There’s a major lack of news lately and as you probably know, I have very little time for media stories speculating who we might be buying, as that’s all the vast majority of them are; stories.
But there is one article that made me think a little and I’m happy to link to it, for that very reason;
http://footballleagueworld.co.uk/4-things-that-must-happen-at-aston-villa-this-summer-agreed/
Play the gallery and you’ll see the points made.
I’ll go through them one by one.
1. Building bridges with the fans
This one’s easy.
Communicate with us, for a start. Which in fairness, is something that Tony Xia seems to have done from the off.
He’s been more verbose in his comments in the last couple of weeks than Lerner has in all his tenure, so he certainly ticks that box.
Now, if he were to announce some serious plan to keep attendances up, the like of “kids for a quid” for every game, he’d have this one wrapped up.
Let’s face it, it isn’t cool for kids to support a Championship club is it?
And I’ve often commented on how the kids are our future lifeblood.
I doubt that will happen, but what a way it would be to create a bond.
2. Find players who know the Championship
Pretty much common sense, this one, but not so straightforward.
It’s about getting the balance right and while getting in a team of Championship players makes sense, so we have to have a team that are good enough for the Premier league, if we were to be promoted. It was a major problem for the Albion, for example.
Hence, my opinion says we need to keep some of our more technical players, but that’s RDM’s problem and not mine, fortunately.
3. A restoration of club identity
Not so easy, this one, as I’m not sure how you go about it.
What is our club identity?
The article talks about us having a superb history and a fantastic ground; points that make me swell with pride.
But, for me it’s about Villa park being a fortress; a place where the fans intimidate other teams.
We know we’re well capable of it, but the hierarchy need to give us something to shout about.
Winning things, or at least being seen to be challenging is of course an obvious answer too and Xia seems to have appointed a pretty decent managerial team which will give us a decent footing to work from.
Perhaps a more important thing is that we should aim to play decent footy, as the turgid, frankly boring style of play we’ve been served up over the last five years or more simply isn’t what the Villa are about for me personally.
Entertain the fans and make us want to watch.
4. Ensured stability
This one is even more difficult.
Stability is great and perhaps the ultimate example is SAF at Man Utd, who as we all know, was one game away from being sacked before his team went on one of the best long-term runs in the history of the game. Would the Utd board have stuck with him if he hadn’t won the FA cup?
The difference between stable and fickle isn’t that big is it?
What if we have a disastrous start and (god forbid) we’re near the bottom of the table come christmas?
Does that mean we stick with things as they are?
The article mentions how you don’t always need money and cites Leicester as an example, which is fair comment.
But we all know that was somewhat a fairy tale and the article also mentions that there’s a lot of money at the top of the Championship.
My viewpoint here is simple.
The more you spend, the more likely you are to be successful, on the whole.
I know that will have its dissenters, but that’s how I see it.
We’ve seen managers at the club try to buy rough diamonds on the cheap and it simply doesn’t work on average. Players are worth higher fees for a reason.
But I suspect the point raised here should have been more about our style of play.
This is where we need the stability and we need to establish the same and stick with it, through thick and thin, even if we change managers.
And stop selling our better players to bring inferior ones in, would help too.
Which all comes back to Tony Xia, where I hope his actions are as good as his words.
Or am I seeing things the wrong way?
I’m sure you’ll tell me if that’s the case.
Comments
82 responses to “What do we need to move forward?”
It’s easy really, isn’t it?
I don’t think.
You’ve sumed it up nicely Badger, to put building bridges top of the list is spot on, fans had seen things about our club way before the club did of it going wrong , talk to us fans , to many employed staff going wrong and getting away with it, managers, coaching staff, scouts, we see things they don’t. Buying to build positions and not just run with failures, use our own youths, many things to put back into our club was ignored. Imo .
One overriding factor has become clear in hindsight and that is throughout Lerner’s tenure he failed to be actively involved with the running of the club; leaving it to various others who turned out to be either incompetent or unreliable. In that respect he’s the architect of his (and the club’s) failure.
