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A Little Recent Villa History Lesson!

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A Little recent history lesson

I know its nice to think times at Villa have never been so good, especially when we MAY reach our highest finish position since the 96/97 season when we finished 5th, but consider this little fact:

In Deadly’s last reign in the PL from the 1988/99 season when we finished 17th of 20 teams, Villa have only finished out of the top 10 on 5 occasions.

90/91 we were 17th
94/95 we were 18th
02/03 we were 16th
05/06 we were 16th
06/07 we were 11th

Not bad really for the man we were all so happy to leave when Randy bought the club.

In fact during Doug’s reign of penny pinching economics, regular changes of management, etcetera we actually finished 2nd twice, yes 2nd and 4th in 95/96.

Yes football has changed tremendously since, of course, costs are higher, but so is revenue, with attendances up across the board, not just at Villa Park and media money is beyond what could have been dreamed of in his first season back in 88/89,

The present Boards stated aim is to put out a side able to compete week in week out with the aim to gain regular European qualification and return those heady days of the early 80’s pre Ellis, when we won the League and subsequently the European Cup.

I know it suits the everything is marvelous in the garden argument, but when fans argue that achieving the EC is nothing special, Notts Forest did it twice after all, I wonder just how low some fans will go to prove the present manager is supreme above all his predecessors. When you consider few British clubs have ever won that accolade its demeaning to suggest its no mean achievement. Its a disgrace especially to hear a Villa fan suggest it, especially when today’s outfit, despite a tremendous effort have yet to achieve more than 6th a target Ellis met or beat 7 times in his second term in the PL.

The signs are good, with 3 games to go 5th and a real European qualification is a great achievement in only 3 seasons even considering the money spent, but there is some way to go yet, to achieve the 4th and
two 2nds achieved under Ellis to say nothing of the wondrous 80/81 season and of course that pinnacle in Rotterdam

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Walking Where Angels Fear To Tread