WAT IS GOING ON AT VILLA?
I MUST admit I was blown away by Villa spending £31million on Ollie Watkins.
And my first thought was, are the Premier League clubs being told something about the fans coming back that the rest of the country doesn’t know yet?
I’m not having a go at Watkins – he looks a good player and he works his socks off and, added to that, he played under Dean Smith at Brentford, so the manager knows his character and what he is capable of.
Yet so many clubs are spending big money this summer... when it looks from the outside that the issues with TV deals being dropped or renegotiated, and the absence of fans, means they must be losing millions.
Someone close to negotiations suggested to me the top-flight clubs are facing losses of previously guaranteed revenues of up to a BILLION pounds between them, if the coronavirus crisis continues.
So the only thing I can assume is that these
Premier League bigwigs have had conversations with the government, and been given some sort of indication that fans will be allowed back soon – even if that seems so unlikely to the rest of us.
Honestly, I can’t think of any other reason for all this spending when you must be so unsure of your income. Nothing else makes sense.
I hope Watkins is a success – he looks a good player and a good lad, and I would really like to see players from the Championship prove themselves in the Premier League.
But for Villa’s sake, I hope it’s not a gamble too far – because these are still frighteningly uncertain times for most football clubs.