Habib Beye has left Aston Villa by mutual consent.

The 34-year-old defender will now be parking his Ferrari at the Keepmoat for the foreseeable future, as his emergency loan to Doncaster Rovers will now become a permanent move. Beye was signed from Newcastle United prior to the 2009-10 season for a transfer fee around £2.5m to a three-year deal. His wages are reported to be in excess of £40k/week. The resources expended on Beye coupled with his inability to break into the team (and disastrously bad play when he did) have led to him becoming a symbol of the financial irresponsibility engaged in by the club during Martin O'Neill's time in charge.

Watching Beye on the pitch, it's hard to believe he was once a key player for Marseille. Beye's decline phase came quickly, and it seemingly coincided with his putting pen to paper on his deal with Aston Villa. In all, Beye made 18 appearances (with 15 starts) in all competitions over his two-and-a-half year Villa career. None of them were good. All of them were expensive. Perhaps the amount of the stick Beye has gotten these past few years is out of step with how much he actually deserves, but he is by many accounts a nasty prick of a man and I'm sure the £6.5m he's been paid by Aston Villa should offer some solace.

Farewell, Habib Beye. I do not wish you the best of luck, and you will most certainly not be missed.

According to Jack Bell of the New York Times, MLS club New York Red Bulls have set their sights on Stephen Ireland to bolster their midfield. This rumor seems absolutely nuts, and for good reason; it is absolutely nuts! You know what else is absolutely nuts? The people running the New York Red Bulls. Were we talking about any other club in MLS, I'd dismiss this rumor out of hand. But when you're not dealing with rational actors, it becomes tougher to gauge what's realistic and what isn't. Sporting Director Eric Solér and manager Hans Backe are just crazy enough to pursue Ireland. But despite what may be legitimate interest, the odds of this actually coming off are almost non-existent.

MLS has been successful as of late in attracting talented younger players from Europe and Latin America, and anyone that follows the league closely will tell you that its reputation as a "retirement league" for aging stars isn't really based in reality. Still, Ireland is a step above the level of player MLS has had success in attracting. Designated Players (players exempt from the salary cap, of which each team is allowed three) come in two distinct flavors: there's the aging superstar looking to expand their profile and earn one last big paycheck (Beckham, Henry, Rafa Marquez) and there's the increasingly prevalent trend of younger players from (typically) Latin America that view MLS as a stepping stone to a top European or South American league (Fredy Montero, Diego Chará, Fabián Castillo.)

At this point, no MLS team has been successful in attracting a first-team player in the prime of their career from a top European League. There may come a time when that happens, but the league faces a lot of challenges in doing so; even if MLS were the top league in the Americas (and it's closer to 4th, behind Brazil, Argentina and Mexico) it would be at a tremendous disadvantage. Professional athletes typically want to play at as high a level as possible, and there's no level higher than one of the top four European Leagues. The prestige, the opportunity to play in European competitions and the highest level of play in the world are all things no leagues other than the top flight in England, Spain, Germany and Italy can offer.

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It's typically Arsenal fans who bitch and moan about being left out on Transfer Window Deadline Day, but we Aston Villa supporters are stuck with nothing as well.

"I’ve totally ignored the transfer deadline. I keep saying we’ve got a wage bill to manage and we’ve not really wavered from that," said Alex McLeish.

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It's that time again! The transfer window will be closing in less than 24 hours, and as we've seen in years gone past something crazy is likely to happen. It won't involve Aston Villa, of course; I think at this point it would be an enormous shock if any moves are made before the day is up. Still, what happens to other teams matters to Villa as well and we're all football fans in any case; the transfer window deadline is always nuts, even on the rare occasion nothing happens.

The fine people at SB Nation Soccer will be all over things today, so be sure to keep an eye on things over there. Stuff is happening already; Djibril Cisse looks to be on the verge of making a move to QPR, and the south London club have already landed AS Nancy Lorraine midfielder Samba Diakite. Everton have taken advantage of the financial trouble at Rangers in order to bring in striker Nikica Jelavic. Chelsea have been busy trying to snap up young prospects, making an offer for Nottingham Forest striker Patrick Bamford and bringing Racing Genk playmaker Kevin De Bruyne to London for a medical.

