I’ll swap you my Barry for your Bentley

It’s not altogether different from swapping Panini stickers in the playground, except that you don’t have to pay your stickers £50,000 a week once you have them!

I have heard a rumour that we are in talks with Spurs about a swap deal of Gareth Barry for David Bentley. I’m hoping it is just garbage, because it doesn’t seem to make too much sense. Well certainly not as a stand alone thing anyway.

Barry is a class central midfielder (albeit not originally, but he has definitely made the position his own now) who is near the top of his game and Bentley is a winger who is near the bottom of his game.

Barry is by far our best in his position, and we’d need to sign someone to replace him, whereas we are not in a desperate need for a winger. A back up would be good but there’s no point having a back up winger if you have no-one in the centre.

Barry is the captain and a central figure for our team, Bentley doesn’t get in his team and would struggle to get in ours, unless he recaptures his old form.

Barry is worth at least £10, Bentley would struggle to fetch 5, so I’m guessing if it does go ahead we would get some cash too.

The positive side

It seems that I’m not too keen on the idea doesn’t it? There are some positive ways to look at this though. It seems likely that Barry will be leaving us during the summer and it is also being rumoured that we will be buying Bentley, so I spose it makes sense to wrap them both up at once. I have also read in the past that Barry was a Tottenham fan when he grew up so it could appeal to him on those grounds. He will also like the fact that he will most likely get in the team every week, which is far from guaranteed at Liverpool.

I would also take it as a sign that we intend to do some big signings this summer; if we are going to spend around £5m on Bentley, someone who will largely be a back up winger, then surely it means we will also be splashing out for a centre back, a centre midfielder AND a centre forward. We need to replace Laursen and Barry and we still need a centre forward who can actually score goals, so if this goes through I see ambition (yeah, I know it could also mean that we will unambitiously make do with what we already have, but if you look up there, the title of this section is ‘The positive side’).

Also being said

There is also a rumour that Man City have offered us £10m for Barry. I think we may want around £12m and we have seen that MON will not be haggled down once before, but City could easily meet our valuation and pay Barry handsomely so that could throw this swapping lark out the window.

Wherever he goes though Barry needs to be replaced surely. Unless MON has big hopes for Salifou, Reo-Coker, Sidwell, Gardner or even Milner moved into the middle.

Whats new rumour-cat? This week’s Villa transfer gossip

I’m back, with the latest Villa shenanigans and I’m going to go through some of the most exciting rumours that are floating around. I haven’t just been a lazy scoundrel mind you, I’ve been blogging over at Footbo on footy in general and yesterday I did an interview/blogpost for a *spit* Birmingham City blog, and he’s doing a return one for us next week.

But anyway, there has been so many rumours that I have had to ignore some of the obviously made up ones, otherwise you’d never get any work done for reading about all the players who are coming to Villa this summer. And I know how much time you all already spend reading Villa blogs and other websites when you should be working. I still need to get one of those ‘Quick the boss is coming’ buttons installed on this website

The biggest transfer rumbling around is Randy Lerner’s comments that there won’t be as much available to spend as last year. Now this could be mind games or it could be the truth, but either way it’s not all bad news. What we need to do is buy better, not buy dearer. For what we have spent in the last few years, we could’ve vastly improved our team, but many of the signings have not been great. I won’t go into who right now (maybe another day) but it is obvious to most that we haven’t been particularly shrewd with all our signings of late.

Enough of all that though, let’s get down to business, there’s gossip out there that won’t spread itself;

