Dave Woodhall is offering pats on the back all round.
The general opinion is that the Villa aren’t playing all that well. We’re letting in too many goals, we’re missing too many chances and it’s rare that we put on the sort of style we became used to last season. And yet we’re sixth in the league and, even more surpisngly, fifth in the Champions League with two games left. For a club who spent a decade wondering if this was as bad as it got and knowing next week would invariably be even worse, it’s some sort of golden age, and what’s making it even more incredible is that we’re doing it with the sort of handicaps we’ve never known before and which only seem to be affecting us.
PSR has been done to earth but it’s undoubtedly affected the Villa, perhaps more than any other club. When you finish seventh one season and fourth the next it’s only natural to be thinking in terms of improving another three places. You’d probably spend the sort of money that would give you a chance of finishing top of the league. You certainly wouldn’t be forced into getting rid of arguably your most consistent player of the previous five years and your most mercurial talent, and replacing them with free transfers and youngsters.
That’s the sort of obstacle we’re up against in trying to even emulate last season’s achievements. The other big problem is what came about as a result of that success, namely the Champions League. We saw a bit of it last year, when we were having to balance midweek European games with league games at the weekend. The big difference is that the opposition in the Confrence League was naturally of a lower standard so we could get away with not always giving it our best shot. That’s why we could get as far as the semi-finals despite only playing to anything like our capabilities in two or three matches.
The pressure wasn’t really on, either. Nobody apart from the clubs involved care all that much about what is still a consolation competition for the also-rans of the big nations and the not-quites of the smaller ones. In contrast, look at all the hype and coverage we get now. Villa beating Bayern made headlines all across Europe, and with that sort of attention comes added pressure.
And, let’s not forget, we’re still novices at this level. We were out of the Premier League for three years and it changed immeasurably. Teams had got bigger, faster and more adept at beating the inexperienced newcomers. That was in three years – you can imagine how much Europe’s top competition has changed in 42. A club who’d just got promoted to the Premier League would be performing miracles to be fifth at this stage, and what we’re doing in Europe is much the same. We’ve arrived in the Champions League and we’re playing like old hands. We look like we belong, and that takes some doing.
There might come a time when that anthem and the kids holding up the banner in the centre circle all gets a bit boring. Until that happens, I’m looking round, enjoying the view and saying Well Done Villa.
