Ewan Kingsbury

Sun 15 September 2024 11:00, UK

Aston Villa’s former chief Keith Wyness has claimed his old side have shown they “don’t care” how revenues are raised after two big controversies.

Speaking on the new edition of Football Insider’s Inside Track podcast, the 66-year-old – who served as CEO at Villa Park between 2016 and 2018 and now runs a football consultancy advising elite clubs –insisted increasing fan costs won’t make a significant dent in reducing the club’s losses for Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR) purposes.

Aston Villa have apologised to fans after attempting to double disabled fan parking prices to £380 a season – which worked out at £20 per game.

Meanwhile, the Midlands giants have set prices at up to £97 per game for this season’s Champions League home fixtures.

Business president Chris Heck has responded, claiming that “achieving our sporting ambitions while complying with financial stability regulations requires difficult decisions”.

Villa had to sell Douglas Luiz early in the summer window to avoid a potential points deduction for breaching PSR.

Aston Villa attitude ‘won’t fly with traditional fans’, says Wyness

Wyness told Football Insider‘s Insider Track podcast: “PSR is in the mix, but these increases won’t be the main way to make the losses smaller at Villa.

“Player trading will still be the main issue for that.

“They’re looking at all the revenue streams they can, and I get that. But there has to be a sensitivity.

“This has been led by Chris Heck, who was with Philadelphia in the NBA.

“He’s got a record of doing this in the US, raising prices. It seems pretty clear that Villa want to get the revenue up, and they don’t care how they do it.

“That doesn’t fly so well with the traditional fans, particularly the ones in the Birmingham area.”

In other news, Villa reject offers from 40 clubs for star man.

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