• An interesting rumour doing the rounds at the minute is that we are interested in Liverpool’s young striker; Ryan Babel. I love the sound of this for a number of reasons; first off I like that we are being linked with players from the team that finished 2nd in the Prem. Much better than Scottish or Championship clubs if you ask me. Babel will also not come cheap, so if we are to sign him then we know that the club is not going to scrimp and save to a detrimental extent. It’s not all sunshine and roses though, Babel suffers from a problem we are not already short of; he doesn’t score enough. He is more of a winger-cum-striker so maybe he could help us to create more chances, but in reality, is he something we need? I feel we already have what he can offer, so whilst I wouldn’t mind the extra strength, we need a goal scorer and a commanding centre back more.
• A big rumour around is that we have already began inquiries leading to us signing David Bentley from Spurs. I’ve already said my bit on him and my opinion is still the same so rather than repeat myself, I’ll just link back for you: http://astonvillablog.com/whats-new-rumour-cat-latest-villa-transfer-gossip/ It does seem odd as our first priority to be a winger (see above) but there is no shortage of wingerumours (<– d’ya like what I did there? I made up a word…. hmmm nah it’s crap, it will never catch on)
• Michael Owen. Another I’ve covered before and another that will be both good and bad. Owen is a great talent and he is EXACTLY what we need up front. Now I don’t know if everyone agrees with me on this but I feel that if we had a player who did nothing else all game but poach, we would score twice the amount of goals. We create chance after chance after chance (even during our off spell we still created a fair bit) but don’t convert enough. The big problem with Owen though is his injuries. He makes Darren Anderton look good! If he could stay fit, and come to an agreement on wages, he’d be perfect. Thats a big IF though.

I’ll cut it there and pick up where I left off tomorrow. I know I only covered 3 people so far but i don’t want you all getting sacked for reading super-long Villa rumour blogs! So check back tomorrow for another bunch. There’s no shortage I assure you

Will Martin O’Neill be tempted by the Celtic vacancy?

Gordon Strachan has resigned from his post as Celtic manager after failing to win the league, leaving the job open and, as usual, a number of names are being batted around as possible successors.

Martin O’Neill was Celtic manager for 5 years before stepping down to care for his ill wife, Geraldine, who has lymphoma. O’Neill took a season off and then came back to football with Aston Villa, where he has been the manager for 3 seasons.

MON vastly improved Villa’s fortunes on the pitch, alongside new owner Randy Lerner, who vastly improved Villa’s fortunes off the pitch. His first season saw Villa become a strong mid-table side and then follow it up with a 6th placed finish, running Everton towards the wire for 5th, but slippin up and failing to win in the last 3 games of the season. Then this season he continued to improve the team, breaking them into the fortress that is the Big Four and heading towards Champions League qualification, but slipping up in the run-in, winning just 2 games in the last 13.

Now he finds himself facing the grim reality of just how difficult it is to break into the Top Four of the Premier League. So will the prospect of a return to a job he was so successful at be too tempting to resist?

The task that faces O’Neill to continue to improve Aston Villa is huge, needing to spend big money in order to keep up with not just the Big Four but now also there will be very stiff competition from Man City, Tottenham and, of course, Everton. Add to that the rumblings that his spending will be limited this window and the Celtic job sounds very much the easier option.

O’Neill would be welcomed with open arms by the Celtic faithful, after making himself into a legend in his 5 years there, whereas at Villa he has recently lost a large part of the fanbase. Firstly he was heavily criticised for fielding a weakened team in the UEFA Cup and then he suffered further loss of faith from the fans with Villa’s dreadful end to the season.

Now he will be thinking that he could go to Celtic and just face the challenge of fighting with Rangers, rather than with Liverpool, Man Utd, Chelsea and Arsenal, not to mention Man City, Spurs and Everton.

Reaching the Champions League will be a much easier task and the supporters will be fully behind him. Will it be playing on his mind? Will he leave Villa now, feeling he has taken them as far as he can?

Villa end it with a win but Everton ensure we finish 6th

After the Blackburn game at the start of Feb our season took an unexpected downturn seeing us win just 2 of our last 13 games, and those were against the teams that ended 17th and 18th. It was a disastrous end to what was set to be a sensational season. But luckily we did enough up until Feb to keep us top six, despite this crumble.

Yesterday we needed Everton to drop points if we were too sneak back into 5th for the final table, but the Toffeemen defied history’s trend and came away from Craven Cottage with a victory. Leon Osman potted 2 for them and Fulham failed to reply, making our 1-0 home win over relegated Newcastle irrelevent in the chase for 5th.

The significance of finishing 5th was that we would have improved on our league finish for a 3rd season running under O’Neill. As it turns out we have stabilised and stayed 6th. It is a wake up call to the powers that be at Villa that we need to invest to improve. The Premier League has become a VERY expensive league to compete in these days.

Maybe not even necessarily more expensive signings, just shrewder ones really. If we had enough quality players on the fringes of the team, we could’ve prevented this season’s crumble. We could’ve halted our league slide and avoided the UEFA Cup mess.

