Come On You Irons 12:11 Wed May 15
Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Aston Villa are no guaranteed to finish fourth and get eight games in the expanded Champions League format next season.
They finished fourth and qualified for the Champions League in only their fifth season back in the top flight since their promotion in 2019.
This is quite a remarkable achievement under an excellent manager with pedigree. Makes the media's criticism of West Ham supporters ever more embarrassing with their Moyes love in "be careful what you wish for" rhetoric.
Let's hope Lopetegui and Steidten can work together to move us forward to compete at the upper echelons like Villa.
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Replies - Newest Posts First ( Show In Chronological Order)
rumford
8:28 Mon May 20
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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News in the midlands is suggesting Villa will need to sell at least one decent player as they posted a loss of £120 m in their latest published accounts. That is despite the £50m windfall for
Champions League qualification. So it's not just about rich owners as Newcastle have also found out with Howe moaning about not be able to spend the owners money.
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Sir Alf
8:03 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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A quick Google on the name of the theme / song that gets played at the circus:
Julius Fučík - Entry of the gladiators (Op. 68) [Circus Song]
Julius “Fuckit” might be more appropriate :-) and would sum up how West Ham has been run down the years and especially the first 10 of 14 years under Sullivan
Perhaps they should play it when the team comes out or when Sullivan takes his seat.
Lets hope its now in the past and Steidten is allowed to save The Dwarf from himself.
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Side of Ham
7:53 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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After what happened at Wolves I don't see this Loppy signing up to anything that doesn't involve a decent budget to get a squad to his exacting requirements......it looks to me like he's waited for a club that is looking to turn over a new leaf.....and our January window makes a lot of sense if he was in contact with the club back then at all.....that's me just hoping were not run like a circus still.....
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Capitol Man
7:52 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Eerie Descent 1:24 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
You'd probably be claiming to have said the same against Brighton, or wolves, or whichever of the Jon huge clubs performed better than us this year.
People were all about why we could be Leicester.
Most changes of manager don't work and a number are an utter disaster. You can't point at one that does with hindsight and say "see, we should have changed manager too" - especially seeing we've had far worse seasons through much of our history than this one.
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Sir Alf
7:41 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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British, Ludo, one or both of you might be right. Only time will tell but we should always be careful of the spin or PR the club has a history of. It seems we always sell or get rid of more than we buy over the last 4 or so windows and while fees might have been poor ( hence losses on many players ) we saved a lot in wages. Se have made 30-50 million from European exploits last 3 seasons. The budget rumours are just that and classic lowering of expectations. I can see us selling Paqueta and then the coub and websites quoting how we spent north of 100 million ( say 140 ) whereas net spend is low. A lot of it will be down to payment structuring. We trousered a lot of the Rice money up front but pay out on players against future revenues over 5 or more years hence in cash terms we are in very good shape.
I see us having to spend 100-150 million if we want 6 quality players. If we dont Loppy will walk ?
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ludo21
5:07 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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british is best - you believe what you want to believe... personally I believe the reports that Lop and TS have six targets lined up and will be making early signings.
Agree it could have happened 12 months earlier but I see this as an exciting new chapter and I don't think we will be short of funds.
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british is best
4:32 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Were a year behind where the club should be . Simply because of one man David Sullivan. Moyes should have left the morning after the trophy parade. It was the perfect time for change for both parties. And as usual the paupers act is in full swing already. Apparently lopetegui only has £60m to spend . Despite a £365 m turnover this season. Absolute piss take .
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Sir Alf
2:45 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Time will tell with Villa. Its a tad early to say they have gone “up a level” but Emery does have a track record to suggest its possible. He did arguably his best work at Seville but its hard to sustain without the revenues.
Bottom line is that clubs outside the richest 6 have to match their revenues longer term to gave a chance to truly get to and sustain the “next level”. Initially it requires a few years over performing like Villa have done this season. That has to be allied to excellent recruitment and youth development to build a strong squad as euro competition and league as to be tackled along with domestic cups.
Villa next season have that challenge. The odds are firmly stacked against them to bolster the depth AND quality to ensure they can handle 2 games a week without form in the league suffering. Also, as Moyes failed to learn / was incapable of addressing, teams work you out tactically, who the threats are and who to neutralise. 2nd full season “syndrome” is coming for them. If they can progress in tye Champs league enough to earn a reasonable chunk of prize money and make the Europa or Conference the season after, they will have been very successful imo. If they made Champs league again they will have reached the very best performance they could.
