Several Mystery Clubs Circle on Potential Aston Villa Player Haul

Mystery Shopper

After a Chinese mystery club has allegedly bid £25m for Jordan Amavi, it’s created a snowball effect as other Chinese Super League teams have turned to Villa as the source for potential players.

Explanations to why a team would value the promising Amavi, who still has defensive question marks to his game, at £25m, are few and far between, after other European suitors have reportedly pitched up around the £8m to £9m mark.

Maybe left-backs are worshipped in the Far East like strikers are over here? Maybe there is added prestige in China to own a former player of Tony Xia? Maybe a team just needs a left-back as the final piece of the jigsaw to win the Chinese Super League and the only scout they have is based in Birmingham and they are confused about the exchange rate?

With the Chinese Super League awash with money (hence why Sven Goran Erickson ended up there to collect more brown paper envelopes), it will now be a real test of the Villa owner Tony Xia’s resolve as mystery clubs swoop like vultures to tempt Villa’s ‘superstars’ east.

Villaboro Mk II

Information reached MOMS HQ  that Middlesborough’s supposed £6.5m bid for Gestede is also under serious threat from a mystery club, which threatens to derail their attempts to build Villaboro Mk II.

With Guzan and Traore already in place, this is an admittedly shonkier version of their original Villaboro in the late 90’s/2000, which included Andy Townsend, Gareth Southgate, Ugo Ehiogu and George Boateng.  

Boro’s bid to bring Gestede back to the Premier League though looks like it will be dwarfed by a rumoured £30m bid from the mystery club that hopes Gestede will help them dominate the Chinese Super League in the foreseeable future.

Rumour has it that the mystery club could be Shanghai Shenhua, who are looking to form a little and large/beauty and the beast strike partnership after recently signing Carlos Tevez from Boca Juniors.

Italian Job

Chinese whispers also suggest that another mystery club from the Far East is looking to make a £50m ‘stunt transfer’ of Villa’s Jordan Veretout just to crush Juventus’s rumoured interest in the French midfielder. In the mooted government-sponsored bid, the idea is allegedly to create a PR event that shows up Serie A to be small-time compared to the Chinese Super League, so in the future Europe’s finest talent will make the CSL their preferred destination.

Offering £25m for a Championship left-back is also believed to be a related strategy to belittle English football in comparison to the CSL in a similar fashion.

MOMS has also been tipped off that Villa’s board is extremely disappointed that the Andre Villas Boas managed Shanghai SIPG have openly declared an interest in Jordan Ayew. The Villa board were hoping that any interest for the Ghanaian striker would come from a ‘mystery club’ because they always offer at least twice the legitimate value of the player.

UTV

A Venglos View is a satirical (and sometimes surreal) look at the Villa…

On a serious note, be aware of transfer rumour stories that mention ‘mystery clubs’ as they are often leaked to the press by agents or clubs to manipulate a situation. Whether to create fake ‘other interest’ to up an actual interested party’s bid (in this case maybe Liverpool for Amavi?), scare off suitors or save face, for example.

Check out other Venglos Views

For more Villa fun and laughs in audio form, listen to the MOMS Podcast: