Tales from not-the Top Flight

Some big transfers have been taking place in the second tier but the one dominating the back pages is John Terry’s move to Aston Villa. Yes the former England captain has left his beloved Chelsea and joined Steve Bruce’s merry band of men from the Midlands otherwise known as Aston Villa. So lets see if we can answer the question on everybody’s (well at least my own) lips. Is John Terry still good enough? Can he still preform at a high level in the Championship and lead Aston Villa to promotion. Admittedly that was two questions but lets get into them.

So is John Terry still good enough? There’s plenty of arguments to say that JT is past it. The centre-back will be 37 in December which effectively makes him a dinosaur in footballing years. He also only played nine Premier League games last season, with most of those coming at the start of the campaign so there has to be serious doubts over his fitness. Terry also wasn’t very good the season before last, although to be fair not many Chelsea players were. Terry will also have to acclimatize to playing alongside Nathan Baker and Neil Taylor, as opposed to Ashley Cole and Frank Lampard.

There are plenty of reasons why JT may well be a smash hit in the Championship for Aston Villa next season. His experience at the very top level will be tremendously helpful to all the players in the Villa squad, plus Terry will not fear the pressure of a promotion push one bit. While Terry may well have lost that ‘yard of pace’ it is important to remember that he is playing the Championship, a league that while physically demanding does not possess anywhere near the quality of the Premier League. Plus JT is being managed by Steve Bruce and if that doesn’t spur you on to success then surely nothing will.

In some other transfer news Joe Hart has also been linked to Aston Villa, which won’t happen, and the mighty Boro are finally making some moves in the market as Johnny Howson and Cyrus Christie have been heavily linked. Nottingham Forest have raided Rangers to sign Barrie McKay while they’re doing their best to hold on to Britt Assombalonga.

Finally I think we need to mention Carl Ikeme. The Wolves goal keeper has been diagnosed with acute leukaemia, a very nasty disease to be dealing with. Here at Tales, and indeed the whole FMG family, we would like to extend our thoughts and prayers to Carl and his family. Carl is a warrior on and off the pitch and we know he can beat this.