Eleven arrivals, close to £290m in sales, and a first XI five years younger: a club that started July boxed in by UEFA finished the window with room to spare. Two defeats don’t change what was built.
Villa went into the summer with a UEFA settlement that said, in plain terms: break even this season, and don't add anyone to your Champions League squad unless you have first taken more cost out than you are putting in. Add a €22.5m fine in June for overspending on wages, and the shape of the window was set before a ball was kicked. Sell first. Then buy.
They did both, and they did the second part better than most people expected.
What went out
Morgan Rogers to Chelsea for £117m, a British record. Ezri Konsa to Arsenal for £51m. Ollie Watkins to Al-Hilal for another £51m. Youri Tielemans to Manchester United for his £35m release clause, Lucas Digne to Paris Saint-Germain for his, Emiliano Martínez to Chelsea for £7.5m, Barrenechea and Dobbin for smaller sums. Close to £290m in all.
The important number isn't the fees, it's the profit. Konsa and Watkins were both bought so long ago that their fees had been fully written off, so every pound of those sales counts as profit. Tielemans arrived free. Rogers cost £16m. Villa banked around £245m of profit on players in one window, which is what clears the break-even test on its own.
Look at who left, too. Watkins is 30, Martínez 33, Digne 32, Tielemans 29. Rogers is the one young player sold, and he fetched more than the rest combined.
What came in
Nine permanent signings, roughly £250m in fees before add-ons, and their average age is under 24.
Johan Manzambi, 20, from Freiburg for a club-record package, the Rogers replacement at 10. João Gomes, 25, from Wolves for £38m to partner Kamara. Nicolas Jackson, 25, from Chelsea for £47.5m to lead the line, reunited with the manager who had him at Villarreal. Ibrahim Mbaye, 18, from PSG for about £47m on deadline day, the most expensive teenager Villa have ever bought. Taylor Harwood-Bellis, 24, from Southampton for £25m as Konsa's replacement. Zion Suzuki, 24, from Parma in goal, and Matteo Ruggeri, 24, from Atlético Madrid at left-back. Leon Goretzka, 31, on a free from Bayern Munich, with over 300 games and 18 trophies behind him. Modou Kéba Cissé, 21, from LASK for about £4m as centre-back cover. Alejandro Garnacho and Aaron Wan-Bissaka on loans that turn permanent if things go well.
The price of doing it this way is that the money came from fees, not wages. Each fee is spread over the length of the player's contract, and six of the nine signed to 2031, so the books carry about £50m a year for this summer's signings from now on. That is real, and it is why January will be a quiet window unless someone leaves.
The bit that matters
In July the tightest rule was the Champions League registration one, and it looked like it might block a signing or two. It didn't block any. After every deal is counted Villa still have about £40m a year of room under it, going into January.
UEFA's spending cap measures wages, fees, and agent costs against income, with a limit of 70%. Villa breached it two years running and paid fines both times. On our numbers they sit at 65.7% for December's check. Under the Premier League's version of the same rule, where the limit is 85%, they are at 50.6%, about as comfortable as a club can be. And the break-even target that carried the threat of a European ban is cleared with a surplus of roughly €200m, thanks to the Rogers, Konsa, and Watkins money.
Two caveats, because they are real. Four of the new wages, Goretzka's, Jackson's, Mbaye's, and Harwood-Bellis's, have not been published, so our figures for them are estimates, and the ratios will shift a little when the real numbers land. And Garnacho's £42.5m obligation is not on the books yet; when his appearance clause trips, it takes about a fifth of that £40m of room.
Neither changes the picture. A club that started the summer one bad decision away from a UEFA ban ends it inside every limit, with a first XI whose average age is 24.
The team
At full strength it picks itself: Suzuki; Wan-Bissaka, Harwood-Bellis, Torres, Maatsen; Kamara, Gomes; Mbaye, Manzambi, Garnacho; Jackson. Wan-Bissaka over Cash is the one call Emery hasn't made yet, and it is the right one. Wan-Bissaka is the better one-on-one defender, and with Mbaye in front of him the right side needs someone who covers the ground behind.
The bench is where the difference from last year shows. Goretzka, McGinn, and Buendía as the midfield cover. Abraham behind Jackson. Lindelöf and Mings behind the centre-backs, Ruggeri and Cash behind the full-backs, Hemmings and Alysson wide.
The outlook
The start has been bad, and there is no dressing it up: four goals conceded at Brighton, a Gomes red card in that game that costs him three matches, then a 1-0 home defeat to Arsenal. Zero points from two. Add the Super Cup defeat to PSG and it has been a rough August.
Context, though: the two league games came before Mbaye and Harwood-Bellis arrived, with Manzambi injured, Jackson making his debut, Goretzka still building fitness, and Garnacho yet to start a match. Onana is out until April with his knee, and Madjo's foot keeps him out for a couple more weeks. The side that lost to Arsenal is not the side listed above.
Our season projection, which knows about the results and the new players, has Villa finishing tenth on average, with roughly a one-in-ten chance of the top four and a one-in-twenty chance of going down. That is where a rebuilt team with two defeats sits in September. The Champions League starts in Bruges on September 8th, with Fenerbahçe the first home tie in October and a trip to Barcelona in November.
Rebuilds usually cost a club a season. This one took seven weeks and ended with the books in order. Hull away on Saturday is where it starts to count.