Hourihane to Villa (confirmed)

[Fergy]

If the sale is done and dusted in the next week, surely that sell on clause must be invested into signing a player (or players) not only capable of ensuring we get out of this league but players capable of excelling in League One next season?

 

[demportdave]

If the sale is done and dusted in the next week, surely that sell on clause must be invested into signing a player (or players) not only capable of ensuring we get out of this league but players capable of excelling in League One next season?

Don't think we should be spending any money on transfer fees in January, pay good wages to get quality loan signings in until the end of the season to get the job done. Too many mistakes are made on (panic) January signings and we don't want to waste our limited transfer budget over-paying for players who are no better that what we already have. In the short term, quality loan signings are a better option in our situation.

Hopefully, we'll be in League 1 next year and the close season is the time to look at what we need to take us forward and perhaps offer longer contracts so that we can built a team around a nucleus of players who are comfortable at that level. There will be a lot of good quality League 1 players available as free agents in the summer and we should be competing for them.

 

[Knibbsworth]

If the sale is done and dusted in the next week, surely that sell on clause must be invested into signing a player (or players) not only capable of ensuring we get out of this league but players capable of exqcelling in League One next season?

We have Liverpool away (estimated £500,000), Liverpool at home (estimated £300,000), Conor Hourihane add ons (estimated £600,000) - that's a total of £1.4m of unbudgeted income in the space of a month.

You'd like to think James Brent and his board will let a little bit trickle down to his manager to make sure we have every chance of promotion this season.

9 days left for us to wrap up our transfer business.

 

[cheshiregreen]

Looks like Villa are keen on ex Argyle players not just Conor.

http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/f ... t-12486207

 

[Quintrell Green]

Looks like Villa are keen on ex Argyle players not just Conor.

http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/f ... t-12486207

Does anyone know whether there is any beneficial 'sell-on' clause attached to Barnes that could possibly come back to Argyle?

 

[Ham Green]

Not a penny.

This wouldn't be his first move since we sold him, and we sold him for a half-bag of wine gums and a kiss on the cheek.

 

[NLG]

If the sale is done and dusted in the next week, surely that sell on clause must be invested into signing a player (or players) not only capable of ensuring we get out of this league but players capable of exqcelling in League One next season?

We have Liverpool away (estimated £500,000), Liverpool at home (estimated £300,000), Conor Hourihane add ons (estimated £600,000) - that's a total of £1.4m of unbudgeted income in the space of a month.

You'd like to think James Brent and his board will let a little bit trickle down to his manager to make sure we have every chance of promotion this season.

9 days left for us to wrap up our transfer business.

Given the current squad are good enough to get us out of this league (results so far), it may be better to put it in the bank ready for the close season, lets make sure we can compete/get out of league 1.

 

[Biggs]

We have Liverpool away (estimated £500,000), Liverpool at home (estimated £300,000), Conor Hourihane add ons (estimated £600,000) - that's a total of £1.4m of unbudgeted income in the space of a month.

You'd like to think James Brent and his board will let a little bit trickle down to his manager to make sure we have every chance of promotion this season.

9 days left for us to wrap up our transfer business.

Where's the 600k for Hourihane come from? I thought it was 20% of a probable 1m fee...?

Edit: just seen the updated transfer fee... That's quite a leap!

 

[Newmansd]

Its now i wish i copied and pasted some of the drivel that was written about him back then.

Him and Lansbury would make Villa into a decent side.

The vast majority rated Conor Hourihane, and I don't think a single fan ever wanted him dropped from the team.

A small minority thought he was negative in his passing selection, but most recognised that was due to Carl Fletcher's ball retention tactics. CH was clearly under instructions to look after the ball.

Hourihane flourished under John Sheridan and became a more complete box-to-box midfielder. Many fans were very angry and disappointed in Brent for accepting £200,000, which was a low winning bid for our STAR player.

At no stage was Hourihane ever thought of as crap or useless when he was at Argyle - that just wasn't the case.

That's very sentimental of you to think in such a way, however I remember many slating Hourihane during his latter days under Sheridan, and a few certainly suggesting that Argyle drop him. Actually, I think he got more abuse under Sheridan than he got while Fletcher was with us.
Of course, we all remember things differently...

 

[demportdave]

Given the current squad are good enough to get us out of this league (results so far), it may be better to put it in the bank ready for the close season, lets make sure we can compete/get out of league 1.

Here we go again, we're already promoted, never mind the little matter of there being almost half a season still to go.

Did you not learn anything from last season?

 

[Knibbsworth]

Its now i wish i copied and pasted some of the drivel that was written about him back then.

Him and Lansbury would make Villa into a decent side.

The vast majority rated Conor Hourihane, and I don't think a single fan ever wanted him dropped from the team.

