We joined Villa on 23rd June, giving us plenty of time to overhaul the squad and bring in the players that we wanted.
One player already at the club was Sebastian Frankle - who we sold to Villa as Blackburn manager for £45m! He was one of just two first team players under the age of 25, so it was quite clear that we’d be signing some younger players to join him.
Upon joining there was £70m in the bank but the finances have been a bit up and down over the last few years. But that just makes it even more ridiculous that the Blackburn board were only giving us £50m to spend!
We were also able to expand that budget even more by selling some squad players, including 34 year old Ollie Watkins and central midfielder Gustavo Assuncao.
In return, we have spent £101m on players and the window isn’t even over yet!
My first signing as Villa manager was Junior, an attacking full-back who I tried to bring to Blackburn many times but he just wasn’t interested. I’ll be retraining him as a conventional left-back rather than using him as a winger this season.
Yuri Kane was the 2nd Brazilian to join us and, just like Junior, was a player who I’ve had on my radar for a while.
Next up was the big one.
Centre back was an area I wanted to improve on, so I went all out and spent £51m on Jon Casado from Athletic Bilbao
It was Villa’s record transfer fee but I think it will be worthwhile. He’s one of the best players at the club and is still only 22.
The last major transfer was another defender as we paid Bayer Leverkusen £26m for Alex Taylor, who can play right back or centre back.
So it was only 4 major signings, but if you sort our players by my scout's opinion on their current ability then those 4 signings are our best 4 players.
There are some familiar names at the club including Ezri Konsa and Douglas Luiz (who have both spent their entire careers here) as well Trevor Chalobah, Aaron Ramsdale and Conor Gallagher.
I should probably know who Matheus Cunha and Gabriel Vidovic are in real life… but they are here too and look like 2 very decent players as well!
The season preview has us down as 3rd favourites, but that is genuinely wrong. We’re about the 8th or 9th best team in the league on paper, which is why the board only expect a top half finish
A few weird bugs like that seem to be popping up in the save now, including the fact that Nnamdi Ofoborh is going to be joining Cincinnati on the 1st January 1900…
My former club Blackburn are predicted to finish 14th this season and have appointed Roger Schmidt as my successor. It’s a pretty decent appointment for them as he won the Carabao Cup and Europa Conference League whilst manager of Leeds before being sacked from Elland Road last season.
Our first match in charge of Villa will be away against current title holders Man United so is the toughest game we could’ve got!
So as long as we don’t get off to a dodgy start this campaign, I am hoping to take Villa to the levels that I could only dream about at Blackburn.
European qualification is very much the aim this season.