Aston Villa - A fan's view
Wednesday, 23 May 2007 18:01
Good, bad or just the same old, same old. What the fans made of the 2006/07 season.
The season might be seen as a failure by some fans, but taking into account the plight of the team under O'Dreary, I think it went pretty well.
Villa were unbeaten until October 28th (the last team in the country to remain unbeaten from the opening day) and eventually finished in a respectable eleventh place.
An opening-day visit to Arsenal's brand new Emirates Stadium brought a fine battling draw and the team later went to Stamford Bridge and prized a point off the champions too.
But this typified the Villans' campaign. Too many draws.
An unexpected unbeaten start was followed by a winless streak, while the season was consistently peppered with draws - 17 in total.
But even with the euphoria surrounding Martin O'Neill's appointment, the small squad was never going to challenge any higher than mid-table.
So all things considered, eleventh place and just six points off a Uefa Cup spot was pretty good going for the Villa.
Grade: B
High Point
The high point of the campaign was going away to Everton and winning 1-0 thanks to Chris Sutton's glancing header. At that point, Villa were the only unbeaten team in the Premiership.
Low Point
The run of eleven matches without a win was definitely the low ebb. Having gone unbeaten until late October, the team simply couldn't buy a win and almost got sucked into a relation battle as a result.
Fan's Player of the Year
- Gareth Barry -
Once again Gareth Barry was the Villain's best player by a country mile, not only skippering the side admirably, but bagging nine goals in the process.
He finally got the England recall he has deserved for four years and would probably have 50 caps by now if he played for any of the top four.
Although his lack of pace is frightening at times, he makes up for it with his intelligent approach to the game. His crossing is outstanding and his work rate is second to none for the claret and blue army.
A special mention should go to Gabriel Agbonlahor, who scooped both the young player awards at Villa Park this season. His breakthrough has been terrific.
He has the pace to scare even the greatest European defenders and scoring ten league goals, particularly having played most of the campaign wide on the right, is a fantastic return.
Needs for Next Season
Villa are badly in need of cover in all areas on the field. Celtic's Artur Boruc would give Thomas Sorensen some much-needed high-quality competition in goal, while Sheffield United star Phil Jagielka would offer cover for the continually crocked Martin Laursen at centre-half.
A midfield player like Joey Barton would bring some goals from midfield, which would help support the strikers' efforts on that front.
And after fans' favourite Juan Pablo Angel decided to join David Beckham in the US, any striker that comes close to Benni McCarthy or Dimitar Berbatov would be a perfect addition.
Expect plenty of speculation and links to Jermain Defoe and Craig Bellamy.
Joe Shackley
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