Stevie G may be a Liverpool legend, but he’ll go down as a dreadful Villa manager. By routing Brentford 4-0, their first game without Steven Gerard as their manager, Aston Villa showed that their former manager was always the problem.
There must have been a huge celebration in the Villa locker room after this win today. To be honest, ever since Steven Gerrard was tempted down from Rangers and hired as the Aston Villa manager last November, Aston Villa has been awful. Everything about their team, from the defense, the midfield, the forwards, the coaching, substitutions, tactics, etc., has either been out-of-sync or just plain pitiful since Gerrard arrived.
It’s actually really strange why Gerrard, who was an uber successful manager with Rangers up in Scotland as he went unbeaten to win the Scottish Premiership, turned into a caricature of a manager while coaching Villa. Like I said, Gerrard had proven he has the tactical nous and courage to win and had done it consistently as he turned Rangers from a mid-table Scottish side back into league champions.
Yet, it’s entirely different to manage in Scottland than in England. And we’ve seen though Gerrard’s failure that fact played out in real time.
In order to be a successful coach in England, one needs to be able to adapt their tactical gameplans to the opposition. Unlike in Scottland, every single English Premier League team has the quality and tactical fortitude to beat even the very best teams in the country. You’d be lucky to see a mid-table Scottish team beat a good Celtic or Rangers side once every five seasons.
Obviously, Stevie G never adapted, and it eventually affected his team’s performances on the field. Oh, and Gerrard’s uncanny ability to fall out with every member of the Villa squad also helped to get him sacked.
Did Gerrard actually think he would be able to survive with his team not only putting in horrible performances every week, but also being hated by all of his players? I hope he didn’t.
Anyway, with Gerrard being old news now, Villa finally came out of their shell and DESTROYED Brentford. In a matter of 15 minutes, Villa had already scored three goals and their star players, such as Leon Bailey, Danny Ings, Tyrone Mings, and Douglas Luiz, looked rejuvenated. Olle Watkins added a fourth goal in the 58th minute to beef up the score, but Villa Park was already in pandemonium by that point.
Their team finally showed that they had the skills and fight to stay in the Premier League and that all of their issues were down to Steven Gerrard’s stubbornness.
Still, I’m not sure if Villa will stay up this season as there are a lot of good teams fighting to stay in the Premier League, but at least they now have a chance as this win puts them 14th in the table with 12 points.
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