Dave Woodhall looks at the latest Villa Park debacle.
It all seemed so promising. On the whole Saturday’s results had gone well. Beating Liverpool, who are hardly world-beaters themselves, would put Villa five points from safety, and as it was live on TV the nation could see the transformation in a side that had appeared shell-shocked and doomed a month ago, but who since then had shown signs of resilience and a willingness to pull together.
“Shell-shocked” is a good way of describing what happened next. Well, the supporters were, at least. I suspect that nobody who draws a monthly salary from Aston Villa was all that bothered, apart from the loyal handful who work for the club as well as support them. More on that later.
There isn’t much point in dwelling on the match. Until kick-off I was clutching two straws; that we hadn’t really been turned over all season and that our defence was starting to look half-decent. We’d not got the worst goal difference in the league any longer.
Ninety minutes later even those desperate hopes were gone. What we’d witnessed was one of those genuine “I remember” moments, the worst for twenty/thirty/forty years. Until now I’d always considered Southampton in 1987 (a game fortunately witnessed by a mere handful of us in those pre-saturation TV coverage days) to be the nadir of Villa performances. It now has a genuine rival.
Whether that 1986-87 season was worse that the one we’re currently enduring has been a cause for some debate since last August. Until now I’ve argued that it was, because back then such hammerings were taking place almost every other week. Now we’ve got the chance to emulate that particular saga as well, because God knows what Sunday’s debacle will do for the team’s mindset. They’d almost got towards some sort of positivity. Results had improved and there was a small, very small, bit of confidence in their play. Now it’s back to square one.
I’ve no idea what’s happened this week to have them turn in a performance such as the one we witnessed. Liverpool are no great shakes and although they’re man for man better than Villa, they certainly aren’t six goals and it could have been more better. Still, at least we now know that’s it. All hope has been extinguished, all straws unclutched and all creeks will now be negotiated without the aid of a paddle.
In the same way that there’s no point in talking about the match, there’s not much more in throwing accusations and insults around. The blame is apparent, it starts at the top and works itself down to the players. For the first time I’m also starting to wonder whether Remi Garde is really the man for the job or whether he was a ‘right man at the wrong time’ appointment in the same way as Jo Venglos.
The good doctor was described by former Express & Star writer Martin Swain as “urbane, polite, well-travelled, but up to working in the muck and nettles of English football? I don’t think so”. The first part of that description could apply to Remi Garde. I hope the second doesn’t also prove true.
There are a lot of people, well-travelled or not, who are clearly not up to working in the muck and nettles of Villa Park. Almost all of them are highly-paid for the privilege, will continue to be so regardless of results and which division the team end up in, and it shows.
There are also many people who are clearly very good at what they do. Most of them aren’t anywhere nearly so highly-paid and relegation will result in many losing their jobs. No matter how the rest of us feel about afternoons like Sunday, these are the ones who will really suffer.