Are Villa a better team without Grealish?

So Jack has gone to join the Oil Sheiks up in Manchester for a Premier League record fee of £100M. Personally, I think it’s a little sad that he didn’t buy fully into the vision sold to him by Dean and the owners. But hey, such is life. Does this mean that those plans are now in tatters following his transfer? Far from it from what I can see.

Last season was a hell of a ride culminating in our 7-2 home win to Liverpool. And who could forget the 3-0 away win at Arsenal? This was a bright new Villa, full of attacking prowess with a rock-solid defence behind them. But roll forward a few months and the whole team were isolating from COVID and the kids were left to face Liverpool in the cup. Prior to that Ross Barkley got injured and never fully recovered. The COVID outbreak came at just the wrong time for him. Then we had the man himself pick up an innocuous injury that seemed to last forever. During this time, we struggled to pick up points due to an apparent lack of creativity. Were we still too reliant on one man?

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Last season we bought wisely, picking up Emi Martinez for a snip from Arsenal (madness on their part…) and adding Matty Cash to the already pretty solid defence. Up front, we bought in Olly Watkins for a then-record fee of £28M and paid £17M for Bertrand Traore. In this transfer window, we have gone one better. Paying a new record fee of £33M for Emi Buendia from Norwich who was arguably their best player last year. We bought Leon Bailey from Bayer Leverkusen for a fee of around £25M, he is a player who is extremely quick and nimble-footed so should bring some excitement to match day. And then there is Danny Ings, a top goalscorer, who we paid £25M for from Southampton. He should be looking to bag a hatful of goals with the players who will surround him up-front. He’s already begun in the friendly with the new Serie A team Salernitana. Not forgetting Ashley Young, a free from Inter who will add vital experience and set-pieces. There’s also Axel Tuanzebe returning for his second loan spell from Man. Utd who will add cover to the defence.

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Of course, we will miss Jack, but with these new additions to our team, I feel that the future is bright. I haven’t even mentioned our kids who have also been looking sharp, especially Jaden Philogene-Bidace and Carney Chukwuemeka. Both made their debut’s last season and neither looked out of place, I hope they are both given more first-team experience.