Aston Villa fans will be feeling the Premier League life force being slowly drained from their club, as they failed to win another game where three points were vital to have any hope of an unlikely survival bid.
Villa’s defensive organisation improved against WBA, restricting their opponents to zero attempts on target, and Rémi Garde’s men controlled the majority of the possession, but they fell down when it came to any imagination or endeavour in the final third – if only players would make runs off the ball and midfielders would get into the opponent’s penalty box!
Draws are no good to Villa, it’s three-point bounties they need. It’s very fast becoming too little, too late.
The end of season fate may already be known, but in the meantime, here’s five reasons to be cheerful as Aston Villa fans…
5. OKORE EFFECT
Just like last season, when Jores Okore returns from a long-term injury Villa suddenly don’t look so shocking at the back.
Okore came in against Southampton and Villa got an unlikely away 1-1 draw. Then when he was missing the Norwich game and on the bench against Sunderland, Villa lost both games. Remarkably considering how dire Villa have been this season, Villa have only lost one in seven league games when Okore has played, and that defeat only came against Arsenal.
Removing Micah Richards of centre-back duties, who has the positional sense of a submarine with broken sonar, and bringing in the Danish centre-back has gone a long way to improving Villa’s fortunes in recent weeks.
Okore will probably have to start chipping in with goals too though for Villa to actually win games. Five of the seven games he’s started have ended in draws, which isn’t good enough. Still, at least we’ve got one player to build a team around!
The only one I can agree with is Okore, however MOM’s it is a BIG stretch to find five positive things about Villa period at the moment, so respect for the attempt.
Possession is useless without scoring, never hear the phrase “Possession wins you games”. However Garde is a good manager and want to keep him, though I think he’ll be gone at the end of the season.
Responsibility – Nope, haven’t seen it. Not yet. CEO had 17 months to put it right, in my industry you get three months probation. Delph’s final contract was a shambles, nothing’s been done about Bodymoor, our one starlet who’s a Villa fan wants talks at the end of the season about his future? Fox is wonderful at Business Development, but doesn’t have the complete skillset IMHO for CEO. Chairman has lost it at the beginning, so out of touch. Fully agree with MOM’s that good football business has to start with good football. Having all 20’000 Under Armour employees know about us doesn’t equate to the one second on CNN when we’re mentioned if we were to be successful.
FA cup, no no no. It can provide a welcome diversion and some momentum if you’re winning well against tough teams. But the fatigue on the few decent players we have is too big a price. Ayew looked burnt out in the last game for instance, and Lescott can’t play two games a week effectively.