Aston Villa: Remi Garde To Consider Future After Transfer Blank

After Aston Villa failed to make a single signing in January new French manager Remi Garde will consider his future at the club, according to the Daily Star. He says there were financial constraints that saw him miss out on all of his January targets. Garde says Villa moved the goalposts, deciding not to spend on the reinforcements who could have brought Premier League safety.

"Maybe it was not as clear when I signed, but it's something that I don't want to discuss too much. I understand that you cannot carry on doing the same things when you have not been as successful as you have wanted." "The situation of a team at the bottom of the table was not easy for players but that was not the only reason. It was also a financial problem. Probably the club realised mistakes has been made in the past, probably they didn't want to do it again. "As a new manager I would have expected new faces to support my changes. I made a recommendation to the board to try to sign players for the team because we needed that. In some games we are close to competing, but we need a little bit of quality."

"I cannot do more. I tried to sign them, I worked on very hard, but for different reasons we couldn't."

Garde apparently wanted strikers Seydou Doumbia and Wahbi Khazri but saw them join relegation rivals Newcastle and Sunderland respectively, and the club saw their only successful bid - for goalkeeper Lovre Kalinic - fall apart because of work permit issues. Paul Merson spoke to Sky Sports News to give his assessment, suggesting that the club are now dead certs to be relegated, questioning why they didn't go for Jordan Rhodes before he moved to Middlesbrough. Niall Quinn called the lack of activity a "white flag of surrender", likening the club's current situation with five years ago when they were rooted to the bottom of the league and went out and paid a massive fee for Darren Bent from Sunderland. Ultimately he saved them, but they'll have to look within for their next messiah. You have to feel sorry for Garde: he was brought in to save the club and he's had to watch as the clubs at the bottom of the league strengthen as his side have stuck with their cards. You really can't blame him if he leaves.