The RJW63 Official Jack Grealish Appreciation Thread

[Farlz]

The Chelsea link is absolute nonsense imo. It's Spurs or he stays at Villa.

[GENTLEMAN]

1 hour ago, Nigel said:

This is also a good litmus test to see what the board have in store for us!

Perhaps a little unfair to determine their intentions based solely upon the sale of Jack or not.

I agree, if Jack is not sold the signs are ve+ but FFP means a hole has to be filled and the sale of Jack would provide a simple means to clean the FFP slate. Yet, in doing so, you lose 'our' lad, a once in a generation player who is currently the most talented in the Championship with even more potential. It is a decision I do not envy them.

Due to his talent, I would lean toward keeping him and exhausting all other avenues to the balancing of finances for the satisfying of FFP. However we're not privy to the options laid out. Maybe, a more tempered view is needed. If Jack is sold evaluation is needed determined upon fee received and how that is planned to be reinvested toward a prudent and sustainable plan. Can they transfer their business and negotiation acumen to the sphere of football? Would they be willing to walk away from the table if our valuation is not met or at least convince their opposition of that?*

*Personally given their history I would back them to do it and believe they have more experience and ability or at least comparable in such matters than Levy, especially Edens, who seems particularly hard-nosed and already has expertise within the industry of sport.

[vreitti]

13 minutes ago, blandy said:

FFP gets determined in March. Like I said unless something comes along to make up a 10s of millions shortfall, we have to sell by end Jan to meet FFP

Perhaps, but that doesn't necessarily mean we'll have to sell Jack. Considering the renewed hope that came along with the new ownership, I think it would be downright stupid to piss all that away by selling the most naturally gifted homegrown player we've ever had. 

 

[Godders]

16 minutes ago, blandy said:

I am commenting on the maths, Godders. The maths and FFP (unfortunately) means that as it stands today the club will fall a very long way short of meeting FFP. It's numbers. Numbers don't spin, they don't send coded messages to potential buyers, they don't send messages to fans.

Reading between the lines of what the new owners said, they were saying to the circling vultures, hoping to pick up players for a bargain fee, because of our impending administration

"woah there, not so fast. We no longer need to sell to stay alive. We're going to be OK. We will take our time and address things in due course, but you can forget about bargain prices for any of pur players. We'll set the price."

FFP gets determined in March. Like I said unless something comes along to make up a 10s of millions shortfall, we have to sell by end Jan to meet FFP

Disagree Blandy. If players have to be sold to meet FFP, why would the new owners say they didn't? All it serves is to royally piss the fans off immediately when players are inevitably sold, at below market prices, to get around FFP. They'd be better off saying something softer, or non-committal. 

I don't have them peg as liers at the moment, so taking their comments at face value, no one has to be sold. The message they're giving is they're comfortable we can meet FFP obligations without being forced to offload players. 

So, the maths are quite simple. Tottenham can either shit, or get off the toilet, because it doesn't matter to our finances whether Grealish stays or doesn't. 

[Nigel]

2 minutes ago, GENTLEMAN said:

Perhaps a little unfair to determine their intentions based solely upon the sale of Jack or not.

 

Im not being unfair as im not castigating them if he is sold.

Im merely curious to know how clever they are in this regard.  If he is sold it has to be done, we wont benefit at all but this mystical FFP will be sated....for this season!

In this way ill be slightly disapointed, but i will understand.

What im hoping is they have a plan, and if hes kept it must fit into this!

[tomav84]

50 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Were those actual words used, because my recollection is that they said no one has to be sold.

Having to sell someone and choosing to sell someone are two different things.

Particularly in this instance as it should be the difference between selling him for £30m as opposed to £15m

"The one thing that the pair of them have said is that nobody is for sale," Bruce told the club's website. "That's music to my ears. "

http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11677/11452549/steve-bruce-says-aston-villas-key-players-are-no-longer-for-sale

[AvfcRigo82]

Jack is going....

 

 

 

... To become a legend for us!

[John]

37 minutes ago, Wainy316 said:

Terrible for Jack's career but would be funny to piss Levy off.

If Chelsea really want to do that they could sign him for £30m and loan him back to us until we are promoted and can trigger a £35m buy back clause. 

[Lord Willard]

I hope he doesn't need to be sold and stays. He is only 22 years old, plenty of time left in his career. If we arent promoted this season he has my blessing. I genuinely think he would of helped England this World cup but that might be my claret tinted glasses. 

