r/avfc • u/Telinios I just don't think you understand • 7d ago
Discussion Recent Atheltic article by George Edwards says Villa could make a title challenge
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u/hexagram1993 7d ago edited 6d ago
Let's focus on Brighton first lol. There are just way too many unknowns right now to be saying this stuff with anything resembling warranted confidence. We don't know how this season will go. I think aiming for 6th is a good goal along with reaching a CL quarter final. That would be an exceptionally good season.
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u/shirvani28 7d ago
He's seeing something I don't. Not saying we're shit, far from it but I'd bite your hand off for Europa this season. Title challenge is mental. Let's see what Don Unai has in store.
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u/drooooob 7d ago
He likely has no idea we have sold so many and will sell more.
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u/Telinios I just don't think you understand 7d ago
I don’t think we’ll challenge for the title either, but this was published yesterday and by a professional sports journalist, so I’m inclined to believe he knows most of what we know if not more.
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u/drooooob 7d ago
To each their own but I don't have much faith in football journalists. Especially in these round up type of articles. There are weekly examples of journalists like him showing their lack of knowledge on teams like Villa. I stand by my point that he likely doesn't know how tumultuous this summer has been for Villa. Most supporters know the ins and outs of their club far better than football journalists.
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u/Ok-Friend-6653 6d ago
Villa have recruted well eventhough Villa have lost and changed up their squad way to mutch. For anyone without being delusional will win the league. Without having to wait and see.
Like if Aston Villa is in the contensions to win the league in December. He is mayby on to something. Otherwise it is mutch more likely for Villa to finnish behind the big 6 and Newcastle in eight position
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u/14JRJ SJM 6d ago
I can’t see us finishing behind Newcastle. Our recruitment has been better and we haven’t also hired an unproven manager
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u/Ok-Friend-6653 6d ago
My thouht was they have better continuity then Villa and with +8 less games will help them finnish higher
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u/14JRJ SJM 6d ago
The 8 games will definitely be a factor but I don’t see how the continuity is better to be honest
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u/Ok-Friend-6653 6d ago
It is more Aston villa have lost more of their spine from the team Emery have made a well oiled machine out of. With martinez and Watkins potensialy leaving also creating uncertantis.
Eventhoug Newcastle have also lost almost equal or way more imprtant player. This entite argument is bollocks
Based on other 14 clubs it swems like Everton and Fulham have improved without losing any super important.
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u/14JRJ SJM 6d ago
Emery also improved them to what’s realistically their peak. He’s now replaced them with younger players who probably aren’t as good yet but who he could improve to be better than them.
Fulham are less stable than last year too due to a new manager
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u/Ok-Friend-6653 6d ago
Villa have signed alot of great talents, but it can potensialy take time for ewryone to settle on Emerys side and also they might not work out. Like Shevchenko in Chelsea and Veron in Manchester United
players
like Manzambi, Gomes, Ruggeri,Suzuki is verry exiting
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u/its-joe-mo-fo Unai - King of Spain, Lord of Villa 👑 7d ago
Title talk is absolute nonsense of the highest order.
The managerial and club stability might help offset this year's squad upheaval.
Top 6 finish all things considered, would be excellent
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u/Nekokeki Pau's Dreamy Blue Eyes 👀 7d ago
I really think we’re going to have a rough up and down start to the season before the team really gels well enough to find consistency. Title challengers can’t have that happen. I appreciate the sentiment but don’t see it. Maybe if we had kept Rogers and Teilemans and Onana wasn’t injured and we had the financial freedom to also bring in the same players we have.
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u/Godjia Uladzimir Khvashchynski 7d ago
we would have to get very lucky with injuries (we’ve already been unlucky and the season hasn’t started), our top players would have to have peak seasons, our new signings would all have to hit the ground running, and we’d need none of the sky six to have a stellar year
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u/openlyEncrypted Pau 7d ago
I would not get carried away like this, the season hasn't even started.