The increased revenues of year on year euro qualification will increase revenues as we have seen ( 30 , 40 million ) in turn that attracts better players ( you beat the competition to signatures of players like Kudus ) and if you can keep this level of league performance going you reach nirvana ( not the band ) where worldwide fans increase, attract bigger sponsorships and a self reinforcing cycle occurs.
So the gap the rich 6 have is enormous really. They had “first mover” advantage before the Prem started looking at FFP etc. and as Newcastle are finding there is no quick fix via throwing at it money alone. Even the Mancs have to be careful. Too many years without Champs league will impact their ability to compete but their established world wide fanbase, media support gives them a nice insulation for a while.
West Ham? Get a squad to get back in Europe and do better in domestic cups step 1
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Ron Eff
2:04 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Russ of the BML 11:53 Thu May 16
You could also argue that was game management from Emery. There was a time when teams that opened up against us played into our hands. Leicester spring to mind, where we always had their number. Villa likewise under Smith and then Gerrard. Contrastingly, the teams that let us have the ball had more success because under Moyes we have never had the nous to break teams down if they don’t leave gaps by attacking us.
Maybe Emery wanted to avoid what happened to his predecessors. He worked out how to do both at Villa Park this season, though.
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Eerie Descent
1:24 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Capitol Man 5:15 Wed May 15
Complete and utter bollocks.
There were many, many of us on here stating at the time they appointed Emery that we were 2 clubs massively underachieving given the amount of money spent and the squads both teams had available. One club acted, and look at them now. One club didn't, and we've been in relegation form for 18 months out of the 2 years since.
We should've got a proper manager in like they did at that time, we'd have still won the Intertoto Cup, and we'd be up there in the league fighting with them.
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Russ of the BML
1:22 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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, 12:59 Thu May 16
They have rich owners.
If they invest on the right players they could.
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,
12:59 Thu May 16
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Credit to Villa for getting a CL spot next season but they simply do not have a squad with sufficient strength in depth to sustain a good run in the CL whilst simultaneously trying to get top four position in 24/25.
My tips for top four next season will be City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool.
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Russ of the BML
11:55 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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......And a better coach that can very, very clearly coach players.
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Russ of the BML
11:53 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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Capitol Man 5:15 Wed May 15
You make a fair point. I suppose it is always a natural to want to match the over-achiever and say "Why aren't we doing that".
But I do recall watching Villa at our place for the first time under Emery. It was 1-1 and around March 2023. They had been singing his praises and he was getting alot of media love. But I thought Villa were absolutely awful that day. They played a very cagey, defensive low block and were wasting time and diving and just generally played the game in a very unsportsman like way. So for me, I was not impressed at all and wondered what all the fuss was about.
But I realise now that he had only been there five months. And things do take time. Emery at that point was obviously still implementing his style and so came to West Ham with a ploy to do a 'West Ham' on West Ham as Dyche did with Everton earlier this season.
But I watch them now and they are the complete opposite to that. They play attacking football with intent and they look focussed and have a very clear attacking philosophy and game plan that utilises their key players strengths.
Whereas - For West Ham that's not changed. They have taken their own path and we have stayed firmly on our path of cagey, defensive low block with an attacking game plan of basically playing on the break and "seeing what happens".
Villa do not have a superior team and squad to us but look what they have achieved with a different style.
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Barty
4:27 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
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ludo21 2:59 Thu May 16
Re: Aston Villa in the Champions League
Barty- we have a long list of LWs that we are looking at:
Is Amine Goiri one of them? If not he should be on that list
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amine_Gouiri
https://youtu.be/tDhfwUlwOso?si=-XZ420sOMysIur3W
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Barty
3:08 Thu May 16
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He is a very skilled 10 but versatility is important too
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Sir Alf
3:05 Thu May 16
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I think I read that Kudus thinks his best position is central behind the strikers as a number 10.
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Barty
3:02 Thu May 16
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These are high level athletes they can be trained
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ludo21
2:59 Thu May 16
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Barty- we have a long list of LWs that we are looking at and Kudus has no history of playing on the left, he has not played there this season (apart from a couple of times) when we had no LW… can’t see how both Bowen and kudus play together in a 433 unless Kudus plays from deeper.
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Barty
2:57 Thu May 16
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We will need 3 players so Bowen, Kudus plus the left winger is needed
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Barty
2:52 Thu May 16
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*them = Bowen&Kudus
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