Doug Ellis calling an Extraordinary General Meeting held at Villa Park 2nd Nov 1979

Shot of the arrival of Ron and Donald Bendall at the meeting and then Doug Ellis and Eric Houghton arriving at a small stage set up on the pitch at Villa Park. Extract from speech from Doug Ellis including a cut-away shot to a partially obscured Ron Saunders in the crowd. Short extract from speech from Ron Bendall. Shots of the ballot voting which followed in which Ellis failed to achieve the support which he was seeking.

[@benellis9665]

This footage is goldust!

[@richardwhitehead3746]

Wonder what those people jeering Bendall's words about Ron Saunders were saying 18 months later?

[@mrshifter9582]

The true doug Ellis, he was gone after this and success followed, when he came back we were relegated within 3 years and in a complete mess only to be saved by Graham Taylor. Fantastic footage, can we have some more please.

[@Villain1874]

Doug Ellis done far more harm than good. He held the club back with his poor decision making and flawed personality.

[@thevillaaston7811]

Yep. Agree with this.

[@duncanedwards7840]

Bendable & Ellis it appears got an equal amount of boo-ing from what I could tell. R I P. U T V

[@anthonybailey1966]

The irony of it all....the man who appointed our greatest manager wanted him out years later...and to think less than 2 years later we'd be league champions! Doug did a lot for Villa and cared enormously for the club,but as far as his later opinion of Ron Saunders was....he was way off the mark. Even more ironically the man who championed Saunders here,Ron Bendall slipped up letting Saunders walk away from the club....we might well have had a dynasty similar to the great Liverpool team of that era if he had've stayed....the players certainly believed that afterwards!

[@SirTifficat]

Ellis couldn't stand Ron Saunders being a bigger character than he was. He wanted to be the big Mr Aston Villa, surrounded by tabloid stars and deference. There's a great photo of him confronting Ron in the dressing room after we'd beaten Sunderland to gain promotion to the first division. In this moment of victory and celebration the body language of Doug Ellis towards Ron tells you all you need to know. He wanted Ron out.

[@lennylaa1686]

Yes, I should imagine Doug hated all those ''Saaauuuu-nnderrrrrsss'' chants. Must have got his back up. But how would it be possible to immediately sack the manager who got the club back into the top flight at the first time of asking - a magnificent achievement.