Protests at Villa Park will only result in relegation

How the fans protests will only lead to disastrous consequences for Aston Villa.

One only has to look at the treatment of Steve Kean at Blackburn to realise that protests have no positive effect on a team. All it leads to is self-fulfilling prohecies of relegation. This weekend the Aston Villa fans have arranged for a protest before the game against Alex McLeish. They believe that with him in charge the team will be relegated like Birmingham were last season. Understandably they are worried, however, is this kind of action going to galvanise a team that is lacking in self-confidence and belief?

There is a common belief that in order to stay in the league home form is vital. So when comparing results between home and away this season, Villa have picked up more points away and rank as the 8^thbest team. However their home form has resulted in 5 losses and they rank at 14^th. They have scored less at home than away and have not won in 6 games. Why are Villa performing worse at home than away? As much as the manager and players can be blamed, I believe that the fans play a major part in how this season will turn out.

Is McLeish lacking the motivational skills necessary to inspire a team clearly lacking a buzz or are the players to fault for their own performances? It really comes down to both, yet the biggest factor at fault is the fans. This constant negativity and lack of support, especially in home games, is a remedy for disaster. Players feed off the atmosphere and all too often this season Villa Park has resembled a morque more than a football stadium. It is no surprise that Villa perform better away, away from the negativity, receiving constant support and noise from a continued passionate support. It is sad when a team is better away because they are away from the criticism of their own “faithful”.

People will argue that success breeds a positive atmosphere, however is it not more likely that success comes from the support of the fans. Under O’Neill the atmosphere at Villa Park was electric and it clearly galvanised the team. When comparing attendances from last season to this one the crowd has gone down, the atmosphere is dropped. Since McLeish took over there has been a belief from the off that he was not the right man for the job. And some fans have refused to support the man at the helm. This attitude is not going to do anything but lead the team to relegation, how ironic would it be that the fans who believe we will be relegated will effectively create a self-fulfilling prophecy through their lack of support for the manager and thus the team.

When the fans boo the team it becomes counter-productive, during the summer the fans moaned about every manager Villa were linked to and in their unrealistic expectations of who and where Villa are. Under Martin O’Neill Villa’s best finish was 6^th, yet this is completely unrealistic now as Spurs and Man City are stronger than they were and Villa are weaker. In O’Neill’s reign he was given high wages and transfer fees. It can be argued that it is through these high wages and poor transfer decisions that the present problems at Villa have been created. The fans should respect McLeish for taking a job that he knew would require cutting the wage bill, selling players and buying only with a small transfer budget, how can he try to emulate O’Neill?

It is important to note this is a difficult period for Villa, they have invested a lot in the last few seasons and yet came up short, this has resulted in losing good players and have possessing too many old and overpaid ones. McLeish has been brought in to steady what was a volatile ship and what the fans need to do is support the team, create a positive atmosphere. The team that O’Neill had is nothing like what McLeish has at his disposal. Yet the fans appear not to recognise this, they believe he should be performing to O’Neill’s level, even though McLeish has almost no budget for players and has been forced to reduce the wage bill. The current team need the fans on their side.

Many fans will argue that his style of play is negative, that it is too defensive. Yet so was O’Neill, he played counter attack football every game, yet had the personnel to implement it effectively. McLeish has not been given this luxury. McLeish inherited a team of ageing, overpaid players and in fairness his own signings have not been good enough; N’Zogbia has not performed as expected; as good as he is when on form, he suffers from a terrible lack of consistency and if you watched Wigan play these past few years you would realise that his signing was not going to replace both Young and Downing. Alan Hutton has showed that he is a Championship player at best and Jenas was unfortunate to get injured so early as he could have done a good job for Villa. It is only Given who has shown his worth.  His decision to continue play Warnock must be questioned as he is proving to be liable to a mistake and goal in every goal at this time.

A real positive for Villa is that they do have an excellent youth system which contains real talent which O’Neill chose to ignore. Barry Bannan’s comments were very interesting regarding O’Neill. He has brought out more from Ireland and is playing Cuellar at centre back which is better for the team and they possess a real gem in Gary Gardner. What the team needs to do is get through this season and build from there. 

Do the fans really want Villa relegated? By their actions it would appear so, perhaps if these the protesters want to see improved results they should try supporting their side instead, McLeish is not going anywhere.  I believe that those who protest don’t actually support the team at all because real support goes through good and bad, if they want the players to give 100% then they should too. There are some very poor teams in this league and Villa are much better than Birmingham were, with total support of the fans relegation should not be an issue.