At least that’s the way some Villa fans interpreted the events of the last game of the 2011-12 season. Villa fans were in buoyant mood at Carrow Road for a number of reasons: the warm, summery conditions; free replica shirts courtesy of the departing and well-liked Carlos Cuellar; the narrow avoidance of relegation, now seemingly a Villa season target and the imminent departure of Alex McLeish, whose time in charge was thought to be well and truly over after over a half-season of negative, not to say dire, performances.

In terms of speculation as to who the replacement might be, many focused on the promising young manager in the other dug-out at the home of the Canaries; Paul Lambert. Lambert had worked near-miracles in East Anglia, taking City from the third division back up to the Prem in consecutive seasons. Tipped to go straight down again, Norwich defied the sceptics by finishing comfortably mid-table, well ahead of Villa’s struggling side. Some Villa fans put two and two together and backed it up by chanting “Paul Lambert’s claret-and-blue army” through the afternoon.

The game lived down to the fans’ expectations, with McLeish selecting another defensive line-up even though there was nothing on the game, as if by instinct. Norwich, predictably and deservedly ran out comfortable two-goal winners. McLeish sought out CEO Paul Faulkner immediately after the game to outline his transfer plans for the summer. Faulkner’s “Thanks, but no thanks” response gave the Vila boss a clear enough idea of what was coming and he was duly relieved of his duties next day.

Some too-ing and fro-ing ensued over the completion of the deal, but it was soon confirmed that Lambert was to be the new Villa boss. The presumed increase in salary hopefully acted as some compensation for the apparent reality that Villa were now, having been chasing Champions League football just a few years earlier, settling for survival at the highest level, with owner Randy Lerner no longer enthusiastic about pumping money into the club. Still, Faulkner was positive about the new appointment, the phrase ‘vibrant football’ being pressed into service on many occasions.

Lambert’s initial transfer policy was to sign ‘young and hungry’ players from the lower divisions, work them up to Prem standards then watch them thrive or sell them on for heavily-inflated fees, thereby keeping the bean-counters happy. Some Villa fans liked the sound of this, as it appeared to be more sustainable than the previous regimes when chucking lots of money around and hoping it worked seemed to be the plan. Others were more sceptical, pointing out that the policy of ‘buy cheap, sell dear’ was about as old as the game itself and therefore hardly original. Nevertheless, players like Matthew Lowton and Ashley Westwood were amongst the early manifestations of the new method.

After a poor start to the season, with the closure of the transfer window imminent and in something of a panic after losing unimpressively in the first two games of the season, Villa swooped again for a young, little-known striker from Belgian club Genk, Christian Benteke. Rumour has it that the player had been brought to the attentions of the club by previous boss McLeish, and Lambert merely actioned what might have happened anyway.

Whatever the truth, Villa paid out a fee in the region of £7 million for what was hoped to be a boost to the striking department. At first, it didn’t look that way as Benteke, despite a debut goal against Swansea, had trouble locating the net from decent chances. Some even bemoaned the fact that the hopeful was getting some starts ahead of penalty-box poacher Darren Bent.

Every time Benteke wasted an opening, you could expect a chorus of, “Bent would have buried that!” Still, his movement, link play and prodigious strength meant he was a better team selection than Darren and soon enough, the goals started to flow in abundance. Even in a poor Villa side, his goals made us competitive and only dried up in his injury-enforced absence. If the 2010s were one of the most dismal in Villa history, then Benteke was truly the diamond that stuck out of the camel turd.

Lambert’s transfer policy went through ‘Young and Hungry’ to ‘Overseas and Never Heard of Them’ all the way to ‘More or Less Knackered and Unfit to Play but We’ll Sign ‘em Anyway’. Unsurprisingly, the team continued to look like a side whose only ambition was to avoid relegation. With Christian leading the line, there were always goals to be had, with Agbonlahor and Weimann either side of him. The return of Fabian Delph from injury added some grit and craft to the midfield and the defence wasn’t too bad at all when Ron Vlaar was fit to take his place in it, that is, about a third of the time.