QPR is far enough down the table that they aren't of major concern at the moment, but assuming they land Cisse they may well have just saved themselves from relegation. Djibril isn't nearly the player he used to be, but he fills a pretty gaping hole in the team and still has enough left in the tank to be an asset. Diakite is a very good young player, and bringing him in was an excellent move for QPR; it's officially just a loan, but if they like what they see and manage to avoid the drop, he'll probably be at Loftus Road next season. What Chelsea does is somewhat irrelevant to Villa in a direct sense, but the fact that Everton managed to find the money needed to strengthen their squad while Villa sit on their hands is somewhat disheartening. With Rangers looking to offload players in order to prepare for a coming financial reckoning, perhaps this may have been an opportune time for Alex McLeish to renew his interest in midfielder Steven Davis?

At any rate, consider this your home for all things transfer deadline day. Thoughts on the moves being made? Hear any fun rumors? Feel like venting about Villa's skinflintery? Give us your thoughts in the comments!

Most of you will probably remember this video starring Stewart Downing, released by Aston Villa as part of their season ticket drive ahead of last season:

It was part of a series that also included Ashley Young, James Milner, John Carew and Carlos Cuellar, a nice little viral ad campaign that used video manipulation trickery similar to that employed by Powerade in a few wildly successful commercials a few years back. Predictably, a few gullible souls were tricked into thinking the commercials were real (and they invariably took to the virtual streets proclaiming to have "found out" Villa when the ruse was revealed to them.) It also turns out that some pretty high-ranking folks at Liverpool were fooled as well, and it may even have been the thing drew their attention to Stewart Downing in the first place:

There was some footage of Stewart where he was, from 30 yards away, kicking a football into five different trash cans and it was brilliant. John and I said: "Oh my God, this player is brilliant, we’ve got to figure out a way to make a deal with him."

--Tom Werner, Chairman of Liverpool Football Club

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Normally this is the sort of story that would have me dancing a jig of glee: Emile Heskey, James Collins, Habib Beye and Carlos Cuellar are set to leave Aston Villa in pursuit of clubs that actually, you know, want them. These four leaving would free up £10million and Randy Lerner would double that amount, giving Alex McLeish £20m to play with in the summer. And, of course, AML has a proven record of being responsible with money and only bringing in the most talented of players.

It's almost certain Emile Heskey will go. He's 34 years old and, well, not very good. It's been rumored for quite some time that he'll be on his way to Leicester. Perhaps we'll replace him with a Jamaican striker?

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Jamaican newspaper the Gleaner -backed up by the Daily Mirror's James Nursey- are reporting that 19-year-old striker Brian Brown has pulled out of national team camp in order to come to Villa for a trial. Brown was Jamaican high school football's most prolific scorer over the past two years. The Gleaner also reports that he has turned down multiple offers from Red Stripe Premier League clubs and is also entertaining scholarship offers from numerous American universities. Also, his nickname is Rambo. Which is amazing.

I do actually pay a little bit of attention to football in the Caribbean because it's heavily scouted by MLS and the US national team faces teams from the region during CONCACAF tournaments. With that being said, I hadn't heard of Brown until this morning and none of the go-to sources I use for information about Caribbean football seem to know much about him either. That being said, a 19-year-old that's broken numerous schoolboy records and has been called up to the senior national team sounds like the kind of player worth bringing in for a trial. Not a whole lot of risk, and given the relative under-scouting of the region we could end up with a pretty special player if things break right.

The big Aston Villa story today comes to us courtesy of Sky Sports (and probably other places, too) and it's sure to elicit a completely reasonable and appropriate response from Villa fans; Alex McLeish has stated that, unless players are sold - something he does not appear to be expecting - there will be no further signings in the January transfer window. McLeish specifically addresses James Collins, acknowledging that there is likely a fair amount of interest but claiming that "there's not been an approach as such." The most recent semi-plausible Villa transfer rumor has connected Collins to Blackburn, with Villa sending the player and cash to Rovers in exchange for defender Scott Dann.

If you've been paying attention, this isn't news. At all. This is what we heard in August, and save for a week where McLeish seemed to be publicly asking for funds before completely dropping the issue and returning to the company line, it's what we've heard any time a reporter has inquired about potential transfer dealings. Once again, the wage bill is the main focus of the issue, and I think that's encouraging; Villa have some players making some pretty hefty wages, and if Lerner is willing to pony up for transfer fees so long as the wage bill stays under control then we could actually see some movement. But that's pure speculation, and I don't think we're going to get any clearer an indication that someone has to go before anyone else is brought in.

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