September Optimism Gauge

[thunderball]

Credit to the Villa Management, a lot of brave business, good prices, I'm sure the wages are sensible and we are set up for a few years of [sustainable] development. Some may work some may not but you can't knock PL's vision.

I think I posted once last year because I was so depressed with what was happening at the club, but yesterday we turned the corner. I take solice from the Newcastles, Swanseas and Norwichs of the league, and hope when Benteke or others hopefully blossom our substantially improved financial position will be that we can hang on to them, even if it's just a little longer.

Just a shame we didn't shift all the dead wood once and for all.

[Chindie]

I'm not terribly optimistic. The only guarentee we've earned ourselves this window is a few more bodies and maybe some interest born of the unknown.

We looked poor going into the season and the first 2 games proved it. We've now bought some players but all are gambles or punts. If all perform to a decent level, we'll have done well and look solid for a few seasons to come at least. But I doubt that will happen - not all these players will do it. Even if these players do all perform, we still lack creativity imo - we could have done with either a mid with an eye for a pass and a goal, or a good winger.

I'd have been fair happier if we'd been able to bring in a player or 2 who has done it at the top level of the game, and then brought in the punts to augment that. Instead it's all punts on players from weaker leagues and lower levels.

I hope it works out, and undeniably it'll be interesting.

[CI]

It will take 2 more windows to clear out the dross and to bring in 6 or 7 more players.

If he can do all that whilst staying a PL club it will be a brilliant achievement.

[Pez1974]

We'll be bottom half all season, I'm fairly sure of that. Tough to judge the new signings as they are all unknowns, but that in itself brings a degree of excitement. My prediction is that we'll take a few beatings until Christmas - I wouldn't be surprised to see us bottom 5 - but that we'll kick on in the second half of the season and finish 10-14th with reasons for optimism next year. We'll see, but hey, I'm looking forward to it a lot more than last year.

Onwards and upwards!

This. A proper transition year, with the young and hungry making big strides over the next couple of seasons. Whether we can get back into the top 6 will depend upon the application of Financial Fair Play properly, and how much revenue we can bring in, allowing us the additional spend.

Prett optimistic medium term.

[onje_villa]

Feeling generally very positive despite sharing people's fear of a lack of quality.

I absolutely back the way they're going about building a sustained development, TRO and P3TE are completely right about buying players and improving them and them having a resale value.

I just hope we can get by this year. It seems to me that we can slowly add to this squad in the next few windows and we'll end up getting better and better.

We just need to start collecting some points but I think it may be a few games yet before we do.

Hoping for a good second half to the season.

[avfc1982]

Awful uninspiring signings. It's almost like Lerner is preparing us for relegation. Just who are these players we've signed? Lambert must still think he's at Norwich.

Relegation battle all season. We'll do well to stay in this league.

[VillaGoMarching]

I can see us doing a Wigan of last year, slow start then a steady rise to safety come March/April.

[CI]

Our initial challenge is not getting cut adrift pre Xmas. All the fixtures look tough at the moment. We need a win for confidence then we could see a massive change ?

[steell]

I've supported Villa for 35 years and almost without exception, the players who have become VP heroes and been with us during our best spells, have been unknown, younger players, often from the lower leagues or unknowns from abroad. We just have never been a sexy club, our geography has always been against us, so PL feels like the perfect fit for me, he's as close to Ron Saunders as we've ever had and for that reason I refuse to label these signings as 'awful uninspiring'. Time will tell BUT the 3 players that PL already signed have been the highlight of the three games so far, so why not trust him with these guys??

[Villarocker]

I agree with VGM in that we will probably take time to gel and look a bit like relegation certainties for a couple of months and then (hopefully) we will start to knit a decent side together and climb to safety. I do believe that we will be a half decent side in a year or two.

[Hanky]

I'm not particularly optimistic about the season ahead. A lot of unproven players in there, will be interesting to see how they get on and hopefully perform well above what I expect.

[Dodgyknees]

Very pessimistic - I think we will do well to avoid the drop.

I cannot understand why anyone thinks we have done well on the transfer market - am I missing something?

Who the f**k have we signed.? It's embarrassing when you consider we could have signed or even loaned some quality. But no, we have to sign players from the lower leagues! I am all for building for the future, but PL teams need some proven quality to challenge for even top 10.

Lambert maybe have potential as a manager, but he will have to be a miracle worker to turn this championship quality squad into anything of note.

