TRon

While it's not good news it's quite fitting that the two areas where we should be strengthening, up front and left back, is where we have suffered injuries to players who might have been pencilled in as excuses not to buy. Ben Arfa up front and Ferguson as left back cover.

Maybe flogging Routledge has made this a goer. I'd like to think so.

Well presumably because we don't want to potentially waste a lot of money in transfer fees and wages on a player who'll end up as a reserve and who is only then going to block the progress of the promising young left back that we've already got. I know you like Shane Ferguson, but as a defender he is completely unproven. Enrique has the speed and power to stop any attacker whatever his attributes, whereas Ferguson looks like he could be knocked over by a gust of wind. In fact he's already been knocked out of our optimistic hopes he could play this role through injury in the pre-season friendlies. Thank the lucky stars I say.

What's he on? £20k a week at least is my guess. That's not peanuts for most Championship teams. He's on £8k. Not sure why you'd think a Championship free would be on £20k. I'm not privy to players contract deals so I go off what is reported in the media. If he's on £8k only maybe the lack of interest from other clubs is due to agent signing fees?

What's he on? £20k a week at least is my guess. That's not peanuts for most Championship teams.

Villa just look like a Freddie Shepherd version of us a few years ago at this time, chucking daft money at any player of repute and offering silly contracts. Shay Given on a 5 year deal is just mad. I wonder who's going to pick up the tab when Randy Lerner fucks off? Or are Villa fans already picking up the tab through the club paying back the loan?

Wonder if he'll agree to go to Swansea? I would imagine he's a London lad so would prefer to live somewhere a bit more cosmopolitan.

Because a large number of them are financed by generous benefactors who are happy to throw money at their clubs? Like Stoke and Wolves? Aye, righto. Ok - I'll try again - other clubs weren't trying to correct years of negligent ownership that had created an 100% unsustainable business. Any other examples you'd like me to bat back? How long are you going to bang this drum? Will you still be defending him in 2015 on the basis of "what Shepherd did"? At what point does it become his responsibility seeing as there isn't a contract at the club that wasn't signed under Ashley? I'd agree that there comes a point where Shepherd's mistakes become irrelevant (even if they did set off a chain of catastrophic events). But I am not sure that pointing out that none of the contracts at the club were not signed by Ashley makes a whole lot of difference. He still inherited a mess and has to try and clean up that mess. This will be a popular post. It has to be said if Ashley left the club tomorrow he would leave it in a hell of a lot better condition than the day he took it on. Healthier balance sheet but short on playing staff of right quality. But why worry about squad ability, its only a football club. Your putting words in my mouth there, I do worry about the overall squad ability. Try not to take my post out of the context in which it was made. edit: or should I say, I have concerns. I don't worry about it. There are two aspects to the club. Finance, yes we are in a better position. Team, we are a poorer side than the one he bought. Fundamentally I'd want to be enthused by the football rather than the annual release of accounts. That remains to be seen, but I suspect you'll be proved wrong on that. Even without the two more signings that will probably happen, I think we're stronger now than we've been for some time. If you gave me the option of Kevin Nolan and Andy Carrol in a straight swap for Cabaye and Demba I'm afradi that I would say we were in a worse position... Time will tell? Well I wouldn't agree, and particularly if you add in the returns of Ben Arfa and Gosling, and the arrivals of Marveaux and perhaps Abeid as well. Carroll and Nolan did lead to us playing in a certain way, which was fine for getting promotion and sticking out the first season, but if we want to kick on we need to change our style. The important thing about the new signings is that they'll enable us to play through the midfield a bit more and keep possession more easily. Comparing individual players with one another misses that overall picture. I think this will turn out to be our best side since the Sir Bob days. That's my take on it as well. I believe it was worth sacrificing Nolan's goals in order to try and move forward. There is a risk involved in changing to a less direct style of play with new players but IMO it's one that had to be taken rather than hang on and play survival football year in year out. My issue is with a bit more investment we could have made the process of changing the way we play a lot more secure by strengthening the squad a bit further. It might still happen, but I wouldn't put money on it.

Was Downing in the last year of his contract? If he wasn't then it's a totally different situation. Could Villa sign better than N'Zogbia for say, £12m? That's not how it works when a play is in the final year of his contract as we have seen with Enrique. Wigan will need to replace N'Zogbia and as it gets closer to the close of the window the price would drop. Villa have shot their load early though and that means they will probably pay close enough to £10m. Nowhere near the £15m valuation you mentioned in the post I responded to though.

That's what struck me, individually these guys all look very talented but they hold onto the ball too long which allows defenders to regroup. Maybe it's harsh to judge on yesterday's game though because as VI pointed out Paraguay did the same thing to nullify Spain. They ar good at it but for me they cross the line with their cynical "smaller" fouls.

One thing which puzzles me about income is why we still have Sports Direct as our main "sponsors" for the stadium. Does Ashley actually pay anything for it, because if he doesn't then I'm pretty sure that could pay for a few wages. Shepherd was reckless with the spending when he was here, but we must have pulled in a lot more sponsorship money just due to the higher profile players we brought in. Ashley seems to have gone to the other extreme altogether.

