With Saturday’s defeat to Sheffield Wednesday at Villa Park, the boos at the halftime and fulltime whistle were palpable and a number of manager Steve Bruce’s strongest backers are now willing to concede that Aston Villa aren’t making progress and are arguably going backwards.
If you don’t move forward in the game and show improvements, everyone else around you will and whilst I still give Bruce more credit than most for the work he has done at the club given the atmosphere and confidence levels, I’m not alone in slowly coming to the conclusion he physically cannot take the next step that I believe everyone wants.
Not promotion, tactical awareness and a game plan that might be slightly entertaining and not resort instantly to ‘don’t concede’.
I’m not alone.
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I really wanted to give Bruce a chance this season, I wanted to believe that he could lead the way to promotion with his experience. After a summer of uncertainty, it was correct to start with him as manager and right by the owners to take a look at things and see what they had bought before making big changes.
But after yet another woeful performance today he has lost the majority of support and goodwill, I hope he will go before things get too nasty as he doesn’t deserve personal abuse. He has maybe found his limitations as a manager, he can be a good motivator, good at man management and has attracted some good players to sign. Where he is being exposed now is of his lack of tactical awareness in favour of old-fashioned put your boots on methodology.
We hear too many excuses of squad rebuilding and starting again. Villa are in fact in a much better position squad wise and infrastructure wise than nearly all other Championship teams and the majority of them seem to cope ok.
What has made me now decide that change is required is that we are not progressing, not in a style of play or in results, in fact, we are getting more and more bad performances and the team look more disjointed than ever. Too many players out of positions and out of form, a badly handled transfer mess in defence, not being able to utilise star players, and a worrying lack of direction means it could be 100 and out for Bruce.
Thanks for the return of belief last season and for the Wolves and Blues games. Thanks for trying your best but it’s time for a new direction with a manager and coaching staff who can get these players working as a unit, not as individuals.
UTV
Writer – Platt-itudes
More on the Vital Villa forum thread – usual caveats stronger language, some toys being thrown out of the pram etc…