But outside our first team we are very below par, as was proved by our early Carling Cup exit and our poor EUFA Cup performances (ie Zilina & Hamburg). The Moscow mess may well have been the cause of the slide as it made the club unsteady and ambitions unclear. If it wasn’t the cause it certainly did nothing to stop the boat rocking.

This summer will be a very telling time for Aston Villa. Keep your fingers crossed.

Is Carew leaving us for Man City?

Sky Sports are running a story on their website and on Sky Sports News that John Carew is a target for Manchester City. If it is true, you have to fear that he will be very tempted by it.

Why would he go?

It has not been made any secret that he and O’Neill have had their differences and he also may feel that we are going to struggle to keep up with them next season (MON publicly saying as much didn’t help there). This and the fact that they will undoubtedly increase his wages, lead you to think that if Man City go for him, they have a good chance of getting him.

Where would it leave us?

For the last few months, Carew has been about our only threat in front of goal, so to lose him would be devastating under current conditions. But there is every chance that after the summer Gabby will pick his head up and get back on top of his game. Gabby will never set the world on fire, but when he is full of beans he can be a real terror for defenders to deal with and can even find the net fairly regularly when he’s on song.

Emile Heskey is our other main striker, a player who I never wanted to sign, despite being one of those rare people who think that he is a good player. The reason I didn’t want him is because he doesn’t fit into our team, and that has been proven very concisely I feel (O’Neill seems less convinced than I am).

Nathan Delfouneso is kicking at the heels of the first team, but I seriously doubt he will get into the team regularly unless injuries force it. It worked out for Gabby, so the Fonz just needs to bide his time and be ready when his chance comes.

Carew replacements?

You have to fancy that if MON let’s Carew leave it will be with someone else in mind to come in and replace him. I guess I won’t be too averse to it happening as long as someone good is brought in (someone who will fit the team), because we won’t ever get the very best from Carew if he doesn’t get on too well with the Gaffer.

It’ll all hang on MON signing a real good replacement though, and that is an area his expertise don’t seem to stretch to.

It’s the final weekend! Villa face Newcastle, with a beady eye on the Fulham v Everton game

Everton have lost every game they’ve played at Fulham since the Premier League’s inception. That’s 7 league losses and 1 cup loss. There we go. I started with something positive. So will it be a case of ’start as you mean to go on’ and this’ll be a positive post? I’ll come back to that question innabit.

Sunday we find ourselves intwined in the battle to stay in the top flight, as we play a team that are sitting 18th. The drop squad find the weekend as follows:

• Newcastle face the drop unless they get a better result than Hull, and could even still face the drop if they win.
• Hull face a Man Utd side that have already won the title and that have the Champions League final on Wednesday, so may well be a little easier to beat than normal.
• Middlesbrough can still survive mathematically but it’s very unlikely that all the pieces of that jigsaw will fall into place.
• Sunderland are the highest placed team that can still go down but they are playing Chelsea, so it’s by no means going to be easy. If they lose and both Hull and Newcastle win, they will be down.

As you can see it’s going to be an exciting finale, so can Villa resist the Toon’s desperate surge for survival or will we crumble to a loss that will cap off a terrible second half to what was looking to be a terrific season? It would certainly fit the bill of the last few months. We steam-rollered all the way through to Feb, winning games for fun but then it all came falling down.

It’s been quite a heartbreaking few months to be a Villa fan; the torrid run of losses being so much harder to bear after all those wins and then Martin Laursen announcing his retirement. I can honestly say that I was even more upset than when Take That split up!!

Prediction

A draw. I’m not just being boring when I say this, I honestly think it will be a draw. Newcastle will play scrappily in pure desperation and we will reply with much of the same as we struggle to take hold of the game when we aren’t on fire and running at teams. There will probly be goals but I think this has draw written all over it. Which means bye bye Newcastle, which will be just crazy. They are one of the most supported teams in the country and they won’t even be in the top flight. If it happens they may well implode because they have high profile and highly paid players that will be outta there (including Owen, Martins, Duff, Smith, Nolan, Viduka)

These rumours just can’t be avoided – No, no please god no to this one!