 

Regarding our owners/Bruce saying no one is for sale and we sell him for £30-40m. Fans may call them liars, rocket polishers or whatever, I call them smart business men. A simple statement and getting an extra 15m for one player sale.  That's the ascute business men we need to run Aston Villa Football Club. 

[villa89]

33 minutes ago, Farlz said:

The Chelsea link is absolute nonsense imo. It's Spurs or he stays at Villa.

They need to sign 'homegrown' players. It's why they signed Drinkwater, Barkley and Rob Green. I'd much prefer to see him at Chelsea rather than Spurs.

Edited August 2, 2018 by villa89

[sharkyvilla]

3 minutes ago, villa89 said:

They need to sign 'homegrown' players. It's why they signed Drinkwater, Barkley and Rob Green. I'd much prefer to see him at Chelsea rather than Spurs.

Really?  For Jack to reach his full potential I think he can either do it with us by getting us promoted then building the team around him or playing for Pochettino.  Chelsea would be an awful choice for him really.

[GENTLEMAN]

34 minutes ago, blandy said:

I am commenting on the maths, Godders. The maths and FFP (unfortunately) means that as it stands today the club will fall a very long way short of meeting FFP. It's numbers. Numbers don't spin, they don't send coded messages to potential buyers, they don't send messages to fans.

Reading between the lines of what the new owners said, they were saying to the circling vultures, hoping to pick up players for a bargain fee, because of our impending administration

"woah there, not so fast. We no longer need to sell to stay alive. We're going to be OK. We will take our time and address things in due course, but you can forget about bargain prices for any of pur players. We'll set the price."

FFP gets determined in March. Like I said unless something comes along to make up a 10s of millions shortfall, we have to sell by end Jan to meet FFP

Have to agree exactly with that. As you say, I took it as a stark message to other clubs, and haven't seen read anything contradictory to that since. "We're stable so forget about derisively bids for our assets (5 million for Chester, 15 million for Jack)". Very different from "we will not sell at any cost".

It seems plain that Stoke weren't serious about Chester and have since backed away. The question is how serious are Spurs about Grealish? Are they willing to pay market value, and then some? Or did Levy see a bargain asset that could have the potential to integrate into the team or at least be turned around for a much greater profit. 

ATM, the answer remains as clear as mud. Whereas, Rowett commented that they weren't in for Chester anymore, Pochettino has remained silent. Sometimes you can look toward media leaks as an indicator to intentions. However, the situation is so entangled that it is impossible to unweave. Largely because of a) The ethereal ITK fart-cloud that surrounds spurs., and b) The state of modern day 'journalism' (twitter rumour --> paper --> twitter rumour feedback loop). Interestingly, this morning paper-talk is of Spurs's interest in Lewis Cook. Is this a tactic to bait Villa, a switch of target or target separate to Jack? Intriguing

[Stevo985]

15 minutes ago, sharkyvilla said:

Really?  For Jack to reach his full potential I think he can either do it with us by getting us promoted then building the team around him or playing for Pochettino.  Chelsea would be an awful choice for him really.

Might just be me, but I honestly couldn't give a shit about his career if it's not with us.

[blandy]

10 minutes ago, vreitti said:

Perhaps, but that doesn't necessarily mean we'll have to sell Jack. Considering the renewed hope that came along with the new ownership, I think it would be downright stupid to piss all that away by selling the most naturally gifted homegrown player we've ever had. 

I know. It's a complete downer and a conundrum - sel lthe best player, miss out on promotion and meet FFP, or keep him still (probably) miss out on promotion fail FFP and get walloped, all the while supporters will be unhappy if we either sell him now, or Jan, or miss out on promotion. As @GENTLEMAN says - not an enviable choice.

I'm nigh on certain he'll get sold if someone meets a fair price (though not for a knock down price) as much as I don't want that to happen. 

[privateer]

24 minutes ago, villa89 said:

I'd much prefer to see him at Chelsea rather than Spurs.

It's still a bit like deciding between a kick in the sack or a knee in the sack but IF he goes, I would actually rather see him at Chelsea rather than Spurs. There is little rational logic behind it other than I hate Spurs and Levy more than I hate Chelsea.

