If you expect the worst you’re never disappointed. Unless you’re expecting news about injured Villa players, then the worst would probably be a relief. Boubacar Kamara’s out for the rest of the season. But Leon Bailey’s back, which may or may not be good news.

We have, apparently, agreed terms with Roma for Tammy Abraham. There’s also talk of Douglas Luiz coming in on loan; insert your own punchline here.

The team flies out to Istanbul with Emiliano Martinez missing, which should be good for anther few hundred rumours.

We’re fourteenth in the Deloitte Football Money League for 2024-25, with a turnover of £390 million. You could say well done to Chris Heck for a lot of it but nothing that gives him any credit should be allowed.

Later on the same day we did our best to add to this season’s figure by winning at Fenerbahce. The team was much as expected, with Tyrone Mings starting, Lamare Bogarde in the team and a few unknowns in the squad. Not that this was a problem, because Villa were on top from start to finish. Jadon Sancho opened the scoring with a header worthy of any centre-forward after a deflected cross and had another shot kicked off the line after that. Morgan Rogers scored from the loose ball but it had come off the ref so was disallowed.

Rogers had another one disallowed in the second half and Matty Cash hit the post, then they scored to show what happens when a Turkish team equalise. Mighty impressive it looked as well, although they all looked a bit daft a couple of minutes later when it was disallowed.

Youri Tielemans gave everyone something to talk about when he had a bit of a squabble with the boss after being substituted and we managed to have three players booked in the last couple of minutes plus stoppages, which isn’t bad. Then the other results mean we’ve qualified straight into the knockout stages and we’re second in the group. All in all a good night and after the fuss that was made about the police operation everything went smoothly off the pitch as well.

While the team flies back to Birmingham, Tammy flies to Manchester with a few assorted club officials. £18 million is the figure doing the rounds, with Yasin Ozcan included/on top permanently/on loan.

Then it was off to Newcastle, not quite as far as Istanbul but colder and the locals speak worse English. There’s a rumour that Morgan Rogers is injured, which for a change isn’t true. They could have scored after 38 seconds but the best keeper in the world showed that he still is and the other Emi was just as good at the opposite end. Martinez made a borderline miraculous save as half-time approached and that was about the last chance Newcastle had.

Villa dominated the second half without having to work too hard then with a couple of minutes left Ollie Watkins got the second. We did of course get another midfield injury, this time Tielemans. We’re back on track and even more noticeably there’s a (very) few observers talking about us being in the title race. Wonders never cease.