First and foremost Dr. Xia has to be seen, heard and be actively involved with the club supported by a competent and football experienced board. He must communicate with the fans – that means listening as well as speaking.
So far it seems Dr. X has recognised these essentials and in appointing DM has brought in a manager that appears to have connected well with fans at his previous clubs.
All bridges need solid and dependable foundations, something that has been sadly lacking at our club for many years. It remains to be seen what Dr Xia and his team are able to build from there; it’s a major task that won’t happen overnight but reconnecting with the fans is essential to its ultimate success and future sustainability of our great club.
Agree completely.
Lerner, even in his early -supposedly ‘keen’ – days, left the club to be run remotely by people who simply weren’t up to the task. He also seemed to take advice from those with whom we were supposed to be competing – embarrassing enough once, incomprehensible to do it more often – and not something that anyone would usually expect in any business.
Xia has a chance to appoint experienced football people, and if the coaching staff are anything to go by, he seems to be taking sound advice so far.
All good points Badger but they’ll all come to nothing unless we cut the cancer clean out of our club. We need an environment where all players train hard, respect the shirt (& the manager), and give their all on a Saturday.
Anyone that’s refused to play or caused problems over the last couple of years must be made an example of, get rid, however we can. How we deal with this will be the test of what our new owners and management are about. Then we can begin rebuilding.
http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/aston-villa-takeover-update-dr-11442033
If this article is true I don’t fully understand why PL / FL can’t approve Dr. Xia’s acquisition. The board members (apart from Dr. Xia himself) are known to the FL and PL and as far as one can see there is nor reason for them to fail the FPP test?
The accountants and lawyers engaged to do this work will be charging several £00’s/hour; they will take as long as they can…
We need a new starting XI.
“There’s a major lack of news lately” – I’d say that we’ve had some major news in the last few days, about the management side, at least!
Of course everyone’s waiting for the FPP approval to be announced, but with RDM & co in place now, I’d imagine that there’s a lot of work already going on behind the scenes.
The ‘news’ many of us would like to hear relates at least as much to who is getting the Order of the Boot, as to who might be coming in…
Well, ok, I meant the last few days then 🙂
RDM and Clark were pretty much nailed on, but point taken.
Yes, agreed, I want to see who’s leaving and more importantly, who’s going to replace them.
Agree all your points but I will pick on just one. Football fans at different clubs give different weight to aspects of the game. “One of our Own” really carries weight at Newcastle and Sunderland. “One Nil to the Arsenal” nuff said.”Spend spend spend” at Chelsea and City “Win at all costs” goes with a red shirt. “Play the game the right way” goes with a claret and blue shirt. Villa fans are not willing to see their team boring, kicking or cheating their way to victory.
I totally agree, OLL!
And it’s a good point.
It’s the reason I often call debatable or “dodgy” decisions in the opposition’s favour if it’s how I see them and why I quite often criticised Ashley Young when he played for us, the diving git, as much as I liked him.
No doubt I’m trying to preach to the converted in your case, but things like Villa sticking 2 fingers up to Hitler are exactly what I admire about the club.
And it’s what makes us so respected in the football world, imo.
I’ve just read an article where the writer (a Gooner) describes our relegation as “upsetting”, for instance;
“One of the founder members of the Barclays Premier League, Aston Villa are without any doubt a club with great history and fame and it was very upsetting to see them go down being poor throughout the entire season even though it was more of a question of ‘when’ given the insanity and delusion by which the great club was being run by Randy Lerner.”
http://the4thofficial.net/2016/06/why-arsene-wengers-ethos-will-always-rise-above-the-non-sensical-punditry/
This is what we are and we’re known for playing the game as it should be played.
And long may it continue.
In fairness, at least even Lerner realised this.
Oh, one point I’d throw back at you is that I’ve seen many Man city fans comment on how they despise the way they are now.
All credit to them, too.
OLL this is a point that resonates with me the most. As a longtime Villa supporter in Australia the one question i get over and over is basically “why them?”