I don’t wanna be doing transfer rumours every day. I love doing them and reading them and hearing your opinions on what a player could do for us. But there are so many at the minute that it is going to turn into an obssession and get boring if I do it every day.

One I couldn’t ignore though was Footy Latest’s linking of us with Robert Huth. I hope to god it’s not true. Huth was linked with us (and I believe nearly came to us) back in the O’Leary days. When our ambitions were so much lower and a player like Huth was about the right standard. But as a Laursen replacement, I would be bitterly disappointed. It would be a huge step down for us as a club and would show low ambitions.

It’s no doubt made up and probably based on about as much evidence as; O’Neill looked at him during the Boro game. But he is not what we are looking for. We are after a player who is well above the class of the current crop of centre backs and who will raise them to his level. In fact I might  campaign to make genetic modifications legal and then we can clone Laursen but with new legs! Who will sign my petition? Come on, get your biros out.

What’s new rumour-cat? Tuesday’s latest Villa transfer gossip

The transfer window is so close that you can feel it’s smelly breath on the back of your neck. So it’s no surprise that there are loads of rumours around linking us to all and sundry. Some will come true, some will nearly happen and some are just made up by someone wishing to shift papers or get pageviews

Here at AVB we like to go through them all and try to give a little info on a player and open it up to debate on whether you want them at Villa or not. Yesterday we saw a nice response in agreement with me that Senderos would be a poor signing, or to correctly quote what is one of the funniest comments we’ve had on here for a while:

As for Senderos, I’d rather have sex with a lawnmower than sign him

And on that bombshell, let’s dive into today’s bunch:

• Giles Barnes is a young pacy winger for Derby County, who has been on an unsuccessful loan to Fulham for part of this season. I say unsuccessful because he hasn’t made a single appearance. Roy Hodgson either doesn’t think he is cut out for the Prem or doesn’t see a way to fit him into his team. Now, I’m a big fan of Roy Hodgson, I think he’s doing a great job at Fulham, but I must admit that when I first saw him interviewed I judged the book by it’s cover and said “What’s that old fanny gonna do with Fulham?”. He proved me wrong and I respect that. Anyway, we’re talking about Barnes, not licking Hodgson’s bum-ring, so back to the matter at hand; we are more suited to Barnes’s style and he may well go fairly cheap, so don’t rule him out but he’s not going to set the club on fire and may well prove to be another Wayne Routledge.
• Fulham’s keeper Mark Schwarzer is next up, having been mentioned as someone we have been sniffing around, but I can’t really see O’Neill buying another aging keeper when we still have Friedel. I think MON will keep his faith in Friedel for at very least one more season, so I can’t see where this rumour has come from. A younger keeper maybe, but I just can’t see it with Schwarzer.
• Stewart Downing looks destined to get relegated with Boro so will almost definitely be moving on this summer. He will be far from cheap though and isn’t an area of urgency (like centre back and centre forward are) so I don’t see this happening either. It may do, he is certainly a talented player, but I doubt it. If it does tho, I’m going to take a positive stance and say that if we spend big on a midfielder/winger, we also plan to spend big up front and at the back too. Cuz if he splashes £12m+ on a winger and gets some mediocre centre back then I’m right on that O’Neill-hating bandwagon. And I don’t want to get on that wagon. I like O’Neill.
• Man City’s Joe Hart is again being linked with us and if we do buy a keeper I fancy him as the favourite. He will very likely move on after having had his progress disturbed by the arrival of Given. The lad is definitely a big prospect and may well go on to be a regular England keeper if he finds a team where he’s number one choice. He probably needs to learn to make ridiculous mistakes if he wants to play for England tho
• Along similar lines to Downing is David Bentley. He is also a talented player but he has gone seriously off the boil. He never plays for Tottenham so will most likely move on in the summer but they will want to recoup as much of the £16m they wasted on him as possible. Again, it’s not an area we are screaming out for new players in but if we do make the step up to serious European contention, then we need some rotationability (<– nah, it’s probly not a real word!).
• A quick note on Thomas Vermaelen, who we have been linked with; apparently Arsenal are now interested too.
• Finally, Rabiu Afolabi of FC Sochaux is on our radar. He is a tall central defender with plenty experience but like many of the rumours that are now surfacing, he is unlikely to be of the mould we need to replace a player as influential and significant as Laursen.

