Following comments from Habib Beye after his move to Doncaster stating that he hoped he doesn’t come back to Villa Park, the feeling is probably seen as mutual.

With Beye commanding a fairly hefty weekly salary for a “player” who rarely plays a game of football, it could be argued that Beye was the figurehead of resentment epitomising what Martin O’Neill and Randy Lerner’s gamble on players left behind following the Ulsterman’s exit from B6.

The question has to remain though – is Habib Beye really that bad?

From Winner To Sinner

In Beye’s final full season at Newcastle, he was voted player of the year at St. James Park. Whilst this was a season where Newcastle suffered their drop into the Championship, surely Beye’s rating as outstanding amongst his peers must have counted for something.

Which, arguably, is what draw Martin O’Neill to his purchase. O’Neill, no stranger to the concept of raiding relegated clubs such as Watford and Middlesbrough, engaged in the same formula when looking at Beye.

Here was a player, in O’Neill’s eyes at least, who could demonstrate determination in a team that went down due to a lack of it. From that analysis, it seems almost unfathomable that Beye could have turned out the way he has appeared to.

Instead, he’s now at Doncaster in the Championship. With all due respect to Doncaster, Beye had demonstrated more in his career than playing in the Championship entails.

One question is why hasn’t he taken to football at Aston Villa. The bigger question is whether he is part of another issue in terms of players not succeeding at the club. I imagine hype, hope, and desperation probably plays a part when it comes to Aston Villa.

Who Is The Problem?

Some players obviously fail at clubs. This isn’t a solely Villa problem as we all know. Some players just aren’t good enough. We should know as we have had many during our history. Sasa Curcic is one that always comes to mind. Bosko Balaban another.

Perhaps Beye was much like Curcic – a good player for one club, but unable to transfer that ability to another.

Perhaps Newcastle was the ideal place for him given his position as Player of the Year, although one would say that in a season involving relegation, I doubt Habib had the same idea.

Perhaps he left, in fact I’d say for certain he left, because he was offered more money at Villa.

The reality is that Villa have become known as something of a group of overpaying people which, ironically, actually goes against financial diligence on the part of the board. We all know that some things in life cost a lot of money, but overpaying is rarely good. Overpaying doesn’t just mean spending a lot of money it, rather obviously, indicated a poor value choice.

All of this is somewhat contradictory. Knowing what I know about the club, there’s a very strange manner in how business is conducted. Strange may not be even the right way of describing it, but it certainly isn’t consonant with logic or financial aptitude. Of course, many of these decisions, such as evaluating the value of a player, need industry knowledge. One can’t hope to pay market value for a product if you don’t know what market value is.

Add to this the fact that transferring a player is nothing like buying a used car. There isn’t an industry standard book you can buy listing valuations of players over the years. Price isn’t indicative of value as we all know either.

Just look at the fact that Javier Hernandez cost £6m and Torres £50m. That’s what you get when you compare the sensibility of a football man vs a non-football man. One will get you value, the other will just spend money. In Villa’s current economic client, it shouldn’t really be the case that Villa can’t afford a football advisor to the board, more that they can’t afford to not have one.

Spending money indiscriminately isn’t the solution to every problem. If it was, then the economy would be booming. Instead, we’re left with a system that is fraught with issues due to bad value choices. Villa, as an entity, are no different.

Following such bad choices, the residual problem is the same as any fool finds trying to resell a magic product to some other unsuspecting customer – the queue isn’t very long. You’ll shift the good players like Barry, Young, and Milner because others want them. The average players? Not so much, unless you’re willing to heavily discount them.

Sidwell came in for £5m, and left for £250k. Davies came for £10m, and left for a couple of million. If players don’t play well, through skill or lack of selection, they aren’t going to retail well to future customers.

After all, who’d buy an average player at over the odds?

Oh yes, I forgot, Aston Villa.

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