The answer used to be simple, because despite not having the funds of the Big 4 as they were then, Villa were the one team that was never afraid to go at them with all they had and would never be content with sitting on a 1-0 lead. Whilst i’m not old enough to know the good old days, i do have to warmest memories of a barely 20 year old Agbonlahor sticking it up to the big teams.
that’s what i think the new villa need to capture again, a fearless and hungry side that engages the fans
dan crowley training with gardner 🙂 still mates and both hungry to succeed, worth offering arsenal a small fee or ask for a loan. need hungry players and both are better than we had last year in midfield
The next Jack Wilshere?
Hmm, I’m not convinced Nath.
I know you like your young players, but I still find myself wondering why Gardner didn’t get a recall.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Gardner, but what have a few managers seen that we aren’t seeing?
That said, he’s performed at Championship level, so should be brought back in, imo.
youngsters of aston villa are our future and history, we have always developed youngsters, but lately we decided to cut corners and buy in cheap and nasty made in foreign land. thinking this was sure way to get success on the cheap.
take traore hes never worth 60k wages not last year or this year (i doubts) he doesn’t do enough often enough with the ball. but never tracks back so who ever is behind him in full back has two men to mark.
we are basically developing him on 1st team wages and under no guarantee he will make it. gardner and crowley both are top potential, in championship both made there marks at forest and crowley was at barnsley and impressed. i think gardner will finally get his chance to shine. thats deserved but traore isnt a team player and shouldn’t be anywhere near the 1st team
Nath , that’s what I’m trying to get over to this forum with earlier post, use our own youngsters and not a shop window to rich buy the league teams. It’s ok to sell if that young player is not settled into Villa, let us fans see and enjoy the progress of any player or player’s. Ok at the stage Villa is at now we have to buy, but make our own club players.
Bill – it’s a sound idea in principle, of course.
However what many of us haven’t been able to understand is that for all of the talk about Villa’s youth team/academy/etc., over the years, there haven’t been many products who’ve gone on to make a name for themselves – either at VP or after leaving.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not daft enough to expect 11 ‘stars’ coming through the ranks every year – or even 1. But go back over the last [say] 15-20 years and in all of that time the youth set-up has produced how many players who went on to make it in either the Villa teams, or even in lower-division sides? [I can only think of Barry and Cahill off the top of my head!]
Clubs like Everton, and especially Southampton, seem to have academies that produce quality young players on a regular basis; why haven’t Villa managed to do that?
i totally agree with you bill 🙂
we have a tradition of playing our youth. we arent saying blood a team of them . but we want to see our lads given a chance to shine, than some cheap foreign player. albrighton league champion and he was villa through and through. i see you some of you have made a list of our kids that made names away from villa park. this has too change. we need to enhance their qualities and blood them.
god knows we cant live with chelsea and man city spending powers, so we need to be offering the youth a stage to show their skills.
R.I.P HARRY GREGORY
Ditto Giddy……not too many remember him! Bill Pearson would of course!
RIP Harry Gregory
I see our blue nose is back, Langford I do mate and comiderations to his family.
Yes bill only a lowlife scum nose would dislike Langfords post, piss off to whatever tiny stone you come from
Hear hear Giddy, no blue nose does that to our mucker, do they Giddy that’s a dirty trick.
@Ardent
I understand you’re point but you got me thinking, apart from Barry & Cahill relatively recently we’ve had;
Steven Davis
Dwight Yorke
Daniel Sturridge
Craig Gardner
Boaz Myhill
Thomas Hitzlsperger
Darius Vassel
Marc Albrighton
Andi Weimann
Barry Bannan
Eric Lichaj
Lee Hendrie
Karl Darlow
Flabby Toohightoscore
Ciaran Clark
Nathan Baker
Liam Ridgewell
Just goes to show the talent is being spotted and given a good footballing education, what happens next?
I wonder what would have happened to that particular generation if Houllier’s ticker hadn’t been a problem, remember that team of kids against Man Utd when Bannan looked like Iniesta? Who was that holding midfielder who played like Makele? Was it Hodd?
No it was Hogg! That was a very good performance though. first time in many years we took the game to Utd instead of trying not to lose.
Interesting list!
