I agree it helps if people pay you enormously over the odds for players

but I even if other teams paid a whopping ?23m over the odds for the players they bought off Saints (actually quite possible) the players bought in are still only as valuable than those sold so the standard of team play should be about the same.

The bit about youth structures is irrelevant - nobody is blaming Lambert for the fact that Saints are better overall as they're (as you say) just a much better run club - we're only talking here about progress this season compared to last.

Incidentally Villa have a VERY highly rated academy syatem and actually won Europe's youth European Cup (the NextGen Series) just two years ago against the likes of Barcelona, Arsenal & Chelsea.

Posted By: mr carra, Feb 16, 15:02:49