Worrying times at Villa

Friday, 22/07/2011

by Steven Green, Shoot's Aston Villa blogger

After the delight felt by fans at the club securing their first signing of the season (and a great one at that!) a harsh blow was dealt to those expecting more.

Sources around the club have claimed that only “one more major outfield signing” will be made over the summer following the arrival of Shay Given. That player is thought to be Charles N’Zogbia.

Players are needed at Villa and that’s a fact. After releasing ten players only just over a month ago Villa are now left with a select few of capable first team players and a host of promising, but largely untested youngsters. Hardly promising when you have a new manager already under pressure before the season has even started.

This leads one to wonder if times really are hard at Villa with talk of cutting the wage bill rife. An interesting anomaly popped up on the official website too, prompting further speculation over the state of affairs.

Villa have been allocated 350 tickets for an upcoming friendly with Portuguese club SC Braga priced at £18.02 each. A strange number to add on to the end there but if Villa manage to sell out that allocation they stand to make an extra £7.00. There will most likely be little prices hikes like this every now and again throughout the season.

We’re all too used to boring summer transfer saga’s at Villa now but this one is worrying. The players currently at the club need improving, especially since losing Young and Downing and right now mid-table mediocrity looks as good as it’s going to get.

In other news the club played it’s first pre-season game yesterday, running out 3-1 winners against Walsall. Darren Bent scored twice and Emile Heskey added the third.

Also, making his debut was Shay Given. He played the first 45 minutes and managed to keep a clean sheet. A great start for a terrific replacement for Brad Friedel and at 35-years -old is still a baby for a keeper. We can look forward to seeing him in action once he regains match sharpness.

I could ramble on about how many players we could and probably should buy, reeling off a whole list of names but it seems rather pointless now, conservation seems to be the name of the game now and it’s all so depressingly familiar.

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