Another week, what seems like another 500 years of fretting about the Villa.
First of all, welcome aboard to our new members. I know that we have attracted some attention in these uncertain times and we will do all we can to ensure the club is on an even keel. As always though, not only is your voice important but so is that of your friends and family members. Please encourage them to sign up as well. The more members we have the more potent our collective voice is.
So where are we at? Well, the house seems far more secure financially than it was a week ago and for that we are thankful. We are also pleased that the club has been a little more open with statements. But there is still a long way to go until our membership and the wider fan base can feel comfortable again.
What have you lot been up to then, you might ask? Quite a bit as it happens. In fact, we have spent every spare hour possible trying to work out what is going on and helping the club where we can, since that Black Tuesday where the Villa world seemed to cave in.
We have worked on a plan to arrange a fans buyout. Offered to get a campaign together for our support to buy a chunk of the club to help with short-term cash flow issues if they need it. We have even got to the point where our board members will give up time free of charge to help with running things short term if they can make use of us down at Villa Park or Bodymoor Heath. You can rest assured we are doing all we can to put things right.
But that offer comes with responsibility and transparency from the board of AVFC. And, with that in mind, we need a number of questions answered/things resolved.
1) With Tony Xia still in China, who is running the day to day operations at Villa Park currently? Someone signed off on a new deal for Alan Hutton for example.
2) We require an urgent meeting with that individual to work out what we do over the next few months.
3) Competent new CEO’s do not grow on trees; it will take time to organise. But can we be assured we are already actively seeking the right person to take this role on?
4) The forthcoming season starts in the not too distant future. If a decision to release or retain the manager is under discussion, can we have a guarantee that this will be a decision made in the next two weeks?
5) Can the club guarantee sufficient finances are now in place to avoid Administration, ensure we are solvent between now and next May, but also that we can remain competitive in respect of promotion for the 18/19 campaign?
6) Can we have an agreed and briefed medium-term plan to encompass our financial stability and playing strategy? We say there should be no more “one rule for the first team and another for the junior sides” philosophy. The Villa Engine works from the top down or not at all.
7) We demand monthly meetings with the AVFC board when things have settled down to ensure this mess is never allowed to happen again. With that in mind, we also request regular meetings where members of the AVST board meet with our compatriots at the club to understand how we are performing against financial and key business targets as well as being involved in auditing this.
We appreciate that this sounds like a long list of demands but we really aren’t asking for more than who to talk to, seeing how we can help and a bit of oversight. These are the things our supporters are looking to us to organise and broker with the club.
We don’t want the moon on a shiny stick. We just want to know who to talk to and be satisfied things are being resolved.
Over to you Aston Villa!