Maybe I'm too harsh because I grew up watching a team with players like Falcao, Socrates and Zico and it's unfair to expect Brazilian teams to be that good as that was the best midfield I've ever seen. But there used to be a time when if Brazil got a free kick it was as good as a penalty. These days they can't even bury the penalties! Long range shooting which was a Brazilian speciality is also ordinary these days. In yesterday's game I saw so many times when after a great bit of dribbling the player would lose possession at the crux or fail to get the pass when the opening was there. Don't get me wrong, Brazil have some great players, they just aren't a special team any more.

None of Paraguay's fouls were that bad but there was persistent fouling throughout the game - shirt tugging, tripping players etc. The same players were doing it four or five times before the ref cautioned them then they eventually got substituted and their replacements did the same thing.

Was Downing in the last year of his contract? If he wasn't then it's a totally different situation. No, Downing had two years left. Whelan's ace at this, wringing every last penny out of a deal, but if he's going to arse around till the last day of the window, then we need to move on elsewhere. I think he should consider himself lucky if he gets £7-8m for Zog in the last year of his contract. He'll capitulate as it gets nearer the close of the window but it would serve him right if the deal fell through and Zog walked for free next season. If it keeps them up again then it's job done. £8m as opposed to £40m? Serve him right ffs. In that case he shouldn't be selling him at any price. Unless it's £40m.

Ryan Taylor and Perch? What you on about man? So Taylor was bought when we still technically in the Premier (on the way down). Perch was signed after we won promotion, my bad. We first tried to buy him while we were in the Championship. Regardless, they weren't quality signings that's the point.

Part of the problem is we bought too many players suited to the championship when we were down there such as Perch, Ryan Taylor, Best etc. I said at the time we should be buying players who won't look out of place in the premier but I suppose our finances at the time restricted us. Now we are having to try and shift these players before we can allocate those wages to better players by the looks of it.

They had known for months they were going to sack him and Alan Pardew is the best they could come up with? Bollocks. His apppintment, and the reasons for it, are obvious. They might have spent more and appointed Jol and still got worse results. Do you really think Jol would want to work for those two? Or any self respecting manager? There's a few good reasons no other cunt was in for the job. My point was he's done okay results wise, there's no guarantee a big name would necessarily have done better. My point was a big name was never in the frame. They could have been offered Wenger, Ferguson and Mourinho and it wouldn't have mattered. They wanted a yes man. As long as the yes man produces results on the pitch I'm not arsed. Ashley is tight with his money but I read an interview with Beardsley in today's chronicle where he was over the moon the reserves were being allowed to go on tour in Holland. Great gesture IMO, at least Ashley's been prepared to spend some money on the younger players.

There's nothing wrong with holding cash back for later use btw, as long as we've built a strong enough squad ready to go for this season. In my view we are still short of a left back and a striker minimum. The thinking seems to be that these are players we will look to bring in so if that happens I will be fairly happy with the work done this summer, provided they are of sufficient quality. If it doesn't happen for whatever reason/excuse I'll be fucking angry.

Was Downing in the last year of his contract? If he wasn't then it's a totally different situation. No, Downing had two years left. Whelan's ace at this, wringing every last penny out of a deal, but if he's going to arse around till the last day of the window, then we need to move on elsewhere. I think he should consider himself lucky if he gets £7-8m for Zog in the last year of his contract. He'll capitulate as it gets nearer the close of the window but it would serve him right if the deal fell through and Zog walked for free next season.

Brazil aren't a patch on the teams that used to turn out in their colours. They are more athletic and have plenty of eye catching skills but collectively they lack football intelligence. They get into great positions and make bad choices, either over-dribbling like the Argies aor poor final product. That said they would have won against Paraguay if the ref hadn't been piss poor. He allowed Paraguay to wreck the fluency of the game with their niggling fouls all night.

I doubt we will get the striker Pardew was talking about either. There's still plenty of time but I expected either Erdinc or Long to be close to signing by now but both deals seem to have died a death, and the noises the club are now making about only the right player being signed leads me to believe they'll stick with Best. That's just my own unfounded speculation BTW, before anyone jumps in with "there's still a month to go!"

They had known for months they were going to sack him and Alan Pardew is the best they could come up with? Bollocks. His apppintment, and the reasons for it, are obvious. They might have spent more and appointed Jol and still got worse results. Do you really think Jol would want to work for those two? Or any self respecting manager? There's a few good reasons no other cunt was in for the job. My point was he's done okay results wise, there's no guarantee a big name would necessarily have done better.

Gosling looked fairly chunky before to me, although it appeared to be more fat, whereas now it looks like muscle.

They had known for months they were going to sack him and Alan Pardew is the best they could come up with? Bollocks. His apppintment, and the reasons for it, are obvious. They might have spent more and appointed Jol and still got worse results.