Lambert’s playing approach was equally variable. Initially, he settled for the other side having the ball with Villa hitting the opposition with quick breaks, a style that, to be fair, suited some of the players at his disposal. This could work, even with only a thirty percent possession rate. Then, after a trip to Germany where he made his name as a player, he came back extolling the virtues of ball-retention and the build-up of moves was reduced to a snail’s pace, with the talisman Benteke left alone and frustrated, waiting painstakingly for the ball to cross the halfway line.

By this time, Lambert had already had a close shave, with Paul Faulkner recommending to Randy Lerner that Lambert should have been sacked in the summer of 2014, after a dismal run to the end of that season. Lerner disagreed and Faulkner, an honourable man, duly resigned his post. Now the clouds were gathering again, as Lambert’s new tactics saw Villa’s goal supply reduced to a trickle. It was increasingly hard to see how this could be improved under the current manager, as Villa prepared to travel up to Hull for what could safely be described as a relegation six-pointer against Steve Bruce’s side.

Villa had been ‘boosted’ by actually scoring a goal in their narrow home defeat against Chelsea. Well, it was their first PL goal in eleven hours! It was hoped that the diminutive Carles Gil, a player with zero pace but excellent technique, signed for a small fee from Spanish side Elche, would provide some of the creativity urgently needed by his new side. All too predictably, Villa started off with plenty of the possession but carried little threat.

Hull had also made a £3 million signing in the January window, Dome N’Doye from Locomotiv Moscow, and their signing started paying off faster. Allan McGregor’s goal-kick was flicked on to Nicola Jelavic. Ciaran Clark moved into position to deal with the situation but his attempted block resulted in a huge deflection that took the ball past the hapless Brad Guzan. This boosted the home side and they might have had a second when N’Doye headed wide from a good cross by Ahmed Elmohamedy. Villa’s only noticeable response came when Tommy Huddlestone conceded a free-kick which Gil placed a yard wide.

Half-time saw the production of a ‘Lambert Out’ banner that some long-suffering fans had brought with them, no doubt in anticipation of what was likely to happen on the pitch. Paul Lambert was busy, too, deciding to make a couple of substitutions which would hopefully help to get his team back into the game. One of them, the talismanic Christian Benteke, on for Andreas Weimann, might have drawn his side level almost immediately but he put the chance wastefully wide. Perhaps it was the shock of him being presented with an actual chance that caught him out. Alex Bruce then impressed his dad by blocking efforts from Benteke and Ally Cissokho, the latter put in by Agbonlahor’s pass.

This was at least a measurable response from Villa but the danger was that Hull would catch an attacking Villa side on the break. So it proved with about fifteen minutes to go, with Elmo again crossing from the right for Ramirez to head down, enabling N’Doye to provide the finish from inside the six-yard box. There was a limited Villa response, McGregor pushing away Ashley Westwood’s 25-yarder and dealIng with the rebound effort from Benteke.

That was about it for the night. News came in that fellow-strugglers Queens Park Rangers had won 2-0 at Sunderland, placing Villa in the dreaded bottom three. There were rumours that there was a clause in Lambert’s contract that allowed Villa to sack him with a cut-price settlement should Villa be in the relegation places. Whether true or not, the following day saw Lambert put out of his, and our, misery. The latest defeat was Villa’s tenth league game without a win. For those still loyally following the team away from Villa Park, it had been eight-and-a-half hours since an away goal had been scored. Twenty-five league games had produced a pitiful twelve goals and this with one of the best strikers in the league up front.

It had, by now, become impossible to defend his general record since being appointed, and all the indicators were that his team were in a doom spiral where scoring goals, let alone winning football matches had become a long-distant memory. Once again, Villa fans were invited to hope that whoever the new boss was to be, he couldn’t possibly be as bad as the previous incumbent which sums up well the general feeling when Lambert himself had been head-hunted.