Some of those names I’d forgotten – others I’d sort-of remembered but not associated much with ‘academy’ [e.g. Hitzlsperger, Bannan, etc.] because I thought we’d bought them as [admittedly-] youngish players, not as ‘kids’ – same as Delph.
Sturridge – OK, but we let him go aged 11, so not sure whether he really counts?
At risk of pushing my losing argument too far [!], I’d suggest that Yorke, Hitzlesperger, possibly Myhill, and [now] Albrighton are the only ones who went on to any real success after Villa.
Yes a few of them made or are still making a decent living at lower-league clubs, but I still wonder whether the academy/youth set-up is really producing the output to justify its cost? [Not that I’m suggesting it shouldn’t be there, of course…]
Ardent Villan,
It would be good to get back to training our own again, I don’t like this them and us we all under the same badge Aston Villa. It would be good to say thats our kid, and not to see our Ex players playing playing against us. Team first Business second imo.
Bill,
Agreed – no argument on that score.
A few years ago, when my sons were teenagers and playing a lot of school and club football, we used to hear the rumour that ‘scouts’ were present at quite a few games; they were – but it always seemed to be scouts from Blues, Baggies, Wolves, etc.- I can hardly remember any occasion when Villa were supposed to have sent anyone.
Now that may be just because of geography [south side of B’ham] but it always seemed that while other local [Midlands] clubs had people looking at the kids’ games, Villa couldn’t be bothered to cross the city.
Mercers minors…..they were a great bunch of young lads!
Ardent,
Cahill at Chelsea, Davis at Southampton, Ridgewell at WBA (captained his MLS team to the title last season), Gardner at Sunderland, Vassell at Man City.
Lee Hendrie, Gabby, and Clark have all been picked at international level and have played in the premier league for most of their careers…
CAV – looks like I’m going to lose this argument, but I’ll continue as Devil’s advocate anyway!
Cahill – obviously, and I mentioned him originally.
Davis – completely forgotten abput him [possibly because there were several players with similar name around at similar time ?]
Vasell – didn’t impress at VP, and hardly did much at Mancs.
Hendrie – I liked Lee personally, but his career always seemed to be on a downward slope from the early days.
Gabby – well I know that some people were impressed by him in the early days, but personally I always saw him as nothing more than a one-trick-pony, and after his first full season no big [or even small] club thought it worth putting-in a bid for him. ‘Nuff said.
just seen villa are after myhill another name we had in our youth ranks. its a waste of resources if we arent giving the youth their chances. davis myhill gardner albrighton just a few that havent been given a proper run and allowed to leave or sent out on loan
lambert i have to say what a decision now in hind sight allowing albrighton to walk away, or was it lerners advisors that wouldnt cough up what his agent thought he was worth. another sound piece of business. i defended lambert loads, but thats got to be the biggest fubar he did.
we can learn from these mistakes now and trust in youth more, give them more chances, its what the fans really want to see. not gabby on 60k doing nothing but a fresh faced kid giving his all week in and out, hungry for success.i know which i would like to see
Hear hear Nath.
i remember lambert playing albrighton inside right, or inside behind the striker. not his position was it. you were screaming “play him outwide” in his position.we have no width nothing.
i must say bill you were definitely proven right. my hats off in respect. albrighton we all know he could play and it was leicester that got him playing, its a scandal that we shouldn’t allow it to happen again
spuds have triggered a 7.1m clause in gana contract, can anybody remember how much we paid for him. seems a low clause,why would you bother having a clause if its so low. roll the dice and take a risk, odds were good,that he would be worth more than 7m unless you never scouted them proper riley lol
Possibly the only reason he’d join us is if we put the clause in? I don’t think we spent anymore than that, maybe a million or so.
Of the opinion Di Matteo isn’t going to get the final say on the goal keeper and that’s why the new goal keeper coach was brought in. Think he’ll have the final say and Di Matteo will be okay with that. Be absolutely shocked if we go for Myhill, more lazy journalism of a player he used to manage, kinda like Dorrans.
I think Gana was undisclosed, but rumoured to be about £9 mill, although it might have been in Euros.
and we agreed a release clause that low? Crazy.
