Giant Nap

I'm still coming to terms with the fact that Ellis is definately selling Villa.

I'm not expecting/wanting things to happen in the same way as they did for Chelsea for the following reasons:

- Chelsea were already in the Champions League when Bates sold the club. Without Champions League football we can't attract the truly world class merceneries.

- Chelsea have overspent. They've paid too much for a lot of their players and most of the ones they've sold were at a loss.

- Villa have a youth policy

- Villa had fans before 1997 whereas Chelsea didn't (well not the amounts they now appear to have)

The soundbite I keep hearing is "Evolution not revolution". I couldn't agree more.

O'Neill might want to sign a decent winger and some creative midfielders but other than that there isn't a real problem with the players we already have. And nothing motivates quite like the threat of sweeping changes during the January transfer window.

Several players have hinted (And Angel has actually said) that O'Leary had fallen out with a lot of them and wasn't treating them right. His man management skills were lacklustre whereas O'Neill's are legendary.

To be fair to O'Leary for the most part he signed some good players. Bouma and Laursen will prove there worth this season, Sorenson and McCann have already done so and if Berger and Phillips stay fit I'm sure they'll offer a good contribution.

The problem was how he dealt with the players he had. As I'm sure Peter Crouch will testify, he was far too quick to give players the cold shoulder treatment and ruin any kind of confidence they'd built up. Berson had potential but O'Leary had decided early on that he wasn't the player he'd wanted and so let him rot in the reserves.

Not only that but O'Leary had an obsession with going back to what he had at Leeds (literally). At the start of the close-season he was trying to sign Bakke but Ellis was having none of it stating that he wasn't prepared to fork out for a player that couldn't even get into a Championship sides first XI. I can't think of an occasion when Ellis has publically criticised a manager in his employment. He's normally complimentary to them right up to the point where he sacks them.

But I for one have to give credit where it is due to Doug Ellis. Villa could have been in a better position without him but they could have been in a much worse one as well.
I just think that he should have left about five years ago instead of now. Up until then he'd consistantly managed to record a profit for Villa, one of only two clubs in the premiership, the other one being Manchester United.
We could have ended up like Leeds United or Nottingham Forest. But we didn't.

Lerner has bought a club for a fraction of the amount the Glaziers paid for United that has no debts and a potential to bring in far more money than it is right now.

I'm just ordered the new shirt as a celebration of the occasion... I'd buy a season ticket if I didn't live 250 miles away.