So another weekend went by and Villa fans were unhappy. Turns out that it isn’t Groundhog Day anymore, but Groundhog Week. Villa lost 1-0 to Manchester United, and kids were played. However, the fact remains that many fans don’t want McLeish in charge anymore.
McLeish played a better team than usual during the United game, but the tactics have been described as too defensive. I must say that I personally would have gone with two strikers at home but, when your supposed star man plays better alone, just what can you do? Very little really besides drop him, and then you’d have more uproar from other sections of the crowd. The fact remains that McLeish can’t win.
Instant Culture Is Only Going To Make Things Worse
With this kind of situation, which isn’t by any means constrained to only Aston Villa, expectations are going to become wildly difficult to manage. It’s one thing getting rid of McLeish, but there are problems at Villa that go way beyond one man. If this was on appointment that went wrong, it could be called a mistake. However, it isn’t one manager who has been in charge.
In the past 18 months, Villa have had five managers – O’Neill, MacDonald, Houllier, McAllister, and McLeish. Through out this period, the requests have been the same – we’d like some success.
O’Neill, for all of his perceived issues with transfers and contracts at least got us sixth. Detractors will say that he sold the family silver to make it happen, and they have a fair point. Lerner, however, needs to take the hit for that situation. O’Neill may have spent badly, but he didn’t rob the bank – he only spent what was given to him.
Kevin MacDonald started brightly by playing the players that fans wanted to see. All was promising, and MacDonald was in pole position, until a few things cropped up. The first was dilly-dallying about wanting the job, and the second was getting hammered at Newcastle. For me, the Newcastle result should have been chalked down to a simple bad result but fans didn’t want to see it that way and thus, once that happened, MacDonald was never going to take the job. There was nothing for him to gain from that situation.
We all know Houllier’s issues. Trying to play attractive football is not synonymous with winning. Houllier had disagreements with some of the players, arguably with good reason, but that disruption was a stretch too far. The whole conundrum created a mess and, with an underlying heart complaint, it was only a matter of time before stress called time on Monsieur Houllier. The lucky bit was that Gerard didn’t die as a result.
A season where Villa nearly went down should have been enough to put the fear of God into many fans, and wake them up to the reality of what can happen. For me personally, it was the wrong kind of adrenaline rush. I’ve said that some previous seasons have been boring with nothing to play for in the past, but toying with relegation isn’t something I want to experience again.
Now, we are where we are. Fans feel ignored, and the football feels poor value. Whether it is a season card, or individually purchased match day tickets, fans don’t feel entertained. I’ve said before, I don’t feel entertained at times. The “value” of these investments are diminished when I don’t see effort.
So Where Is The Issue?
Lack of effort is a strange problem though. Tactics are one thing, but effort is another. Why are we witnessing another era where it looks like players aren’t communicating with each other? Why is the defence coming apart so easily? Why are mistakes falling between players time and time again?
This is what really baffles me. We’ve seen players like Dunne and Collins perform well under O’Neill. Apart from age, what is so different between any of them now? More to the point, why does this situation keep repeating no matter who the manager is?
The easy option is to dump all the blame on the unpopular man. It is easy because people already have knives out for him. So, with that predetermined arc set, the pressure will build on McLeish and invariably the axe will swing above him like the sword of Damocles. The board may not listen to individual protests, but the consistent pressure will take its toll. Eventually.
Although this may be the desired outcome for many fans, it isn’t going to be the end of the issues. With financial circumstances providing a restraint that many managers will shy away from, whoever gets a shot after McLeish will have the same problems. Same players, same situations, same contracts, same lack of money to spend. The only benefit the new man would have is that some of the deadweights in the squad will be closer to leaving. Nothing else.
So McLeish’s era may be on an ever decreasing timer, but don’t expect much different if, and when, things do change. Unless Randy pulls unsustainable money out of his pocket, then we’ll have to make do for the next 18 months. Otherwise, we’re hypocrites for chastising O’Neill’s spending habits only to replicate it under someone else.
Football has to operate like a business. Lerner is trying to do that. Whilst I can question the ethical choices about how the board have gone about their practice of man management in the past, I can’t really quabble over the idea that your books have to balance.
We can feel like we are hard done by when a rich owner comes in and shakes it all up. I’m sure there are moments where we, as fans, look at Manchester City and say “What if…?”.
The fact remains though that City’s model isn’t viable or realistic. Spending £1bn is a stupendously large investment and, whilst City may win the league this year, that kind of logic doesn’t work very well. It works even less well when there is more than one rich competitor too.
City, for all their potential successes that may or may not happen, need to conjure up hundreds of millions of profit to balance things out in the next few years.
Manchester City’s project worked because they had a fortunate set of circumstances – the timing was right, they had a man who was far richer than anyone else, and they avoided Financial Fair Play for the most part.
But even if Villa were to find a super rich owner in the realms of Mansour’s wealth, they are already behind. They haven’t got the timing, they have to compete under new FFP regulations regarding new contracts, and any new owner would be playing catch up against Mansour’s riches and nascent project, Abramovich’s oil money and years of ownership, and Manchester United’s dominating empire.
Which means it could mean £1bn investment just to get fourth. Would you spend that kind of money? No you wouldn’t, and neither would any sane business person so I’ll be blunt and tell fans to quit dreaming about it happening.
Getting back to Villa’s current plight, McLeish isn’t doing well, but he has circumstances against him. He’s played players we wanted now and, whilst the result wasn’t great with United dominating a lot of the game, this month isn’t the best judgment of his time.
Just like we said his early games were too easy in terms of a run, so these next games are the other end of the scale. If Manchester United’s team was a sign that things might be changing, then it’s not going to happen overnight. If it stays that way, McLeish needs time.
If it doesn’t, then fair enough, give it your best shot if you want him out. Just be aware that if we succumb to the instant gratification culture that demands satisfaction right now, then the situation really is terminal.
Appreciate what we have. It might not be great at present, and McLeish may not be the answer, but I can list 72 clubs who would swap our place with theirs in a hearbeat. We’ve become of the belief that we are entitled to success simple because we’re “big”. The reality is nobody is entitled to success, they’re only entitled to choice.
If we want to attend matches, we can attend. If we don’t, we can choose not to. Frustrating as it may be as a fan, this club isn’t ours anymore, and whilst we may finish lower than last season, we really aren’t that hard done by. For me, the only protest that works is not going if you’re not happy with things. That at least makes sense.
McLeish may be a symptom of our current unrest, but he isn’t the cause. If some fans’ dreams come true and McLeish is got rid of, then the club needs to take this as the wakeup call we should have felt last season. The sooner we accept that any kind of change takes time, the better. The “rich owner” ship has sailed. The only way to compete now is long term, and with a strategy.
Strategies can only get enacted by consistency so if McLeish walks, give the next guy a chance to build something. Otherwise it really will be a countdown to going down.
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