Either way, if he does decide he wants out I'll be most unimpressed with him and won't care if he crashes and burns and disappears into oblivion inside a year. If he isn't one of us any more, he isn't one of our own anymore as far as I'm concerned. If he goes now, he's picked a bad time to bail out on us and will be exhibiting significant bad faith after all we've done for him to get him to the stage he's at now.

Some will say he's earned the right to a move to a top Prem team, as Chester seems to be saying. I say he's earned the right to honour his contract, be an automatic starter for his hometown club this year, if he's fit and in reasonable form, and to guide us back to the Prem.

After that, he will get himself a better move than he would now.

[Jas10]

Would be madness to sell now, so close to the end of the window and start of the season. It’d be like throwing the towel in and make a promotion challenge way more difficul, impossible even. He’s too important to us and easily our best player and the best or most talented player in this league, by far. How would we replace him anyway and do we even have time to?

I don’t want him to leave but we could at least wait until January and come up with some kind of plan regarding reinforcements etc. should an acceptable bid be received. I’m sure the new owners have been looking at ways to deal with FFP too and why say we don’t have to sell anyone and then sell for less than a crazy bid?

As far as Spurs are concerned, say it’s £40m+ put up or shut up. 

[Mazrim]

Yes, all clubs sell players. But selling your best player after taking over, after saying nobody is for sale. That would be stupid and these guys are definitely not stupid. As for the semantics of having or choosing to sell. I think choosing to sell is worse. If we had to sell him I think most fans would grudgingly understand. But Bruce and thus the board  are on record saying we don't. So I'll go with that.

As for the miasmatic world of football finance and FFP. I'm not even going to begin to try and decipher it. I know these guys are very financially savvy, experienced in the world of sports and will be surrounded by some of the very best advisors. So I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and leave it them. And I'll take their word that nobody has to be sold. There's nothing else of worth to go on at the moment.

As for giving them kudos for selling Jack for £30m. You must be joking. Firstly, we're not over a barrel like we were weeks ago. Secondly, £30m is not great value considering the sums players are changing hands for now. What kudos is is due selling your best player for less than he's worth after saying you don't have to sell anybody?

 

[bannedfromHandV]

56 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Might just be me, but I honestly couldn't give a shit about his career if it's not with us.

Well said.

Everyone going on like he's one of us. He's not.

As soon as they sign those professional terms they cease to be one of us.

[jackbauer24]

This FFP argument is complete crap - certainly now.

If we keep him and he makes the difference most think he's capable of then come January (March) we then have to choices as regards FFP - sell him knowing we've got that boost we needed to hopefully finish the job, keep him knowing we can cope with any fine/embargo/points deduction as we're so far ahead or keep him because by that point we'll have come up with other ways round FFP. If his impact isn't great then sell in January or keep him anyway as a points deduction will make no difference to our 9th placed finish.

But sell him now for FFP reasons and basically we're giving up this season. Way too late for that decision to be made. It might not be fair, but I wouldn't view our new overlords well if they sell for that reason at this stage.

There is no common sense reason to sell him now UNLESS he wants to go. But even that doesn't bode well, it means the owners can't even sell their own player a vision for a successful future for this club. It is a lot to base one transfer on, but selling him now for any reason means my faith in either the owner's intentions, or abilities, to turn this great club around will be severely dented.

Edited August 2, 2018 by jackbauer24

[bannedfromHandV]

2 minutes ago, Mazrim said:

Yes, all clubs sell players. But selling your best player after taking over, after saying nobody is for sale. That would be stupid and these guys are definitely not stupid. As for the semantics of having or choosing to sell. I think choosing to sell is worse. If we had to sell him I think most fans would grudgingly understand. But Bruce and thus the board  are on record saying we don't. So I'll go with that.

As for the miasmatic world of football finance and FFP. I'm not even going to begin to try and decipher it. I know these guys are very financially savvy, experienced in the world of sports and will be surrounded by some of the very best advisors. So I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and leave it them. And I'll take their word that nobody has to be sold. There's nothing else of worth to go on at the moment.

As for giving them kudos for selling Jack for £30m. You must be joking. Firstly, we're not over a barrel like we were weeks ago. Secondly, £30m is not great value considering the sums players are changing hands for now. What kudos is is due selling your best player for less than he's worth after saying you don't have to sell anybody?

 

Because of them, hence kudos.

And £30m for a player who doesn't even play at the top level is still crazy, irrespective of other transfers