Hafnia

Rumours on twitter that Villa have more or less been sold...

"Dealing with a devastating injury prepared Barkley mentally for the pressures of the Premier League, although he was frustrated to be removed from the first-team picture by Moyes after a mistake at Blackburn Rovers in 2011 and sent on loan to Sheffield Wednesday and Leeds United. Under Martínez, however, he has begun to realise the expectations that Moyes and Everton's academy coaches always held for the powerful, intuitive talent." Its pretty ironic that I guess if you look at what took him out of playing for Everton the longest it would be Moyes and not the leg break. I really can't emphasise enough how lucky he was to get Martinez at the time that he did. He is a different kettle of fish to Lukaku, technically Barkley is all there and likely had the same superiority years ago. For me it has been his decision making and confidence that needed the work. He needed to play and make mistakes, he wasn't going to learn in lower leagues as it wasnt a challenge for him, players werent even on the same wavelength as him. In all honesty if we had Martinez in 2011, you would be seeing Barkley now as possibly one of the best 3 midfielders in the league.

I think Mr Ferguson may have been behind all this. My theory is that whilst Ferguson backed Moyes he knew that there were some snides working against him. I'm not saying that he thinks Neville is a snide, but i'm pretty certain he's said if Lumsden and Round are part of his team and collective failings then so is Neville. Ferdinand is off... he was deffo behind some of it, Giggs distanced himself from Moyes whilst Neville did his nodding dog. Even if Giggs was behind Moyes failings, he is the only person at United who is untouchable.

Neville should have fallen on his sword when Moyes got the boot.

Bony scored more in 2300 minutes, lukaku played 2900 minutes. Not comparing him to giroud as I don't want him, tidy player but slow and inconsistent. In a better side bony would have really pushed on to 25 goals+

The type of stage where his pace and power will be an unknown threat and likely to be a matchwinner if hodgson has the balls to play him.

Either my posts aren't clear enough or you skim read and miss important bits. Technically he is not going to improve much more than what you see now. Given his biggest weaknesses are technical that means his margin for improvement is small. So to answer your question, what we would be buying is pretty much the finished article. Which in my mind is a £12m player.

Ha ha. Kenwright will be having an urgent conference with Brown Bob as soon as the interested parties are announced. Let the bullshit commence.

Phil Jones, Mr "last minute throw my stupid gormless looking face in the way because I'm positionally shite" .... Unbelievable. Chris smalling, the physical specimen who if he learns how to kick a ball could be average. Exactly why England are laughed at.

Sad as it sounds aside from our great season two other things have given me satisfaction. 1. The spectacular failure of an egotistical, arrogant ex manager who spent his last few years making out he was operating like some sort of charity shop worker. Then when his opportunity came for a role big enough for his ego, he shit on his former employers. Too bad he was found out to be the tactically inept shit house he really is. 2. The failure of Liverpool who ran in to the last few games to enormous fan fare and whilst I had a great admiration for their style, their fans just swayed me from wanting them to win it. Nauseating, righteous, telly clapping wood work crawlers who tell us who or what weare. Feel sorry for the genuine ones, but it's the ones who subscribe to prikish behaviour that swing it. Sorry if that sounds bitter.

Here here, well done James. Star in the making.

McCarthy, lukaku showed why people want to pay £20m, but that's why he's frustrating, if he could do that level of performance against better centre halves then he's in business.

Jones and smalling for fucks sake. Smalling especially, talentless yard dog. Jones just plays to the crowd by being Mr hard man. I hope stones goes for the experience. He will be a mainstay in the team for years to come.

Watch how quick they get sold. He's using bank of America to help with sale, he sold MBNA to BOA and probably has good contacts there. I think he's been excellent for villa, it's just unfortunate that the gobshite Martin O'Neill blew millions of his cash. I'm still gutted that kenwright rejected his advances.

Based on the shite I'm reading on Facebook and us being called bitter I say do it. If you are gonna get called it regardless then may as well do it. Delighted city won the league, absolutely made up. That lot never fail to amaze me with their superiority complex. They stopped the traffic in Victoria street all pissed singing on the street. There were times when I found myself coming round to being ok with them winning the league. Some of their fans soon put that right.

Ha ha!!! They really do make me laugh, having the first credible title challenge in years despite being one of the biggest spenders warrants a parade?! I was made up they sang gerrards name, it more or less said "don't worry about giving the league away by slipping, we still love you" ... Highlights the fact he did throw it away...

Pretty much a tame run out. Made up to see James get that goal, everything else was clockwork. Much love to y'all in the match day thread. Onwards and upwards in slating unobtainable transfer targets from now till September. X

He was on 120k a week, my guess is that if we made his move permanent we would pay up yo the full amount of his contract amount.

I'm ok with it.

Don't know where I said he's at his prime... It's because I didn't. I stated that physically he is developed, he isn't going to get stronger or quicker so with that regard he's already at potential. The only area that he could improve is decision making which isn't a weakness anyway. It's his technical abilities that are his let down. Wenger rightly in my opinion believes that player development is 4 stages... Technical Physical Tactical Mental Basically the technical skills you see at 12-14 years old are pretty much a key indication of where that player will end up. My guess is lukaku was so physically superior to his peers that his lack of ability controlling a football meant he could hold the player off and get to the ball anyway. At premier league level his advantage has been nullified, his poor touches are penalised. Some people remember goals, shots et and think we are going to lose out if we don't get him, I see a player who if he had worked harder on the technical aspect of his game could have been a George Weah.

Because he can finish, is clever, is nippy and had been identified a couple of seasons ago by the senior players as someone with genuine potential. If he never broke his leg he would have had his chance. I expect mcaleny to get on today.

For me regardless of going or not he's shown amazing courage and determination. It's the right decision though.

Based on what I seen I wasn't impressed at all. Let's see what Roberto clearly sees.

It's the equivalent of £50k a week. We saved that not having Phil Neville on the books.... Now that's value.

Why oh why are we judging his goals and assists because of his age??? The average 20 year old striker is still growing, is likely to be 6-8kg shy of optimum lean muscle weight and therefore needs nurturing. Lukaku is physically fully developed, let's not use his age as an excuse or justification to go and blow £20m on someone who for me raises too many concerns regarding fundamental footballing attributes. Because of his early maturity you are likely to see early peaking of his abilities. End of the day it's up to Bob, but I've highlighted my concerns regarding the value.