Villa

[Bethnal Yellow and Green 1,557]

28 minutes ago, king canary said:

Didn't West Ham sign Arnautovic from Stoke? Don't think he's the best example.

And they’ve sold him for a profit (not bad now he’s 30) and he scored 1 in 3 for them over the past two seasons. 

Been a pretty good deal for West Ham all in all. 

 

[Jobsworth Canary 168]

They are reaping the benefit of having a stinking rich owner which is a major major handicap for us in being competitive 

[king canary 7,580]

15 minutes ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

And they’ve sold him for a profit (not bad now he’s 30) and he scored 1 in 3 for them over the past two seasons. 

Been a pretty good deal for West Ham all in all. 

 

Yeah- he's clearly been a bit of a **** but it doesn't seem to have hurt them too badly.

[Mason 47 1,373]

Villa have already dropped over £70 million on transfer fees this window, so I guess this will be an interesting case study season as to whether it is better to go cash-crazy when promoted or go with our more cohesion-kind approach.

£26.5 million for a player who has played 17 Premier League games in 3 years is absolutely bonkers, whatever way you look at it.

[Bethnal Yellow and Green 1,557]

15 minutes ago, Mason 47 said:

Villa have already dropped over £70 million on transfer fees this window, so I guess this will be an interesting case study season as to whether it is better to go cash-crazy when promoted or go with our more cohesion-kind approach.

£26.5 million for a player who has played 17 Premier League games in 3 years is absolutely bonkers, whatever way you look at it.

They have spent that, but it hasn’t actually improved their squad from last season. In fact, without Tammy Abraham I’d say their squad is still weaker than the one they had last season. 

Everyone goes on about Fulham’s £100m spend, but at the end of their Championship season they had 14 first team players on their books - they had to spend a lot and their problem was not spending more on their defence. 

Wolves also spent £100m, but in bringing in players that improved them (Patricio, Moutinho and Raul Jimenez in particular). 

No one approach is better than another, but it is how well you implement your strategy. 

Cardiff tried the ‘cohesion’ approach and desperately lacked quality all season. 

[ROBFLECK 132]

42 minutes ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

Cardiff tried the ‘cohesion’ approach and desperately lacked quality all season. 

This is why I'm so "anxious" about this CDM we need... We've got quality midfielders (Vrancic, Leitner, etc...) but we need a player specifically for this position imho , that is PL quality... We're going to implement the cohesion approach in some ways aren't we? I'm quite satisified with the signings we've made , but some quality is still needed...not just players for the under 23s. 
There's still time .. I know , but there's not much money... makes me wonder who we're going to sign that's PL quality... 

Edited July 8, 2019 by ROBFLECK

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,783]

45 minutes ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

They have spent that, but it hasn’t actually improved their squad from last season. In fact, without Tammy Abraham I’d say their squad is still weaker than the one they had last season. 

Everyone goes on about Fulham’s £100m spend, but at the end of their Championship season they had 14 first team players on their books - they had to spend a lot and their problem was not spending more on their defence. 

Wolves also spent £100m, but in bringing in players that improved them (Patricio, Moutinho and Raul Jimenez in particular). 

No one approach is better than another, but it is how well you implement your strategy. 

Cardiff tried the ‘cohesion’ approach and desperately lacked quality all season. 

They spent £28m on Mawson, Le Marchand and Bryan alone. That's before the loans of Chambers and Fosu-Mensah which probably cost a few million in loan fees. £30m should've been enough for a newly-promoted team to spend on their defence, surely?

And even Cardiff's cohesion approach cost £30m. These examples show just how far (or not very far) £30m goes nowadays.

[Tetteys Jig 830]

1 hour ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

They have spent that, but it hasn’t actually improved their squad from last season. In fact, without Tammy Abraham I’d say their squad is still weaker than the one they had last season. 

Everyone goes on about Fulham’s £100m spend, but at the end of their Championship season they had 14 first team players on their books - they had to spend a lot and their problem was not spending more on their defence. 

Wolves also spent £100m, but in bringing in players that improved them (Patricio, Moutinho and Raul Jimenez in particular). 

No one approach is better than another, but it is how well you implement your strategy. 

