The half-time entertainment at Villa Park is simple. A few fans kick a ball towards the halfway line and hope it stays within a circle offering out all manner of prizes.
Chelsea want to pinch that game, “Prize Where It Lies”. They are also in talks with one of Aston Villa’s pitchside presenters after triggering her release clause, and who knows, by next week maybe the catering staff will have swapped Bodymoor Heath for Cobham as well.
This is all in jest, a new social media gag for Villa fans to mask the pain given Chelsea are not finished with them yet after signing Morgan Rogers for a British record £117m.
Now the Blues are coming for Austin MacPhee, the set-piece coach who was instrumental in Villa trailing only Arsenal for such goals in the past three Premier League campaigns.
MacPhee, also seen on the sidelines for Portugal at the World Cup, is in talks with Chelsea, while his parting gift to Villa was a vital role in the Europa League final – his corner routine leading to their opener against Freiburg.
Orchestrated by MacPhee, crossed in by Rogers and volleyed home by Youri Tielemans. Suddenly the recent past reads like ancient history for Villa, with Tielemans having also left for Manchester United.
Tielemans and Rogers are the calibre of player Villa would have loved to build around heading into a second Champions League campaign in three years.
Instead, they face a bigger rebuild than initially foreseen, pushed a couple of steps back while Chelsea get another summer to try and get it right again with a new manager by chucking another £214m – and counting – at the problem ahead of a second season in four without European football.
It is why Villa fans have turned to self-deprecation, because by now they know that no level of banging against a closed door will ever make it open. Financial restraints meant a record fee for Rogers was too good to turn down – there was simply no way of keeping the England international and spending anything close to £100m.
They couldn’t have both and in this regard Villa are not alone. This summer Elliot Anderson has left Nottingham Forest for Manchester City, while Tottenham Hotspur have bought Sandro Tonali from Newcastle United, Mateus Fernandes from West Ham and Jan Paul van Hecke from Brighton.
Newcastle also face a fight to keep captain Bruno Guimaraes amid interest from Arsenal, meaning their Premier League 2030 vision is getting blurrier by the year.
A system that rewards the clubs who entered the elite before the drawbridge was pulled up – and now generate enough revenue to keep spending big – means there is now a ceiling for aspiration, and that is emulating Villa, who themselves know after finishing fourth then sixth then fourth that the more probable direction is down.
To avoid that, Villa must keep faith in a recruitment strategy that has recently bore fruit. Tielemans was a free agent, Rogers bought for an initial £8m. Middlesbrough take a 20 per cent cut of that Rogers fee, but for Villa it is a healthy profit.
Develop, improve, sell, repeat. It is a dangerous game because competition is fierce and moulding players into British records is rare. There have to be risks, and already Villa’s summer highlights that.
The arrival of midfielder Joao Gomes from Wolverhampton Wanderers for £38m appears to be shrewd business. The 25-year-old is four years younger than Tielemans and the reality is that Villa have a Premier League-ready player whose value could at least double in a few years’ time.
Beating Newcastle to Johan Manzambi also offers Villa hope of replacing Rogers, and at 20 they will pray the club-record £59.5m deal one-day reads a bargain. It is no £8m, certainly, but appears to be a coup.
Then there is arguably the greatest gamble of the Unai Emery era in Alejandro Garnacho.
The Argentine has joined from Chelsea on loan with a vague obligation to buy clause, the terms unknown and which may only become clearer if Emery suddenly stops playing the winger – as was the case with Harvey Elliott.
Emery at least wanted Garnacho, although this move has earned Villa little sympathy from those questioning whether a player who recorded five league goals and assists last season is the wisest way of a frustrated club spending, potentially, some of their Rogers money.
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At 22, Garnacho arrives with his prime years ahead of him, like Manzambi and Gomes, meaning Villa are once again tasked with restabilising a player whose star has faded.
It worked for Marcus Rashford, it might do again, and that puts Villa in the spotlight as the standard-bearer for non-Big Six sides – the club outperforming Chelsea and yet powerless to match them financially.
The jokes will continue to land so long as Villa overachieve and cleverly reinvest, but that is no easy task – just ask Leicester City – and they could feel far less funny in 12 months’ time.
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