Former Crystal Palace owner Simon Jordan has made a bizarre claim this week, suggesting that if Aston Villa owners Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens are serious enough, the club can lift the Premier League title in the next few seasons.
Jordan was being interviewed by Jim White on his Talksport show on Wednesday morning (11.15am) and such is usual on the station, White asked the bold question of whether we would lift the Premier League title during his lifetime.
A logical and valid question, it’s not like we’re struggling to get out of the Championship at present and come anywhere close to lifting the prize even during the more heady days of Martin O’Neill where we couldn’t get over our sixth place ceiling.
In any event, Jordan who does actually usually speak fondly of the club in my memory, pointed to Manchester City as being proof we could.
“It depends how serious these two billionaires are. Manchester City won the Premier League because people came along and changed the direction of travel. David Bernstein was the Man City chairman, they went back through the leagues, in come Thaksin Shinawatra…then you came in with Sheikh Mansour. Man City have gone back through the pyramid and won the Premier League. So the answer to your question is if Aston Villa’s owners are as serious as Sheikh Mansour, yes there’s a possibility Aston Villa can win the Premier League in the same way that Man City did because quite frankly, Aston Villa are a bigger club than Manchester City.”
Given the darker moments we’ve had in recent years, I’ll happily take the positives of his words but unfortunately for us, it appears he’s forgotten about the constraints of Financial Fair Play as no club can now do what Manchester City, and Chelsea before them did, when it comes to spending at that level to take a quick and speedy advantage over other top flight challengers.
The seriousness of our new duo when it comes to constant investment, constant improvement and their overall game-plan for getting back to the top and then competing will be absolutely key – but their combined wallets alone, football has already closed the door on that possibility.