Cardiff tried the ‘cohesion’ approach and desperately lacked quality all season. 

funnily enough, Wolves have spent £45m this summer already to get no better (Dendonker and Jimenez)

[Bethnal Yellow and Green 1,557]

6 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

They spent £28m on Mawson, Le Marchand and Bryan alone. That's before the loans of Chambers and Fosu-Mensah which probably cost a few million in loan fees. £30m should've been enough for a newly-promoted team to spend on their defence, surely?

And even Cardiff's cohesion approach cost £30m. These examples show just how far (or not very far) £30m goes nowadays.

When they only had Odoi and Ream going into the season they needed to complete overhaul their defence. I’m not sure £30 is enough to do that for the Premier League. 

Fulham’s failure stems from their squad management in the previous season really - they had too much of a gap to make up. 

Cardiff’s squad had considerably less talent going into last season than Norwich have in theirs now. But yes, can’t get much as a Premier League club with £30m - especially if your scouting network is ‘players that played well against you in the Championship’. 

[Jim Smith 2,314]

Villa's spending power will ultimately give them a better chance of staying up than us (simple fact of life in the prem that out fans who like to laugh at clubs like Villa spending money seem to have forgotten) but as we have seen with other clubs spending money doesn't guarantee success its about how you spend it and similarly not spending much doesn't guarantee failure if you can pick up a few bargains. with the way we do things we just have to be exceptional in terms of recruitment and pretty much every other element of the playing side of the club in order to maintain our competitiveness.

In truth though you can legitimately argue that to date Villa have spent big to pretty much maintain the status quo from last season and as we were a better side than them last season, they will need to spend a bit more to overhaul us! They already had Mings second half of last season so that's £26m spent just to preserve their current side and the strike they have brought in is effectively a replacement for Abrahams. so it could be argued they are not yet really any stronger than they were last season despite all the money they have spent. What they go on to spend (or who they recruit) in the next 5 weeks may have more of a bearing on matters.

[Icecream Snow 761]

Until they finish their spending it's hard to say. The Telegraph says they're balking at £30m for Kalvin Phillips, £30m for Adam Webster (which seems like a price to scare Villa off) and £20m for Said Behrama. 

They had four loan players starting in the playoff final (Abraham, El Ghazi, Mings and Tuanzebe), they've paid £8m for El Ghazi and are spending £20m+ on Mings.

Their problem is that outside of Grealish and McGinn (definite Premiership starters) they don't have much of a team. Their academy has produced very little over the last three years, and they spent most of their money on over-aged Premiership and Championship players.

[Alex Moss 2,165]

3 hours ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

They have spent that, but it hasn’t actually improved their squad from last season. In fact, without Tammy Abraham I’d say their squad is still weaker than the one they had last season.

These are my thoughts entirely, Bethnal. They have massive work to do, but unlike Leeds, I’m quite happy to see Villa back in the big time. Villa and their supporters were extremely gracious to us on the last day of the season, as has been well documented, and anything to do with Lambert is long since forgotten about.

I do get the feeling that, as it stands, this season will be far more of a struggle for them than TalkSport presenters realise. It’s one hell of an overhaul they have to undertake, and Dean Smith has got his work cut out to build a cohesive and effective unit in just a few weeks. I don’t envy him. So, with the greatest of respect to them, I have a feeling that they will occupy one of the bottom 2 places with Sheff Utd (sorry, but I certainly don’t give Sheff Utd a chance this season - look at their front 2 for starters, they are definitely not PL quality). And that gives me all the more confidence that we’ll stay up, but then I’ve already stated that we are quite capable of a mid table finish, and that’s what I fully expect to happen. I actually think that if somehow we were to shock Liverpool, that result alone could be the catalyst for a fantastic season that not many would have the balls to predict.

[Bethnal Yellow and Green 1,557]

20 minutes ago, Alex Moss said:

These are my thoughts entirely, Bethnal. They have massive work to do, but unlike Leeds, I’m quite happy to see Villa back in the big time. Villa and their supporters were extremely gracious to us on the last day of the season, as has been well documented, and anything to do with Lambert is long since forgotten about.