A small minority thought he was negative in his passing selection, but most recognised that was due to Carl Fletcher's ball retention tactics. CH was clearly under instructions to look after the ball.

Hourihane flourished under John Sheridan and became a more complete box-to-box midfielder. Many fans were very angry and disappointed in Brent for accepting £200,000, which was a low winning bid for our STAR player.

At no stage was Hourihane ever thought of as crap or useless when he was at Argyle - that just wasn't the case.

That's very sentimental of you to think in such a way, however I remember many slating Hourihane during his latter days under Sheridan, and a few certainly suggesting that Argyle drop him. Actually, I think he got more abuse under Sheridan than he got while Fletcher was with us.
Of course, we all remember things differently...

We certainly do Newmansd, he was Sheridan's captain and scored 9 goals in his final season largely from defensive midfield having made 53 appearances. Our options to replace him would have been Luke Young, Dominic Blizzard or Hamza Bencherif - and who was realistically calling for that? It just wasn't ever the case. CH missed only one match that season and it was due to suspension. He was a virtually cast iron key player in centre midfield, our best midfield player by some distance. Free from the shackles of Fletcher's possession tactics, we saw some real quality from CH in his final season. He made vital interceptions in defensive midfield, could playmake, and was our only threat from distance - our only goalscoring threat from midfield at all actually.

When Barnsley offered £100,000 I remember most on here laughing it off as derisory. When we accepted £200,000, many were angry we let our best talent go for relative peanuts when Grimes up the road had not long before transferred for nearly £2m. Some thought it made sense to cash in if he no longer wanted to play here and we loaded add ons into the deal. I don't remember anyone at all saying 'sell him, he's crap anyway'. 'We've still got Dom Blizzard'.

If Hourihane was such a crap unrated player, which he wasn't (that's just how some of you seem to remember it), fans would have been begging to cash the first cheque. I don't remember any fans at all reacting like that. The vast majority of fans wanted to keep Hourihane and turn down the £200,000, including the board according to press reportd, but the player very much forced the situation and made it clear he no longer wanted to play for Argyle.

When we sold Hourihane he was our captain, he was respected and he was missed.

It doesn't make for a fun story, but some fans like to exaggerate that the Argyle crowd is thick - that we all thought Ebanks Blake was 'lazy', that we thought Mackie was a 'headless chicken'. You might have read one or two comments but to say a large part of the fan base felt that about players who were to transfer for millions of pounds is just ignorant. We were gutted to lose SEB at the time and gutted to lose Mackie too. SEB was one of the Championship's leading scorers at the time we lost him due to that contract clause. You keep hearing these revisions of history though.

 

[tandark]

Birmingham Mail reckons £3million!

 

[Lobster]

Do we actually know our sell on percentage? I've seen 10, 20 and 30 written...

Either way, if he goes for £3m then that's another nice little earner.

 

[Voice of Reason]

Knibbsworth - I certainly recall seeing posts/threads about removing him as captain, as he wasn't dynamic enough, too young, over-rated etc etc.
I also remember dozens and dozens of threads moaning about his passing ability. He needs to contribute more etc. If you cant then that's being ultra selective. At the time of his sale we were in no position to bargain, we had barely began to pay off any historical debt and the threat of him leaving for nothing a few months down the line was something the club could not have risked.

He was often maligned despite clearly being way too good for us. A bit like Steve McManaman (our current favourite hate) he looked a world beater at times for Liverpool and Real Madrid, yet for England never really got going, it should be remembered its much easier to play one touch passing when you play with Zidane rather than Carlton Palmer, Tony Dorigo etc.

Well done to Conor, looks like his big pay day is coming, my personal highlight was a cracking goal in a 1-0 win at Wycombe which was my son's first night game, happy times.

 

[davie nine]

These screenshots will probably be deleted by Mods. If so, I apologise but, considering the suggestion that criticism of Hourihane was rare, I thought I would have a look. I won't embarrass anyone by quoting names, except to say that GreenSam's was very positive and I'm sure there were others.

hourihane 0 this lad is not up to league standard unfortunately

Hourihane has dreadful, every pass he made was backwards so negative

And there is no positional excuse to be made for the shamefully negative and cowardly performance he turned in tonight

Overwhelmingly negative and cowardly player. Gets the ball and his first thought it to turn around to see who's behind him to pass to

An awful player who managed to pull the wool for a few people with his 5 yard sideways backwards passes - If only Wotton had the legs to play more games

If he's a suitable captain then I'm the next pope

Hourihane will play at a higher level than the one we're at now. And before I get posts laughing their heads off at that prediction then just take a screenshot of it or bookmark the page and get back to me because I'd be shocked if it isn't the case.

Such a great game eh, virtually every time he touched the ball it went straight to the other side .He is utterly clueless and needs to be dropped for the rest of the season.

I am sure that someone can find some of my posts that would embarrass me.