the "financial dangerzone" and was officially placed in the second category. According to club chairman Eric Gudde, the placing in the more favourable category came earlier than anticipated; he also congratulated the fans and promised to maintain the same policy until Feyenoord was completely healthy again, saying the club will never fall back into the first category. Despite no longer having to request permission from the KNVB to invest in new players, Feyenoord kept continuing the policy for the 2012–13 season, only contracting players who were either out of contract or available for a low transfer fee. John Goossens, Ruud Vormer and Daryl Janmaat were out of contract and signed a deal with Feyenoord over their respective prior clubs. Mitchell te Vrede played for the affiliated football club Excelsior, as well as for the highest-ranked academy team Jong Feyenoord/Excelsior and was promoted to the main senior team. Harmeet Singh and Lex Immers were the only two players whom Feyenoord paid a transfer fee for. Singh, a Norwegian midfielder and one of two non-Eredivisie players joining Feyenoord, was purchased from Vålerenga, while Immers joined from ADO Den Haag. The other non-Eredivisie player joining Feyenoord was Omar Elabdellaoui, who was brought in on loan from Manchester City. On 2 July 2012, Karim El Ahmadi completed his transfer from Feyenoord to English Premier League club Aston Villa for an undisclosed fee believed to be in the region of €2.6 million. On 15 July, Aston Villa supports uploaded a picture on Twitter which showed Ron Vlaar, Feyenoord captain since 2010–11, visiting Villa Park – Aston Villa's home ground – in Birmingham. Shortly after, Martin van Geel confirmed Vlaar sought to leave Feyenoord. After the incident, Villa did not contact Vlaar, prompting Ronald Koeman to issue Villa a deadline of 23 July to negotiate Vlaar's transfer. On 23 July, Vlaar told the public that he would not leave Feyenoord, and said that he felt he was kept "dangling" by Villa. However, four days later, Vlaar told the public he would eventually be joining Villa, as he had agreed personal terms and would sign for Villa subject to him passing a medical. On 1 August, Vlaar officially joined Aston Villa, signing a three-year contract. Feyenoord supporters received the news generally mixed, with some congratulating and wishing the best of luck and others feeling betrayed by Vlaar for misleading them. Stefan de Vrij became the new Feyenoord