I do get the feeling that, as it stands, this season will be far more of a struggle for them than TalkSport presenters realise. It’s one hell of an overhaul they have to undertake, and Dean Smith has got his work cut out to build a cohesive and effective unit in just a few weeks. I don’t envy him. So, with the greatest of respect to them, I have a feeling that they will occupy one of the bottom 2 places with Sheff Utd (sorry, but I certainly don’t give Sheff Utd a chance this season - look at their front 2 for starters, they are definitely not PL quality). And that gives me all the more confidence that we’ll stay up, but then I’ve already stated that we are quite capable of a mid table finish, and that’s what I fully expect to happen. I actually think that if somehow we were to shock Liverpool, that result alone could be the catalyst for a fantastic season that not many would have the balls to predict.

I think they paid over the odds to get Mings to help with their cohesion. 

I think Dean Smith is a really, really good coach/manager and he’ll be a good man to have in charge there. They were the third best team in the Championship, points wise, since he came in - which is pretty good going considering he had no pre-season and completely changed their style of play. 

Outside of McGinn and Grealish, I think Hourihane, El Ghazi and Kodjia should be okay in the Prem. Replacing Abraham is the big task they have and I’m not convinced Wesley is that player. 

I’m guessing they’ll be able to recoup quite a bit of money from selling a few of their players, guys like Lansbury should still get a decent amount for them. 

 

[king canary 7,580]

13 minutes ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

I’m guessing they’ll be able to recoup quite a bit of money from selling a few of their players, guys like Lansbury should still get a decent amount for them. 

Not so sure about that- those guys are on high wages and will be difficult to shift.

[Alex Moss 2,165]

10 minutes ago, Bethnal Yellow and Green said:

I think they paid over the odds to get Mings to help with their cohesion. 

I think Dean Smith is a really, really good coach/manager and he’ll be a good man to have in charge there. They were the third best team in the Championship, points wise, since he came in - which is pretty good going considering he had no pre-season and completely changed their style of play. 

Outside of McGinn and Grealish, I think Hourihane, El Ghazi and Kodjia should be okay in the Prem. Replacing Abraham is the big task they have and I’m not convinced Wesley is that player. 

I’m guessing they’ll be able to recoup quite a bit of money from selling a few of their players, guys like Lansbury should still get a decent amount for them. 

 

Whether Mings develops into a top class, or rather decent Premier League centre back remains to be seen (how old is he now?), but I too nearly spat my tea out when I saw Bournemouth had managed to get an eye watering £25mil for him. That surely puts Zimmermann in the same bracket, and Godfrey comfortably more. Personally I think they’ve paid over double the odds though. Same with the Belgian striker - there’s taking a punt but his stats in the Belgian league do not equate to that kind of price tag just yet. I think we’ve got a far better player in Drmic myself for literally nothing, the only concern with him is can he stay fit? Anyway, for Villa, a lot will hinge for them on how those 2 perform next season. 2 out of 4 key positions in the spine of the team. If they get it right, then hats off to Dean Smith, a really good up and coming manager for sure. Hourihane, McGinn, Grealish will all make the step up, I have no doubt about that, but it’s the opposite ends of the pitch where Villa’s fate will lie. I just think there’s a lot to be said for squad cohesion, and getting that balance right, players knowing each other and being able read their teammates movement in a telepathic manner, and that’s a massive massive ask in just a few weeks in my opinion, but good luck to them (not at our expense obviously!). 

[Feedthewolf 4,844]

So Villa have spent £60m on Matt Targett, Tyrone Mings and Wesley? That's just mental. I think there's a very good chance they'll implode this season and go straight back down.

[Trevor Hockey's Beard 526]

Does the rumoured £20 million move of Maupay from Brentford to Sheffield United change anyone's thoughts that they are nailed on for relegation?

[splendidrush 700]

That's a lot of money for Maupay, he's good, but it's a huge step up and at that price they're going to expect him to perform, a big risk if you ask me.

[Bill 1,788]

Big risk for the two that came up with us, as an immediate return sees them with only two years of parachute payments to cover possible three year contracts

If our 'failure' to spend big sees us down, it won't see us 'out' as well

it will be interesting to see where some of those recently relegated from the PL finish next May

Stoke nailed on certainties for promotion if not the title, as were WBA........Swansea, the model club, Boro

whereas the likes of Hull, Blackburn, QPR, Reading, Wigan, Bolton seem about as likely of making a PL promotion challenge as the Pope does of being seen ordering a kebab on PoW Rd on a Sat night

we'll do well with who we have

[Surfer 1,547]

Especially Bolton. Have to agree with you on that one Bill.