What’s new rumour-cat? Plenty Villa transfer gossip

I don’t know about you lot but I am still feeling down about our boys. Maybe come Sunday I’ll have picked my head up and be thinking we can take a game to Newcastle, get a result and get some luck with Everton dropping points at Fulham, but right now I’m feeling resigned to 6th. A season of exaggerated ups and exaggerated downs that served to change our expectations and then have them come crashing down in our faces.

So what’s left to do other than daydream about who we’ll add to our squad to try and change our fortunes next season. Time for more transfer talk, and yet again there is a fresh crop of names being mentioned in connection with us. Let’s dive in:

• We are said to have had scouts at Toulouse’s last match, watching André-Pierre Gignac, who is a young French striker with a good scoring record (21 in the last 33 games). Toulouse almost came to blows with Lille over his signature, after seeing his impressive loan spell at Pau (low division French side). He became the main striker when Elmander joined Bolton, so maybe he is hoping to follow in his footsteps into the Premier League. Not exactly the number one choice for Villa fans, but depending on how much truth there is in O’Neill’s cautious talk, he may prove an affordable option. There is also a conflicting rumour around that he has already refuted these links.
• Next up is one that I would love to see come true; Joleon Lescott. There’s always a chance with him being a boyhood fan of us, but there have been incidents with him and his brother that have apparently left a bitter taste in his mouth. Lescott would be a great replacement for Laursen; solid, dependable and also gets some goals. Would he want to come though? By the time the window opens, Everton could be 5th and FA Cup winners, so it may be a step down to him. But on the positive side; he has past love for us, knows he would be the number one centre back, a good chance of captainship and ‘ambitious’ owners and management. It’s not one you can call easily, but I hope it happens.
• Arsenal centre back Philippe Senderos has also been mentioned, but he’s far from the top of my list. In fact, if we do buy him as a replacement for Laursen I will jump into bed with all the doubters out there who think that MON is going to have us mid-table next season. Senderos is not crap by any means, but we need a real inspirational player who will pick the team up, lead by example and rule the park from the figurehead position of centre back. Senderos is just another Davies, Knight and Cuellar, who needs a stronger figure alongside him to be effective and who makes silly mistakes. Mind you, I wouldn’t say it to his face. He’d probly nut me!

There are still about another 5 rumours out there worth mentioning, but you don’t want an essay, so I’ll do the others tomorrow. Anyone fond on today’s crop?

Now we have given 5th away as cheaply as we gave away 4th

A draw to Middlesbrough. It’s one step better than the loss to them we suffered earlier in the season but it’s still a humbling experience for a team that was dreaming of being 4th right now and preparing for the Champions League. We have been well and truly brought down to earth us Villans have and allowing Middlesbrough to score more than 10% of their goals for the entire season against us is poor. Especially when you remember that we are a bogey team for them at the Riverside; since 2000 we have recorded two 4-0’s, a 3-0 and a 5-2 win there, amongst others.

We were out of shape from the off, thanks to a recurrence of Luke Young’s toe injury and James Milner was placed at right back, so we never really got the game by the scruff of the neck and actually played very scrappily. Just look at Carew’s goal (highlights video below), it was just a scrap, with us trying anything to get the ball goalwards and Boro defending very poorly, looking very much like a team that are going down.

We now have one game left in which to try and regain 5th and ensure that this season sees us improve our league position for a 3rd year running. But we are now relying on Everton to drop points at Fulham and for us to win against a Newcastle side that will be relegated unless they win, so will be fighting fiercely. We haven’t shown anything recently that makes me think we can withstand Newcastle’s final throw of the dice, so I fear that we are destined for another 6th placed finish.

Yeah, I’m being down on the Villa today, I won’t lie, and I think ‘we’ (you can decide who or what has caused it) have thrown away a golden opportunity of 4th or at least 5th. Now, had you said to me at the start of the season; ‘Would you take a season of staying 6th?’ I might’ve said ok, but after how high we flew and how uncermoniously we have bent over and took a shafting, I feel aggrieved. But then, when has being a Villa fan been anything but this?! (As I said, I’m feeling down on them today)

Anyway, here are the highlights of the game for those masochists who want to relive it:

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