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…
2. RESPONSIBILITY
Finally somebody took responsibility at the club for the disaster of a season Aston Villa supporters have had to endure. MOMS put Tom Fox on the spot at the last week’s Aston Villa Supporter Trust AGM and he held his hand up to take the blame. While Fox has made changes and put new theories into practise, results are the currency of football, and it’s been an out-and-out failure by the Villa board, no matter how they want to dress it up and blame the past few seasons.
Considering the money that was spent in the summer, a better selection and mix of players wouldn’t have had the club adrift at the bottom of the table.
Did new Villa chairman Steve Hollis fill Villa supporters with confidence that things will get better? Not exactly, but at least now Villa fans knows the buck stands with Hollis and Fox.
Compared to Lerner’s efforts of running the club, at least they live in this country and are actively trying to address the problems at B6, whether they succeed or not.
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.