Although Martin O'Neill never led Villa to seize a top 4 spot, he has made Villa a very organized and competitive side. For the past three season, O'Neill has led Villa to finish at 6th spot for three successive seasons. Initially, O'Neill was given fair sum of transfer fee to build up the depleted Villa squad. Instead of spending on star foreigners, O'Neill has shown his old-schooled British manager theory by spending millions on acquiring many domestic rising players, such as WG Ashley Young, DMF Reo-Coker and recently MF Milner and WG Downing. There is nothing wrong to build the squad around domestic talents which is especially logical given the recent premier home grown player rule. However, it also may indicate limited knowledge of O'Neill about foreign players. Villa now has a full squad of up-rising English talents knocking on England national team door; however, most of them are England bench and fringe players. With the current squad of over-priced domestic players, they find it hard to compete with the big six with variety of foreign talents in their team. O'Neill is a competent tactical manager, especially good at designing counter attack and his strategy of attacking through the wing is very effective. Yet, the team remains somewhat lacking in bench depth and also they do not have a reliable scorer as target man Carew and Heskey can hardly combine 15 goals per season.
Now O'Neill has just announced his resignation from the club, Aston Villa could soon sell their last season best performer James Milner to Manchester City and club's biggest assets Ashley Young. Although this could mean the club can obtain money from these player sale for player transfer, the Villa owner has no money to improve the club and more key players could gradually leave the club. Whatsoever, the club must try to strengthen its depth. With no help from the bench, Villa always run out of steam around last 2 months of the season and tend to lose from 4th/5th spot to 7th/8th at the end. Therefore, strengthening the bench is essential for Villa to remain at 7th to 8th position, let alone fighting for the top 6.
Strongest line-up: <4-5-1/4-3-3>
Now O'Neill has just announced his resignation from the club, Aston Villa could soon sell their last season best performer James Milner to Manchester City and club's biggest assets Ashley Young. Although this could mean the club can obtain money from these player sale for player transfer, the Villa owner has no money to improve the club and more key players could gradually leave the club. Whatsoever, the club must try to strengthen its depth. With no help from the bench, Villa always run out of steam around last 2 months of the season and tend to lose from 4th/5th spot to 7th/8th at the end. Therefore, strengthening the bench is essential for Villa to remain at 7th to 8th position, let alone fighting for the top 6.
Strongest line-up: <4-5-1/4-3-3>
Friedel
Cuellar Davies Dunne Warnock
Agbonlahor Petrov Reo-Coker Sidwell Downing
Carew
Prediction: 8th or lower
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