Vital Villa stalwart McGrath4Pope gave his thoughts on the passing of Doug Ellis on our Forum the other day, and whilst I don’t agree with it all, I thought it deserved a wider audience and I’m imagining it might spark a few comments as well as love him or loathe him, the self-named stand does still split opinions even to this day, although I do imagine he quietly relished that.
It’s no surprise where I sit on the Ellis debates, but I’ve bolded the most salient point.
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It is interesting how highly Doug is being spoken of by players/managers who served under him. The likes of Dean Saunders, Paul Merson, Paul McGrath, Ian Taylor etc have utterly sung his praises. Now I’m not suggesting that the opinions of the European Cup winners who were disgracefully shunned by him should be ignored but maybe it shows that things are rarely black and white – there are always shades of grey.
I’m a football fan who grew up in the 90s and whilst I always thought the man lacked the ambition to really go for it when it mattered I never hated him as much as others seemed to. Indeed, when living in Durham and moaning about him once I was met by a load of Geordies saying to me “you moan, but he always puts the money up” – which utterly shocked me! However, whilst everyone remembers us not paying the extra £500k for Robbie Keane it’s easy to forget that he gave Gregory nearly £7m for Steve Stone (outrageous money at the time).
I can’t deny he did well out of us but – shades of grey again – I always felt he acted on what he thought was best. In the end, I wanted him gone like everyone else, the game had passed him by and we couldn’t even afford to sign the awful Eirik Bakke. But even then there was something about him that I liked and always did. When he sold to Lerner I believe he gifted the club something like £30m(?).
(Ed – he gave our Academy a small donation following the sale from memory).
Since selling the man still turned up every week, regardless of ill health whilst the custodians at the time hid.
He was in no way perfect, but also did a tremendous amount of good for charities and for the City of Birmingham. He was also one of the last of the ‘old-school’ characters in football before the bland commercial state of affairs we find today became the norm.
I didn’t understand the call for applause a few weeks ago and felt it was unnecessary and undeserved. However, now that he’s gone there is no battle to be fought anymore and, like it or not, Doug Ellis will go down in history as a significant figure at Aston Villa, the man deserves his minute’s silence as a mark of respect.
I understand those who disagree, but the answer is simple – come up to your seat 2mins later, just before kick off.
To be honest though, I do have faith that even the most fervent anti-Ellis Villan would have more class than to disrespect the minute’s silence.
Writer: McGrath4Pope