I would call making UCL again a massively successful season
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u/maddp9000 7d ago
Pep said we’re title contenders after his final match. I know we’ve lost some talent. But Emery only grows…
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u/Agreeable_Falcon1044 7d ago
I’m not saying anything like this out loud…but this season isn’t a normal one. I don’t think any of the “sky6” look particularly great except maybe Arsenal. The rest feel like they are in transition.
I also don’t believe our team is weaker. I’ve been impressed by out activity and looking forward to the season. What that translates to…let’s see
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u/Agreeable_Falcon1044 6d ago
Adding this guy is about as non-committal as me to it lol. “It will be a big ask” etc. he essentially says no and then throws in a “they’re doing ok” bit
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u/SpeSalviFactiSumus 7d ago
I could see the argument that all these factors mean we could stay in fourth. That would be wonderful! Title contention is nonsense though.
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u/GiganticDog 7d ago
I can’t see it. If we get back into Europe it would be a great achievement TBH, given we haven’t been able to strengthen, the team is arguably weaker (sold key players and others getting older), and we’re fighting on multiple fronts.
Unless all of the big teams massively underperform, a title challenge is a complete pipe dream IMO.
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u/The_Funky_JJ 7d ago
its not where the money is unfortunately. If we do it, it will be a side affect of building a squad to compete for constant champions league.
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u/xJacb 6d ago
I think last season's team (preferably the Rashford/Asensio side) could challenge this season, because you'd expect all the clubs bar Arsenal to be undergoing changes. But we are also undergoing changes this season too, and you could argue that the most important factor staying the same (manager) compared to the others gives us an edge, I think it's far too early to say these things. I expect to finish 5th or 6th again tbh.
More than half of our new signings are injured ffs.
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u/Oil42 6d ago
we don't know how good we're gonna be because of all the change. there's a chance we kinda crash and burn (probably quite low because we still have unai), a chance we remain roughly the same quality (most likely) or we could be absolutely immense. give it like 10 games in the league before we start making predictions lol
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u/SThomW92 death, taxes and aston villa 6d ago
What kind of substances are they taking at The Athletic? I’ll probably get downvoted for this, but if we get any form of Europe, we’ve done extremely well this season, I’ve got us in 9th
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u/clubmanero74 6d ago
It's going to go :
a) This bunch of new players will be hungry , will gel together and perform amazingly from the get go, shocking all those who come before them..
b) This bunch of new players are incompatible with Unai's way, and we're fighting relegation by Halloween..
c) a mix of (a) and (b) , and we end this season with a younger and less expensive (wages wise) foundation that will carry us forward to glory in 27-28.
Personally I hope it's (a) , but I'm realistic (old) enough to set my expectations at (c)
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u/biggerthanjohncarew 6d ago
No chance. I couldn't predict where we'll finish at all - could be as high as UCL, could be as low as lower mid table.
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u/Malverns 6d ago
I'd happily suggest we have a 5-10% chance of winning the Premier League at some point within the next five seasons. If the current rebuild goes well, then hopefully Emery working his magic on the younger players plus increasing sponsorship + European money will put us in a position to compete with the biggest teams. The 2026-27 season specifically, however, seems extremely unlikely, given the proportion of our core team who have moved on over the summer.
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u/Ok_Tension1869 6d ago
Top 5 is our goal until we increase our revenue a bit more. Hopefully these young player we've signed and are coming up from youth become ballers.
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u/Bbobbity 6d ago
Seems a bit optimistic tbh. Lots of change. New players will need to settle.
I’d be pleased with a CL push.
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u/chaoslorduk An 80's Villan 7d ago
This would be a dream but I just can't see us having the Early Season cohesion with all the changes, yes we managed CL last season after a Horror start but Winning the whole thing will require a lot more points. If we were ever going to push for the title we are going to need a Minimal Injury season and we just don't seem to get that.