I hope I am wrong.

Yeah not far off my thoughts. These are potential gems but we need a bit more than that at the moment.

[Morpheus]

It's the timing of the revolution that may be wrong?

I am in full agreement with Richard that there was something rotten at the club, a cancer which was spreading throughout which needed eradicated. That cancer to my mind was largely the exceptance of defeat and it was ok to admit that Villa are no longer a big club. This has actually been spread by former players who have left our club due to a lack of ambition shown by the club more recently when MON wanted to push on from sixth to Champions League and was told, cut backs. Probably the main reason why Dempsey refused to come. No chance of playing in Europe and not a sniff of any trophies down at the Villa. A club in obvious decline if you like and not a club to go to if you want success!

Lambert has tried to cut that cancer out by investing in young hungry players who have as yet no acceptance of defeat and a lack of success which in the long run is undoubtedly the right way to go but to try and do it all in one window is risky especially when the revenue from TV is going to be increased to an extent that there's going to be an even bigger gap between Premiership and Championship clubs. It's a massive risk to expect lower league players to hit the ground running, especially with a team which has flirted with relegation during the past two seasons. I would have preferred more gradual change with more investment in players such as Johnson, Hoilett and Carroll coupled with lower league signings just to give us a more solid base especially when it's so important to stay in the Premiership this season.

That's why I'm questioning the timing of our revolution but maybe with Lerner having a recent windfall in his pocket this will be our safety net should we be where we all expect to be come the dreaded January sales?

[sne]

We'll be bottom 3 come new year, hopefully not too far away from the teams above.

The second half of the season will prove if Lambert is the great coach we all hope he is and if he can get this team to gel and perform above their level playing "his style of football" whatever that may be.

If not we'll be the team to beat in the Championship next season...

[StanBalaban]

Awful uninspiring signings. It's almost like Lerner is preparing us for relegation. Just who are these players we've signed? Lambert must still think he's at Norwich.

Relegation battle all season. We'll do well to stay in this league.

Hold on, Lerner's just given his manager £20 million quid to spend. How is that preparing for relegation?

How Lambert has spent it was up to him. It's not important whether or not we've heard of these players - it's whether Lambert knows enough about his new players that matters.

As was pointed out recently, there were plenty that were so happy when we signed Hutton, and I know most of us wanted Zoggy, so why not give these lads that will run through a brick wall for Villa a chance?

If we're light on quality, we can prepare to add that in Jan, especially if Henke and the scouting network can deliver some early progress in the next few months.

Our squad was small and we've just added 7 new faces to make a team. I personally think that KEA, Vlaar, Westwood and Benteke in particular will be a big hit here.

[thunderholt]

I'm up for this now, still wish these signings had been made before the season began but that's how this stupid window works.

Not the foggiest idea on any of our new players in fact I had never seen Vlaar, KEA or Lowton until a couple of weeks ago and I'm impressed by all 3 so I'm not concerned that I have (I'm guess the same for most of us) not seen any of this weeks signings play as Paul Lambert seems to be able to spot what he wants in a player.

Don't get to hung up on where they come from if they have "it" then this manager will bring it out of them. I think we all understand this season isn't going to be easy we are going to have some difficult times but I'm excited for the 1st time in ages about what the future for Villa holds.

Amazing - if McLeish had made these signings, people would want him hung, drawn and quartered. I am glad he has gone but equally I am surprised at the amount of faith people have in Paul Lambert.

If Mcleish had made these signings this place would have gone in to meltdown.

alex mcleish doesnt have a proven track record of buying surprise packages from lower leagues, lambert has done it very well. that's the difference

there's plenty to be excited about from the players who've come in. we've brought in a dutch international feyenoord captain in vlaar, feyenoord's best player of last season in el ahmedi, a striker from a very exciting young belgian international team in benteke, middlesbrough's ex player of the year in bennett, a young leader from crewe in westwood and a very highly rated attacking full back in lowton

then there's holman who could be okay, a squad strengthener more than anything but potential there to be a kuyt-light style workhorse who'll score a few goals and be a nuisance, and bowrey who's a really unknown quantity that nobody's expecting anything of

part of the excitement comes from the unknown there, and the fact that we'll have so little premiership experience is a concern to some, but that's not really the issue. the problem will be integrating everyone into an already very disrupted squad. we've had more managers in the last few years than anyone else with o'neill, macdonald, houllier, mcallister, mcleish and now lambert all managing the side, and players brought in by each of them for different styles and systems still there

