Buendia playing in front of him. Ideally Digne needs McGinn there or JJ who are experienced in covering the full back space. 

Similar to the Cash / Young experiment on the right side. I can fully see Digne and Moreno in same team and I think we could often see it with a substitution where one comes on to play LM etc..

We all like how Cash and Young are competing on the right. We now get that on left as it seemed clear to me with Digne starting all the games Emery didn't rate Augustinsson at the level of Digne

 

Personally I think you’ll see Ramsey in front of Moreno with Digne dropping to the bench. Then McGinn in front of Young on the other side with the intention of buying a player to replace McGinn. Maybe Bailey might even start on the right. 

[Zatman]

3 hours ago, Laughable Chimp said:

Even before the Lange days. The numerous signings  in the Belgian league suggested we had a link there.

I think I read Suso was friends with a Belgian agent. Wes, Engels, Samatta, Nakamba and Trezeguet had previously played in Belgium. I think Kalinic as well

[Zatman]

4 hours ago, WallisFrizz said:

I get the impression that Villa are more agent driven than data/scout driven. The fact that Moreno was linked with Forest last summer makes me think his agent has been touting him around the PL clubs. 
Weston McKennie is another who clearly gets touted round by his agent and we are always “interested”. 
The Joao Felix rumours were similar.

It seems like there is an element of who do we know is available and looking for a move in this window with our signings rather than any long term scouting. Must be hard (and frustrating) to do long term scouting though when your manager keeps changing.

I would imagine Emery would know more about Moreno to suggest him