Saint Matty 76

Yep. Went off the boil a bit towards the end (who didn't) but I think he's a great prospect who I was worried about losing due to remaining contract length. Look forward to seeing him alongside a better partner (hopefully) next year.

Yeah I'm all for filling out the squad in certain areas, but another not particularly great AM/Winger is the last of our worries. Pretty much an identical player profile to Elyounoussi/Armstrong too, just at a lower level.

That takes Villa to about a £300m net spend over the past 3 years, mental.

Agreed, sounds good but how many post-season Telegraph/Athletic pieces have we had talking about how much we'll do, which has led to literally nothing.

McNeil played 38 games this season and scored 0 goals, he is the absolute last thing we need. Before that... 36 games, 2 goals. 38 games, 2 goals. There wasn't particularly anything impressive about Weghorst either, who even got dropped for their most important games.

Yeah, this is something I tried to say a few weeks ago but it's hard to voice it correctly when you're in the midst of such bad form. I do really still think we're overachieving with the ambition shown from the club in the past 3-5 years.

He's got 2 goals in 2 games in his last two starts on the wing for Liverpool. Imagine he'd be one of the 10s.

Ah, well one year left on the deal pretty much rules out the idea of a loan.

Apparently a good source for Liverpool stuff. I'd be very happy with this one on loan, be a bit sceptical if we're dropping £20m~ outright given the injury concerns.

KWP too. And Ings became a 22 goal PL striker. It's a bit pointless to just hammer in one side whilst ignoring the other, for sure.

Ah, wasn’t sure which part your comment was aimed at. Fully agree with you.

I guess you can put a lot of it down to owner limitations in recent years? I can’t imagine we were happy with our dealings over the past few windows, but we just didn’t have a choice until Gao had gone. It’s been very clear recently that we’ve had to sell to buy, even when we should have realistically had money in the bank. If we have to sell to buy this Summer (with only one sellable asset in the club…) under the new ownership, then we won’t survive much longer in the league.

Pretty much echoing everybody else but absolutely the following; GK: Ideally somebody to come in immediately and be first choice, although it wouldn't at all surprise me for us to take a punt on a younger name and let them (quickly) overtake McCarthy. Similar to what Ramsdale did this year at Arsenal. (B. Dragowski, G. Bazunu, N. Pope, D. Henderson) CB: I hope to god we get rid of Bednarek, and partner Salisu with somebody dependable and experienced. I'm not devastated with Lyanco and Stephens as 3rd/4th choice, but would like to improve there as well if at all possible. This definitely feels like a position where I don't want us to take a punt on a younger player for a change, but it's obviously likely. (J. Tarkowski, J. Worrall, J. Gomez) DM: It's a bit depressing as based on how he's pushed on at PSV, Sangare would've been a perfect signing and one which we missed out on due to ridiculous PL ruling. We need somebody to push Romeu, and Diallo looks to be more of a rotation option for JWP rather than the more defensive spot. Kamara from Marseille would've been nice but he's just gone to Villa. (I. Sangare, Y. Etiki, S. Berge) AM: They're all just terrible. Hopefully we're losing a few this year and the ones who've got loads of minutes this year will be less prominent, but Stu Armstrong is the only one who I'm happy to see start out of the list of wingers/attacking midfielders we currently have. (B. Johnson, Tete, M. Cornet, M. Edwards) ST: If we're persisting with 4-2-2-2, then I'm happy for Che to be one of our starting strikers. It's been a frustrating/bad year with Armstrong but I'm happy to have him around for another year as 3rd choice. I'd take Broja back on loan for another year, but I'm feeling that's a little unlikely at this point. It's probably the hardest position for us to get right, as we've seen the difference between having a player of Ings' quality and... not. (A. Broja, L. Delap, E. Dennis, M. Thuram, B. Embolo) My main takeaway is that it's difficult to know which pot we're looking in, whether it's similar to beforehand or we're now capable of looking at players we've previously missed out on.

100% agree. I worry that Tarkowski in particular will have far better suitors, sadly.

In a season of pretty much no positives, Ward-Prowse getting 10 league goals is impressive.

Well, there's the "is Lyanco actually any good" question answered.

What on earth has Che done wrong? Thought he was our best player v Brighton recently.

West Ham are buying Areola I believe. Doesn't look like there's a whole host of options for Pope around, but then again does anyone really see us forking out money for a player without any resale value?

I don't mind having Redmond or Elyounoussi around as options if we can't get a fee for them this Summer. I'm just fed up of the situation where our selection of winger/10s is so poor that they get as much game opportunity as they do. The rest on that list (other than JWP, obviously...) can go with the inclusion of Djenepo.

Rail replacement bus after the game getting me home for 1:30am, anyone predicting it to be worthwhile? 😆 Actually got a feeling we’ll draw 1-1.

"His new club is Southampton". Maybe a mis-translation but done according to this Polish source.

Probably just hopeful thinking more than anything. I like to think given the level he was playing we wouldn't have offered him an additional 2/3 years on the already inflated wage he was at.

I’m happy that we haven’t fallen for Forster’s end of season form. If McCarthy has had his wages significantly cut then I’m not disappointed with this situation, as long as he doesn’t see a PL minute next year.

I’m not even too sure sadly! Fulham and Bournemouth coming up have both spent more than we have on a player. I do agree though, however I feel like he may end up at the Leicester/West Ham level rather than us.

The 19 Premier League teams other than us I’d imagine.