OPINION
After the financial meltdown which threw the future of the very club in doubt this summer, Aston Villa fans would have been hoping to see the last of any drama before the end of the transfer window.
That does not look to be the case.
After seeing three new names through the door, all of them bolstering the back line, it looked as though Steve Bruce was ready to add another name and make it a quartet of defensive reinforcements, with Bristol City’s Joe Bryan reported by the Birmingham Mail to be extremely close to joining heading into the final days of the market.
However, the Sun journalist Alan Nixon has made a stunning revelation over Bryan’s future, stating that Fulham have made a late bid to snap him up from under the Villans’ nose, despite having reportedly already spent two days with Villa, a medical being completed and just the deal to be signed.
Fans at Villa Park must be raging over their side’s inability to push a deal through that was practically all but done, and there will be serious questions asked over the club’s transfer policy.
Why did he spend two days at Villa Park without signing the deal?
Did the club make an improved offer to try and convince him to sign?
Have Bruce and his transfer team got other targets lined up?
Fulham might be a Premier League side but it is no excuse for allowing the full back to slip through their fingers as spectacularly as they appear to.
After what they have endured so far this summer, Villa fans are right to be aggrieved at this stunning turn of events, and it is not the start the new owners would have wanted.