The Villa Week #4: 808’s and FFP Workarounds

Are you sure you’re capable of keeping up to date with Villa. To be blunt, I don’t think I am. I’m using this column as a learning exercise. Can James Rushton digest everything that happened to Villa in the last week? The answer - maybe, and this column is my test.

I would very much like to seriously start off this column by telling Neil Warnock to f**k off.

There.

Neil Warnock

I wanted to warm to him. I seriously did, then he went all ‘Brexit means Brexit’ to the rather nice Nuno Espirito Santo, and accused the Portuguese of lacking class.

Nuno, the Wolves manager, got lost in the moment and forgot to shake Warnock’s hand after Nuno’s side beat Warnock’s Cardiff.

Bare in mind that Nuno had just seen his side survive not one, but TWO last minute penalties. Bare in mind that this cemented the title and promotion for Wolves. Keep this all in mind as you envision Nuno celebrating with his boys, before running to apologise to Warnock, who was waddling off, screaming curses into the wind. Did somebody mention class? Oh, it was Neil? Ok.

Even after Villa’s victory over his side, the Cardiff manager seemed unable to process it, claiming that Aston Villa fans celebrated like they had won the World Cup. Joke’s on you Neil, that’s impossible. What’s more, he said that his side, dropping from 2nd to 3rd, will relish being the hunters, rather than the hunted. THAT’S NOT HOW THIS WORKS MATE.

Ask yourself how a man, unable to get over a handshake (or lack thereof), is emotionally stable enough to be a leader of men. A well-paid leader of men at that.

Adam Wright

Instead of Warnock, let’s focus on someone a bit more inspiring. Adam Wright is a very unique Villan. Why? Well, I’ll let him do the talking.

Massive credit to Adam, BBC WM, Dan Rolinson and the Villa View for this. What a video.

Cardiff

Villa asked questions of the automatic promotion places, questions that are answered with the word ‘Fulham’. Still, it’s nice to throw the slightest bit of chaos into the proceedings, and Villa did just that by beating Cardiff.

How did Villa beat Cardiff? Oh, by letting Jack Grealish accept a ball from the Gods before hitting the ball extremely hard on the volley against the goalpost and into the back of the net. Let’s watch it again.

And again.

Norwich

However, the Cardiff win is dampened by the Norwich defeat. Still, Josh Murphy’s goal against us was the type of goal to make me think things like ‘you know what, football is actually very fun and good.’ If people like Josh Murphy can score goals like that, then football is the best sport in the universe and damn, if you’re going to define the goal that damned Villa to the play-offs, then I’m glad it was one like Josh Murphy’s. What a bloody smack of the ball it was.

It’s still maddening how Villa seem to swagger from game to game with a drunken allure, sometimes winning with aplomb, sometimes losing and passing out in the gutter. Villa are a very human team.

Sponsorship

Aston Villa have today announced that they will be changing the name of their training ground from Bodymoor Heath to the Recon Training Complex.

Still, we’re all going to call it Bodymoor Heath, aren’t we. Do we really care what the corporate name of a certain place is? No. Because we will call it the name that we have come to know it by. Some might come to refer to it as the RTC or something like that, and friends, that is absolutely cool.

This has raised questions about Villa’s sponsorship, since they are pretty much sponsoring themselves with this move. With financial fair play considerations to think of if Villa stay in the Championship, it is thought that sponsoring themselves via internal methods might be a bypass to some restrictions.

However, it’s no golden bullet. Villa can’t just say f**k this, give themselves millions and expect the EFL to be satisfied. There is almost a ‘fair use’ policy with this sponsorship method, so if Villa are giving themselves more money than they would get through normal sponsorship methods, expect Villa to get punished.

That being said, AVFC are probably going to Recon-ify their kit, their stadium and everything else. We’re in for a wild one off the pitch if Villa stay in the Championship next season.

New Kits

Aston Villa will be getting new kits at the end of the season, in time for the new season. This much is a given. However, Villa have broken up with Under Armour ahead of time and will be consoling themselves with a new and innovative partnership that will ‘benefit the fans’.

Yup, Villa will probably be making their own kits. I broke down potential kit partners, and yeah, I think we’ve covered the bases here.

Leeds

Villa are incredibly inconsistent right now, so you’d expect them to lose or draw this match due to the fact it’s only three days out from the last match. However, it’s at home, so Villa could be equally as inconsistent and win two games in three days. It’d be great.

Leeds are in a state. The type of team you’d want to take to therapy and actually help out. You’d sit down with them, and they’d be surrounded by the crushed, twisted corpses of beer cans. They smell bad and their eyes are sad. If they were a dog, they might get put down, or happily rehabilitated.

“Leeds, you.. You just need to get your s**t together. Also, please cut your hair.”

With that being said, please beat the living piss out of them, Villa.

See you next week.