I think Vertout was the most expensive of last season’s signings. Gana therefore less than 7 million. Following the drop they are all springable, and IMO I would rush round to Pochettino’s with a bottle of something in case he sobers up. I’d bite your arm off for £7.1M in exchange for that loose cannon.
OLL
I agree, the stats don’t tell the story. It’s great that he won the ball, unfortunately the stats don’t reflect the number of times he gave the ball straight back to the opposition.
Just behind Gil of players with over 1000 minutes with 85.6% passing rate with an average of over 53 passes per game. He didn’t give the ball back to the opposition very often.
Also averaged 1.9 fouls a game. I wouldn’t consider that all that bad for a defensive midfielder.
I’m minded to agree with Andrew.
They’re decent stats considering the overall team performance this season.
In a better team, I’m sure he’d look better and can see why other clubs might want him.
I also think similar applies to Sanchez, but I doubt that will go down too well 🙂
Gana’s absolute class. People are being oddly harsh on him for… Well for some reason, then again fans were like that to Sanchez, even though he’s been class for us too. But our fans have a habit of remembering one bad game, not watching the rest and believing they’ve played like that one game all season.
Sanchez is another one that will sadly go.
I agree that he’s a good player that covers ground and breaks up play well. However whilst it’s not necessarily the amount of passes he gives away, for me (and it’s the same with Sanchez) it’s where and when he gives the ball away, they’re both prone to costly errors.
You can make anyone look good with stats. For example according to the stats on prem goalkeepers Guzan came in 7th for the number of saves made during the season. Is he a top 7 team goalkeeper? No thought not.
You can make any player look great if you choose to look at certain stats. Ask our friend Mr Riley…
How many shots,save ratio bet guzan finished bottom
Any Villa payer would play better in another team in today’s world Badger, they don’t seem to have the will as a team, I’ve never seen a disjointed team that Villa was over the last two or three seasons, I’ve always had cause to blame our coaching and scouting at Villa, I’m glad that we have had a new start.
Not having the will and being disjointed is a very good description of our problems these last few seasons Bill, you hit the nail on the head there.
gana will get better next season, so spuds will receive a player premiership ready. last season he was by far the villa best and consistent performer, but second to him was the empty crisp packets
i just thought we should be trying to recoup most of the transfers fees we splashed last year, players like gana, amavi and ayew we should be aiming for making a slight profit, if only to cover the other transfers like vertede where we are gonna receive a massive loss. doubt leicester will want him this time
Veretout’s reportedly willing to stay if Di Matteo wants him too and talks go over well. At least that’s what some reports claim.
Brum Mail reporting that takeover is going smoothly and likely to be concluded Wed 15th June. More good news. Lets make some decent signings now!
We WILL be promoted at the first attempt!
http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/dr-tony-xias-aston-villa-11455372
Here’s the Brum Mail piece
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2016/06/10/aston-villa-takeover-by-dr-tony-xia-to-go-through-next-week/?
Telegraph article on takeover
Great news mate. 😀
Giddy….great news!
You have to laugh at the Daily Mail. They are also saying its going to happen now. Its the same paper that was saying ‘the good Doctor Tony’ had NO money!
We WILL be promoted at the FIRST attempt!
UTV
Lol the media are a joke hope your right mate about going straight back up where we belong Utv
I think we are deffo to go straight back up!
Which lowlife scumbag put a dislike on the RIP Harry Gregory post? They must be sick in the head. There should be a lifetime banning order for sick bastards like them IMO!
There are some sick fucks out there mate.
Whooooooooooooooo!!!!
Looks like we finally have a new owner!
According to the Birmingham Mail as well, we don’t want Myhill. A bit of a relief.
Also don’t get the hype around Dorrans, he did well… 6-7 years ago for WBA. I hope we’re not looking that far back to see who once did okay in the Championship to bring back and hope they do okay again.
Agree on Myhill Andrew. No2 keeper at best IMO. We must start buying in readiness for our imminent return to the PL as well as for our one and ONLY season in the Championship!
Forward thinking
Ambition
Proactive