lambert obviously has a gameplan in mind. he's not gone out and randomly signed all these players. they'll each have been bought for a particular reason, so simply saying "he's from a lower league club so he's shite" is a bit nonsensical

for years we've looked on jealously as other clubs have picked up gems, and complained that we didn't appear to have any kind of scouting system in place. now we have a manager who knows the lower leagues, and has successfully signed from them in the past. he's gone for young, hungry players highly rated by their previous clubs, and added a few older pros as well. maybe not ones with premiership experience, but they're internationals. we've signed 8 players this summer, 4 of them are full internationals, and 3 of them are underage internationals

i find it a bit strange that we had people on here complaining that we werent after the likes of charlie adam and scott sinclair, 3 years ago charlie adam was on loan at blackpool from rangers, and scott sinclar was doing nothing at chelsea. christ, swansea signed him for half a million in 2010. there were people on here complaining about not signing players this window we wouldve complained about signing 3 years ago

we're now in the position where WE'RE the club bringing those players into the league. the benefits are two fold with that. firstly if even 50% of them are successful, we become a very, very good option for the most promising lower league players. secondly, there's a massive sell-on for those players should they become very successful. yeah we don't want them leaving, but if you can buy someone for 2m and sell them for 8m a few years later, you're in a good place. eventually, you'll get to the point where they'll be staying at the club instead of going elsewhere

look, the team isn't going to settle immediately. they're going to need 10 games or so to really get to know each other, but once there's a long term focus at the club in terms of playing style, and everyone signed is signed for that system, then we'll ultimately end up a lot better off than signing "established premiership players" for three times their value, massive wages and no sell-on price

ultimately, if someone said at the start of the summer that we'd bring in a moroccan international, a dutch international, a belgian international and an australian international, and some very highly rated young players from the lower leagues, would we have had much of a problem with it?

Spot on for me,

[Big_John_10]

Another relegation battle will take place but this time it's ok.

It seems the optimism is because we've signed young players who will work hard and want to be here. Surely that would apply to anyone playing below the premiership under the age of 22. Actually that criteria would probably fit any young fan of the club who play Sunday league or 5 a side at power league.

We've signed 3 players from below championship level in one window, I do wonder how many Prem teams have ever done this? But it will work out for us because we have Lambert? I like the guy a lot but just assuming everything will result in success seems a bit blind to me.

For some reason signing 2 players who won't play much and 2 players who could be better than what we've got has made people forget how awful the first two games have been.

It's going to be the 3rd season in a row that we will struggle and seriously worry about relegation. Thank god we got rid of doug so we could be treated to fantastic seasons year after year.

[StanBalaban]

I'm not particularly optimistic about the season ahead. A lot of unproven players in there, will be interesting to see how they get on and hopefully perform well above what I expect.

Thing is, good proven players have more options than to shake a stick at and overpaid proven dross like Hutton and Warnock are exactly what we're trying to get rid of.

KEA, Vlaar and Benteke are all internationals so hardly unproven. The Belgian national side is pretty damn strong to be fair.

Westwood was club captain at 22 to a side with a good footballing ethos, and Holman is an experienced campaigner.

Add a bit of Lambert motivational magic to Marc and Gabby when they come back and we're an ok side. Benteke will take a lot of the pressure off Bent and hopefully create some space for DB9 too. Figure out hbow to get the ball into him and we're golden!

[StanBalaban]

Oh, and FWIW, I think QPR will still struggle this year despite signing a shit load of high waged players.

[LondonLax]

Another relegation battle will take place but this time it's ok.

It seems the optimism is because we've signed young players who will work hard and want to be here. Surely that would apply to anyone playing below the premiership under the age of 22. Actually that criteria would probably fit any young fan of the club who play Sunday league or 5 a side at power league.

We've signed 3 players from below championship level in one window, I do wonder how many Prem teams have ever done this? But it will work out for us because we have Lambert? I like the guy a lot but just assuming everything will result in success seems a bit blind to me.

For some reason signing 2 players who won't play much and 2 players who could be better than what we've got has made people forget how awful the first two games have been.

It's going to be the 3rd season in a row that we will struggle and seriously worry about relegation. Thank god we got rid of doug so we could be treated to fantastic seasons year after year.

You do agree though that if we stay up this season with such a young squad we will be moving forwards rather than backwards for the first time in 3 years?