Aston Villa Banter Archive March 08 2014

08 Mar 2014 15:05:52
Lots of genuine comments ref. players willing to come to Birmingham. Benteke even thought he was going somewhere else! The city is a great city but is not within the scope of most players minds. They don't have to live in the city or even close by but they do need to be impressed by the surroundings and VP is not the best postcode in the city. Birmingham is not a top European city even though historically it is important, so names do not want to know unless the pay packet is very big. A few years back it was said that Middlesbrough took players to ayersome park after dark so they could not see the area! When the chance came to build a stadium at the NEC the council should have gone for it but they backed out leaving the city with 2/3 teams in the middle of houses where the were built nearly 150 years ago. What a lift this would have given to the city, and what an opportunity for our AVFC to bring players direct into a ground direct from the airport. Rant completed!

You raise an interesting point Old Villain. But, taking Barcelona as comparison, Camp Nou is nothing to look at from the outside and is not in a salubrious part of the city
I think a lot of the old established clubs are historically located in inner city areas due to the fact that when they were originally built, they needed to be close to large centres of population who did not possess private transport (Wolves and Newcastle are 2 good examples). I think the biggest problem for Villa is the image of the city rather than the location of the ground.

Hi mendax, that is the point I was making. Most of the world see our city as a less than desirable place to be seen. So how can we get top players to come to VP. You mention Newcastle, but they have an unbelievable image in Europe regardless of the heavy drinking culture. Nothing can be done about the image of our city until which is such a shame. I have a friend who some years ago had a connection with the city side and they realised that the city was the problem with signing quality players.

Yep, I don't think Timothy Spall in Auf Wiedersehen Pet did us any favours.
Benny from Crossroads was no help either

I think a Villa team challenging for honours would also help.
I am a Brummie and proud of it, but our teams performances and immediate prospects will surely affect our chances of signing proven quality players.

Villadave