Where will Villa be in the table at the end of the season?

January 12, 2009 by Martin Banks
Filed under: Aston Villa 

tableThe Premier League table at present makes for some very interesting reading, Liverpool are top for a start, so you can be forgiven for seeing it and thinking it’s from the 80s. The main point of note though is how in-the-thick-of-it Villa are, currently ahead of Arsenal, level on points with Man U (but they have 2 games in hand) and, most amazingly, just 1 point behind Chelsea.

Both Villa and Chelsea have this season found better form on the road than at home, Chelsea going as far as winning twice as many away than at the Bridge. Villa are unbeaten in the Prem for over 2 months, during which time we have picked up 6 wins and not many of those wins have involved convincing performances. Luck has undoubtedly shined on us, but has that distorted the table? Or do you create your own luck?

Villa have won and drawn games that we didn’t dominate, so does that mean we didn’t deserve to win the game? Or is the fact that we can let teams play for large chunks of the game, whilst patiently biding our time to strike, a credit to us?

Take the most recent example, West Brom, Tony Mowbray himself bemoaned us after the game, saying we ‘aren’t interested in playing football’. Sounds like sour grapes in all honesty, especially when you look back at the season to date and see that for the most part Villa have been the most exciting, watchable side in the league. On Saturday, we allowed the Baggies to keep possession but at the same time didn’t allow them to do anything with it. We held them in the middle of the park, not letting them put pressure on our keeper or even our defence for much of it. Then when we got the ball, we’d pounce on them when they were tired and dejected.

Why Tony Mowbray feels the need to criticise us is beyond me, wasn’t this much the same style employed by Muhammed Ali, and he is considered one of sport’s greatest ever entertainers. We bided our time, we didn’t allow them to mount any serious threats, but let them be in control, tiring themselves out, then when a window of opportunity opened, we pounced.

An example on the other end of the scale is the home game against Arsenal on Boxing Day, we totally smashed into the Gunners for 40 minutes, playing superb flowing, attacking football, but despite coming exceptionally close to scoring on at least 4 occasions, we found ourselves 2-0 not long after.

Then there’s the game at their place, no-one could say we were lucky down at the Emirates. We totally deserved that victory, and it came off the back of 2 losses that could’ve easily dropped the teams heads. And the Fulham game saw us dominate way more than Baggies did on Saturday, and attack much more too, but it was ultimately a 0-0.

It’s impossible to deny we have been riding our luck to get so many points when we’ve played so averagely (it’s important to remember that we haven’t played badly), but we have also made the luck come our way. Against West Ham, they definitely outplayed us but we made the attacks that looked more like goals (Carlton Cole’s bluntness in front of goal was a huge help too). Hull was very similar.

The one game we DEFINITELY were lucky in was at Goodison Park. We were lucky not to have been losing by the last minute, nevermind how lucky we were for Ashley Young to have stolen the points in the dying seconds.

So when will this luck run out? And will good form be there in it’s place when it does or will we go into a poor run?

Will we still  be top four at the end of the season? Will we even be top five, or will Everton catch us out?


Comments

3 Comments on Where will Villa be in the table at the end of the season?

  1. Simon Preston on Mon, 12th Jan 2009 11:54

    2. I think we need to bolster our team with another striker and a couple of defenders. We’re still a small team and I’m worried our lads will start getting tired before too long. As demonstrated by our ast UEFA cup match, our B Side isn’t exactly strong (and thats putting it nicely). Strange thing that always strikes me about Villa… we mostly seem to score loads when the other team score loads too.

  2. manutd24 on Mon, 12th Jan 2009 18:35

    3. (MANCHESTER UNITED FAN IN PEACE)
    I was quite surprised at Aston Villa this season, like anyone, but now i think they could even achieve 3rd place. With Chelsea in this bad form, A.Villa could easily leapfrog them, Arsenal not really perfoming this season so you guys could really do well.

    Man Utd will win the title!

    How the table could look:
    1. Man Utd
    2. Liverpool
    3. A.Villa
    4. Chelsea
    5. Arsenal

  3. manutd24 on Mon, 12th Jan 2009 18:36

    4. don’t forget to add me on your links….i’ve already added you!

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