Villa fans should be confident

If the season started tomorrow and the transfer window closed tonight Aston Villa definitely break that top six – no doubts at all.

Arguably Man Ure are actually the only team in the whole of the Premiership that has a stronger squad than last season and the very few signings that have occurred in other teams are pretty much like for like, e.g.: Barton for Parker, Aliadiere for Viduka.

Possibly you could argue Spurzzz have further pulled ahead of us with the signing of Bale, but how can anyone be sure when he’s never played at this level?

So why would I think that a team that limped to 11th is now a sure fire bet for that elusive top-six despite selling players and not strengthening in the slightest?

Our best right back in Delaney didn’t even kick a ball last season. Our sole world class player played barely a quarter of the season, but the difference Laursen made was immense.

Our left back Bouma was truly horrendous for half the season. Then it clicked and he looked immense.

Petrov has been homesick and doing a lot travelling and this appears to have affected his form. Myself, I think that McCann affected his form as he changed his game accordingly or simply didn`t have the confidence in his midfield partner. McCann has left and Stan should now have settled into life at VP.

Gardener looked a very classy player when he finally got his chance but we only saw him for a handful of games. The reserve/youth teams record goalscorer spent the vast majority of the season out on the wing. Then he finally switched up front he looked more comfortable and started regularly scoring.

We didn’t lose a game for the first few months of the season with Luke Moore in the squad. He then missed almost all the remainder with an injury.

Carew, Young and Maloney were only here for less than a half a season but we’ve all seen enough to be very excited about the prospect of a full season. The youngsters are another year wiser.

In short: An entire season with all these players will make a massive difference on our league position and nobody else has stolen a march on us in the transfer market either.

I’m with The General – DON’T PANIC MR AVFC48. We haven`t lost any ground on others and unlike all others our team will be a lot stronger (injury permitting) than all the others over the course of this season compared to last.

It’s all irrelevant anyway because we will be signing half a dozen players, and I think one will be the proverbial ‘bums on seats’ type signing that will make the world sit up and take note.

By Beefy