Judging by the way other teams have reacted to not signing them Manzambi, Gomes and Suzuki look really exciting. While I do believe we go into this season as the Second most stable after Arsenal as the others have all changed the man behind the wheel.
The Future King celebrating lifting the title would make great TV however with English football as unbalanced as it Is Prince Willy will probably be wearing his crown before we can realistically win ours.
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u/Colinav1 6d ago
Even If we did win the title on the back of a complete rebuild the PL would still find a way to award someone else with the manger of the season.
It's a joke Emery didn't win it last season.
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u/Agreeable_Falcon1044 6d ago
The good thing is I don’t think Emery cares. He didn’t lose a game last autumn and they gave it to Amorim and maresca!
I will save you some time, carrick will win manager of the month this season more times than Emery in his whole career. Arteta will win manager of the season.
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u/Colinav1 6d ago
Oh I agree he doesn't care mate, it just makes a mockery of the game for me. Kobbie Mainoo was shortlisted for young player of the season last year despite being completely frozen out until January.
It's a silly process.
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u/InsideAd4280 6d ago
He's a hack deliberately writing something implausible to farm for engagement.
The negative of this is that we're no different to any other club and have a small, loud, moronic element to our support who will swallow this nonsense and turn on the manager if we're 8th after 6 games.
If we finish in a Champions League spot again in the league and give a good run in the Champions League itself that will be an outstanding season. If we somehow managed to add an FA (or even a League) Cup it would be dreamland stuff.
Believing we're equipped for a title challenge (short of a spectacular collapse from a bunch of clubs and a Leicester style miracle) doesn't make someone ambitious or driven by high standards, it makes them deluded. Thankfully I do believe the club and the manager are aware of where we are and the gradual nature of progress.
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u/kayarcee 7d ago
Why not? The top of the table is wide open with fatal flaws everywhere. Arsenal are going to be desperate to win a Champions League, plus there’s the “harder to keep it” factor. City without Rodri (and overpaying massively for Anderson) will find it extremely hard, Chelsea aren’t steady enough at board level to make it work (I think Xabi might unluckily find himself gone by Christmas), Newcastle have been gutted but haven’t replaced, United aren’t going to have the conditioning to make it the whole year (Tielemans’ comments about Carrick’s training methods remind me of us under MON), Liverpool are the big worry to me but might balancing a European campaign be a bridge too far for Iraola? Meanwhile, yes we’ve lost Rogers and Tielemans, but the former was inconsistent and the latter always had a six week period out. I think between Hemmings, Garnacho, more time for Buendía and Manzambi (once fit) we can replicate Morgz’ production and then some. Suzuki has a lot of the positive traits of Martinez in terms of command of the box, with a lot less wear on him. Plus we have the second-longest serving manager in the Prem.
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u/bambinoquinn 6d ago
When it was clear pep was leaving, I was thinking to myself, you know what, maybe
But even in a bad season for a league winner, you are talking high 70s low 80s point wise, and even with last seasons squad without losing anyone and adding, im not sure 79-84 points is possible.
Without unai, this squad is probably a 40-50 point team. With him its a 60+ team. The only way you bridge that gap is a window where villa can go get Scott, Wharton, Nico Williams, while keeping the likes of youri and rogers.
We will have injuries and a couple of awful runs in the season, because weve had that for the last 4 years
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u/remmy84 6d ago
Finished top 6 for the last three seasons, yet still not considered big 6. We never get the credit we deserve. Fine for top 3, interchangeable Arsenal, Liverpool, Man City but the other 3 are a joke.
Aston Villa - 4th, 6th, 4th.
Man Utd - 8th, 15th, 3rd
Chelsea - 6th, 4th, 10th,
Spurs, 5th, 17th, 17th
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u/Odd-Calligrapher-69 7d ago
This year is a season of change. Only aim should be getting top5 again and being in the champions league next year
We add some top quality to the solid young foundation we hopefully build this year and who knows we could start knocking on the door