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Remi Garde hopes to turn around Villa’s holiday blues against West Ham
Boxing Day fixtures are a treasured Premier League tradition, or as Villa blogger Matt Ferenchick put it, “in theory, rather.” Aston Villa’s recent Boxing Day history has been fruitless, with no wins since 2005, including losing five fixtures since 2007 and drawing three. A 2-2 draw with Arsenal in 2008 is the closest they’ve come to a celebratory result, bar a hectic four-all draw with Chelsea the year prior, a goalless affair with Stoke City marking their only other draw. A 4-0 hounding by Tottenham Hotspur in 2012 and a 3-0 loss to Arsenal in 2009, however, soured their holiday cheer in recent years.
How Villa will pine to change the tune of their holiday blues against West Ham United on Saturday. The Lions haven’t won since the opening day of this season against Bournemouth, going a club-record of sixteen matches without a win since. Villa are bottom of the table with just seven points, five behind nineteenth placed side Sunderland. Manager Remi Garde has said the club need ten wins to stay up; right now he’d be relieved with just a single win.
If relegation isn’t already a foregone conclusion, as some high-profile figures such as Alan Shearer have already claimed, Garde will turn to the January transfer window to attempt to scratch something out of a spineless team.
Ironically, his job will be to undo most of the mistakes Villa made over the summer. The Midlands side adopted a strategy much akin to that of Newcastle United, targeting younger players from predominantly the Belgian and French markets. Villa recouped £40 million of their £55 million summer splash from the sales of Christian Benteke and Fabian Delph, but they failed to cover the gaping hole left up front. Benteke netted thirteen league goals last season, a tally Villa only matched as a collective unit this season against Newcastle United last weekend.
Villa brought in center back Jordan Veretout and forwards Jordan Ayew, Jordan Amavi and Adama Traore, who was signed on the club’s highest wages from Barcelona B. Traore is yet to start in the Premier League and has looked particularly out of his depth even next to his fellow signings, of which only Ayew has really shown flashes of the brightness that was expected. Villa sold off their backbone and replaced it with a multitude of over-priced, fringe parts.
Although Tim Sherwood was sacked as manager in October, most Villa fans lay the blame on the hierarchy at Villa park; from the top down: owner Randy Lerner, chief executive Tom Fox and head of recruitment, Paddy Riley. Villa finished fifteenth at the end of the 2013/2014 season when Lerner announced he had put the club up for sale, and apart from a good start last season, they’ve scarcely been above that mark ever since. Yet for all of Lerner’s mistakes over the course of his nine years at the club (remember, he inherited a team in Europe), safety this season may be able to resurrect his reputation in England.
Per the Guardian, Garde visited New York to discuss a strategy and had his purse strings loosened ever so slightly. If he does somehow succeed, luck will have undoubtedly played its part, yet it’s hard to see Villa turning around the ship without a leader and captain up front or a driver in the midfield. Lest it be remembered, Villa have never won on Boxing Day with Lerner at the helm at seven times of trying.
Homepage photo credit: Erik Drost, via Flickr