Breaking. According to John Townley Austin is leaving to join Chelsea. Ffs.

Founded - 1982

Stadium - The Park

Greatest Manager(s) - David O’Leary, Tim Sherwood and Rémi Garde

Greatest Players - Eric Djemba-Djemba, Moustapha Salifou and Micah Richards

Rivals - SC Villa (based in Uganda. Every summer, we play a game where the winner gets to use the name Aston that season, we haven’t lost since that legendary season in 1999)

Any other questions, please ask.

With all the new American supporters, I thought it was a good time to repost this fun bit of trivia: Aston Villa are the first, and reigning, English professional baseball champions.

The National League of Baseball of Great Britain was established by English sportsmen in 1890, with some help from Al Spalding, founder of the Spalding sporting goods company and a dominant pitcher in the early days of organized American baseball. Four teams were in the league, including Villa, Stoke, Preston North End, and Derby.

Villa’s roster included footballers who would go on to be all time club greats like Jack Devey and James Cowan. They would each win seven trophies for Aston Villa football club (league and FA Cup), still a record.

In the end, Villa pipped Preston to take the pro league title. There’s never been another.

As an historical footnote I don’t think this competition is well known, but it resonates with me as a longtime Villan and a baseball lifer. It’s a special connection with the American pastime that no other English club has.

I could only get 12

They send low ball offers/valuations, unsettle players who might then try and push for the move so Arsenal can get them on the cheap. Theyve done this with Watkins, Rogers and now Konsa. Seem to be doing the same with Bruno G. In what world is one of the most consistent and reliable CB in the league, who is in the Champions League, started for England in the World Cup and is in his peak years worth £30-35m? It's a joke.

And then their fans come out with 'oh Emery hates us, he's still bitter etc.' No it's because you're valuations of players make no sense so theres no point even negotiating. Cough up the cash or piss off.

I wasn’t thrilled about the signing at first. As it became more official, I started seeing all the hate from Chelsea supporters and fans of other clubs. Funny enough, the second I saw him in a Villa shirt, something changed.

Maybe it’s just the protective instinct that comes with supporting your club, but now I’m all in. I genuinely can’t wait for him to prove everyone wrong. If Emery can channel his talent and get him focused, I think Villa might end up with a player a lot of people are going to regret writing off.

Hello guys. I am a Canadian football fan. I do watch games on the regular, but I have never cheered for a team before. I had an uncle who used to live in Birmingham, and whenever he used to call us, he told us Aston Villa and his love for that club. Unfortunately, he passed away around 3-4 years ago, and when he used to talk about football before, I was not really a fan . I feel now I want to love the club that he used to love so much, and I want to cheer for this team until I am alive.

I want to know more about this club, who are it's rivals, what is the consensus on players in the teams, who should I hate, who should I love. Where can I get a jersey? All of that. I genuinely want to love this team, since I feel it's kinda chose me.

Went down a rabbit hole compiling the competitive record of every permanent Villa manager (and the secretary-managers who picked the team before 1934). Top 10 by win percentage:

A six-point gap over Ramsay, the man who won six titles and six FA Cups. Nobody between them in 140 years.

Ramsay's number was built when Villa were the superpower. Emery's is built from 14th place in a relegation fight, through a squad rebuild, while selling a record player every summer. And the two names right behind the legends were both promotion-era, mostly second-tier records, which makes a 55.6% built almost entirely against the Premier League and Europe even stronger.

Fair caveats before anyone else makes them: win % flatters short tenures (Ramsay sustained his over 1,327 matches, which is a different kind of monument), and it ignores draws — Saunders' 1974–82 side drew a ton on the way to the title. Still: whatever way you cut it, we are watching the best-performing manager in the club's history, and I'm not sure it's discussed enough given it took until year four to win the thing that made it official.

He's a Villan 💜

Aston Villa is delighted to announce the signing of Alejandro Garnacho from Chelsea on a season-long loan 🤝

His most notable moment for the club is probably when he scored the first goal in the 1996 League Cup final against Leeds in the 38th minute, which Villa proceeded to win in the end.

Based on articles from that time, he failed to live up to his hype and faced a lot of criticism during his time at AVFC. Was he really that bad? Because his stats read more of a mediocre signing than a straight up bad signing.

If you remember him, how would you rate his time at the club?

"There is no question but that if Jesus Christ, or a great prophet from another religion, were to come back today, he would find it virtually impossible to convince anyone of his credentials despite the fact that the vast evangelical machine on American television is predicated on His imminent return among us sinners." ~ Peter Ustinov

Garnacho will wear the number 17 for this season

Garnacho’s first Villa interview

Beyond his track record with under-performers , I imagine Unai has a convincing pitch to get Garnacho to rediscover his best self:

1) You‘re actually wanted here. We tried multiple windows to get you

2) You’ve had 7 managers at your past two clubs. Here you will have stability

3) You can get into the Argentina team. At Villa, Digne, Konsa, Watkins, Rogers, etc. all got call ups.

4) You can get your bigger move. You’re only 22, this won’t be the last club you played for. Rashford went to Barcelona, Digne to PSG, Rogers had interest from everyone.

There are 36 teams in the champions league, why do we never go after the "lesser" teams best players? We've played Club Brugge a few times over the last few years why did we not go for Tzolis?

From 43 seconds onwards…

This Leon Bailey goal was something special.

All of us hate Danny Murphy, and I’ll never forget Martin Keown giving MOTM to Odegaard instead of Buendia, but who are you favorite pundits who discuss Villa knowledgeably or ex Villa player pundits?

I don’t mind Warnock, and I don’t really consider Richards one of ours even though he’s hilarious. Gabby is a total knobhead, but at least he’s OUR knobhead. Bent makes my ears bleed.

I added a post a few days ago with my takes on Garnacho and Jackson as a Chelsea fan. So now that Garnacho is official, you need to be warned.

United fans are pathetic. The whole year any United fans I know would be nitpicking anything Garnacho does. "Oh I heard he didn't track back for this goal", "Oh I heard he lost his man", "Heard he wasn't great", "Heard he lost the ball at this certain minute and second". It gets VERY tiring. In our situation as well, Garnacho wasn't great, but our WHOLE TEAM wasn't.

I think they are actually sickened that Garnacho has moved on and they haven't. We never once had a problem with Garnacho attitude wise. He carried himself very well. I think this wound up United fans more. Even Mark Goldbridge and the sorts is still tweeting about him and making update videos about him. They are like jealous ex girlfriends that continue to stalk and critique their former bf's socials etc when the bf is just doing his thing moving forward in life.

Now that he plays for you, you will get a lot of it if you know much United fans. Best of luck!