Dave Woodhall looks forward to the new season.
Like Christmas, the start of the football season comes round quicker every year and yes, it is because you’re getting old. No sooner had we finished the celebrations for getting into the Champions League than it was time to get the ball rolling again, after a round of pre-season friendlies that just show you can’t judge anything by pre-season friendlies and a summer of transfer dealings that were interesting, to say the least, and haven’t finished yet.
In normal times a team that had finished seventh then fourth would be looking to carry on improving all the way to winning the league but these are not normal times. PSR is rearing ts head in everything we do. It’s the main reason why Douglas Luiz went and why our combination of fabuously wealthy owners and a world-class manager hasn’t broken every transfer record going to replace him. Nobody seems to like the rules, everyone appears to agree on their unfairness and yet, like the North Stand, they’re still there.
And so Unai Emery and the rest of his staff have to wheel and deal in an attempt to carry on that progress, or even equal what we did last season, which in its way was every bit as impressive as anything we’ve done for more than forty years. Unai’s proved that he’s up to the job.
If Villa are going to improve there are a few questions to be answered. Whether Youri Tielemans or one of the new arrivals can replace Luiz, whether we have cover for Boubacar Kamara until he returns. Talking of which, whether Emi Buendia and Tyrone Mings will be able to get back to their previous levels, whether Leon Bailey and Ollie Watkins can recapture the form of last season.
We could do with another central defender as well as a stand-in for Watkins, unless Jhon Duran can stop his nonsense and add a bit more consistency to the promise he showed last year. We could do with Jaden Philogene, Cameron Archer and Ross Barkley returning to be able to step in when required. It’s going to be nothing if not interesting.
There’s also been a lot happening off the pitch, not all of it popular but most of it necessary. Whatever you might think of the Lower Grounds and Terrace View – and the way they were imposed remains diabolical – they’re the level of matchday spending that the club are aiming at.
On a more positive note, the new kit launch was light years away from some of the fiascos we’ve endured over the years. The tie-up with JD Sports is decades overdue, getting Ozzy Osborne onboard was an inspired move and the Times Square billboard an act of genius. Whoever thought of it deserves a pay rise, unless it was Chris Heck. He earns enough already so should be content with the praise that comes from a job well done. It might be apocryphal that he said he was here to make money rather than friends and his ablity to do both is coming to the fore now. Again, we might not like it but when that one hand’s tied behnd your back you have to work twice as hard with the other one.
The draconian rules about lending season tickets show the way the club are going and the fully digital ones are a cock-up waiting to happen. But against that we’ll be playing opposition and travelling to places that even twelve months ago we could only dream about. And most of all, you might hate the Premier League and its grasping avarice, you might hate the club’s blatant preference for wealthy spectators rather than committed supporters, but at half past five on Saturday the Villa are playing. That’s all that matters.
