Last season, roughly a year back in early February, Birmingham City, a team managed by Alex McLeish, drew 2-2 against Manchester City, with Nikola Zigic and Craig Gardner cancelling out the strikes of Carlos Tevez and Aleksandr Kolarov.

So, on the face of it, a 2-2 draw shows that McLeish, often vaunted as the sole source of problems at the club, can manage a team to a 2-2 draw against a better team, who were, and still are, filled with talent such as Edin Dzeko, David Silva, and Vincent Kompany.

In that game, McLeish’s team had 45.7% of the possession, as well as more shots on goal (18) than the Citizens (15), and that was with Birmingham fielding a less than favoured central pairing of Roger Johnson and Martin Jiranek. Scott Dann, now a player for Blackburn Rovers, didn’t feature.

On that day, Birmingham had Stephen Carr at right back for God’s sake. I don’t care how bad people think Alan Hutton is, and he has been pretty poor recently, surely he’s a better Tottenham reject than Carr. He must be, right?

So if Aston Villa lose, and many fans are heralding such a suggestion as immediately obvious, then what does that mean for us as a club? Surely if we can’t manage to achieve the same performances as Birmingham, with exactly the same manager, then what other variables are there? Different players? Different fans?

The most obvious one is the players. Villa are, even without Ashley Young and Stewart Downing, a better team in terms of individual talent as stated previously and, thus, should be capable of as much of a result as Birmingham managed a year ago, surely?

Of course, Manchester City could arguably be seen to have improved too whilst Aston Villa, as a reference point, could be seen to have gotten worse. Certainly the sales of Ashley Young and Downing would show that, especially given that both players featured in the top three players of that game for shots, all three of which played for Aston Villa, although said evidence rarely comes into play when discussing Villa this season, merely accepted as part of the background narrative while the manager gets hammered incessantly.

Young and Downing were sold, both before the manager had any chance of changing their minds, and at least one wasn’t replaced. McLeish has, and there’s no doubt about it, got less to work with than Houllier did. So, surely, it’s a tad laughable to suggest that Villa’s team are, under the right manager, a top eight side as they currently stand, when they are, in reality, nothing like one.

So the players aren’t to blame, and we’ve already established that McLeish managed a home draw against Manchester City last year with a poorer team, then who else can we blame? The fans? The gods? The Mayan prophecy of the world ending in 2012?

Are We Any Further Forwards?

Last season, as another comparative, Villa won 1-0 against Manchester City in their home encounter, where Darren Bent netted his first goal for the club. During that game, Villa managed a pitiful 29.5% of possession, a far cry from the fluid and passing football suggested by many that we were supposed to enjoyed under the Houllier era. Rather it was luck. Luck and holding on for dear life whilst a better team threw everything but the kitchen sink at us.

Villa’s home encounter against Manchester City last season was in late January as well, so it was hardly like we were able to say the manager hadn’t had time to instil his ethos into the play. No – this was Aston Villa alright, playing just as bad as they are now, only with a few better players. Smash and grab, nothing more, enacted to effect. Just like the O’Neill era and, just like O’Neill’s era, some don’t remember the poor football, or the lack of possession, they merely remember what suits our own opinion.

As a reference, 29.5% possession was as bad as we did earlier this season against Tottenham, and we all remember how we judged that performance – far from favourable. This isn’t the same as having 45% possession, or even 40% possession – sub-30% possession is the sign of being dominated, or sitting back a lot and playing on the counter-attack.

Do we recall Houllier’s win against Manchester City as that woeful though? Or do we just remember the fact Bent opened his Villa account? Should Villa manage a similar result, with similar possession, which statistic will be looked at with more scrutiny afterwards, and why? The answer of course, depending on what you’ve predetermined you want to prove.

Poor possession, should it happen, would be slated as a sign of hoofing the ball, and any kind of close win would be written off as luck, largely because those people have effectively formulated their opinion before things even happen, something that some, admittedly, don’t.

Are Our Memories Up To Scratch?

Perhaps such historically poor figures, but with wins to remember, rather than cruel losses, the memories change? That a 1-0 win against Manchester City becomes a solid thought of us punching above our weight, to our success.

Perhaps such perception, warped and as unbalanced as it is, is half of the reason why we were seen as much better under Martin O’Neill than we really were. Of course, the sixth places finishes were what they were, and there’s no denying that, but I’m sure I’m not the only Villa fan who recalls periods of intense luck.

You know the games I mean, where a quick counter attack under O’Neill’s system would snatch a win or draw, whilst the memory of how it came about quickly faded away. “Who cares?” as we often thought to ourselves. Well who cares when you get three points anyway.

Certainly the history books don’t care about performances, merely the results that transpire. To that end, last season’s Carling Cup win by Birmingham goes down as their day of success, not a day where Arsenal played better, but ultimately lost.

Just like Aston Villa’s lack of luck in Vidic’s non-sending off made no difference to the fact that the day belonged to Manchester United. History isn’t about effort, it’s about results, even if how the results happen are often embellished as the tales are told and retold from fan to fan. The history isn’t really as it was when it happened, it’s how you remember it, and the view is often far from reality.

So this afternoon will be much the same. Should Villa nick a point, or even all three, fans will remember the relevant result, even if it comes with some caveats on how it occured. Should they lose, however, even if Birmingham City managed by the same man managed to avoid a loss against the same opposition, calls for the head of the under-fire Glaswegian may well intensify.

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