Aston Villa flavoured news has been a little thin on the ground recently, but here’s a few things that have been going on in the last few days that caught my interest:-

World Cup Squad

This is happening right now and whispers started last night that it’s our Stephen Warnock who will be Ashley Cole’s understudy, not Everton’s Leighton Baines. Neither will play unless Cole is injured and, from what I’ve seen of Baines in an England shirt, I know which I’d have more trust in to handle the pressure.

On a personal note, I started following someone on Twitter who runs or writes for an Everton site over the weekend, but unfollowed them last night after a little rant about what a “disgrace” it would be if Warnock “took Baines’ World Cup spot”. Oh dear. To be honest, I thought that I had already unfollowed them earlier in the day after this person opined that England didn’t need to take 3 goalkeepers to South Africa. Perhaps they were thinking of Baines, but they ought to take a quick glance at the rules or even give some thought to why it’s a 23 man squad, not a 22 man squad.

Other strong rumours floating around at the moment about England’s final 23 are that Michael Carrick is definitely in and Darren Bent definitely out. As I write, I’m seeing hints that Theo Walcott has also been cut from the squad, which is fine by me, he’s already been to one World Cup he didn’t deserve to. I’m also seeing word that SWP, Defoe and Joe Cole are all in.

I think we all know that James Milner will definitely be in and Emile Heskey will probably make it too. We shall see shortly, but three Villans in the World Cup squad will be no bad thing, even if it’s not the three that most fans would pick. [I’ll update the full squad here if and when]

Transfers

The much linked Jermaine Beckford has completed a move from Leeds to Everton, so we’ll hear no more about that and I was amused at the swiftness of the club’s denial of any interest in Birmingham’s latest signing; Nikola Zigic. A player we’ve been linked with in the past and previous denied equally vehemently. Not that the newspapers pay any attention and the rain of ridiculous and unfounded transfer rumours continue unabated.

Pre-Season Schedule

We’ve had a couple of summer pre-season friendlies announced in addition to the two games in Portugal. We’ll play Walsall at their place on July 27th and Valencia are coming to Villa Park on Friday August 6th.

I’d expect maybe another fixture or two to be announced at some point and I’ll probably create a section here just for Pre-Season.

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