Merse Says Win This Weekend OR Enter Dogfight

Paul Merson has spoken exclusively to www.expressandstar.com * and has spelt out what a lot of us know.

We will be in the relegation fight if Blackburn beat us on Saturday.

The former Villa star told the paper:

"Villa have some stinking fixtures coming up and if they don`t get a result against Blackburn on Saturday I think they are in real trouble. They have got to play the top five or six teams which is a tough old run. If they can beat Blackburn it should pretty much get them safe but if they lose they might only be five or six points above the relegation places with the likes of Chelsea, Tottenham, Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool all to play."

He adds that we have to beat Blackburn. "You get a team every year that gets on that glass slope with slippers on and they keep on sliding. It`s happened in the past with the likes of Hull and Middlesbrough while it was Blackpool last season."

He also says he is a .... oh some of you folks are not going to like this...!... FAN of Alex McLeish and says the job he has is impossible.

"I think the fans need to put any negative feelings about the manager to one side - whether it is about where he has come from, the fact he took Blues down last season or ideas about the football he plays. The club are in transition."

Adding that the fans can make a difference.

I guess to be fair to us, the players and managers can make a real difference to us as well. We all did the 12th man stuff last year, how about this year the 11 men do their thing to give us a spark?

I do agree that the anger and all that is best done after a game, not during as it does affect players. But it is a chicken and egg situation really isn`t it?

On paper, look at our squad and look what Norwich, Swansea, WBA, even the likes of Newcastle have and the explain why they are all above us?

(* Paul Merson was speaking exclusively to the Express & Star to promote the Gillette Soccer Saturday Live tour which will be staged around the country from March through to June. For tickets visit www.livenation.co.uk or call 0844 844 0444.)

Lets just hope this game v Blackburn, then the matches v Fulham and Bolton see us go on the attack, GO FOR IT... yeah, I know, same rubbish I said about the Wigan game but I`m still fighting to allow the opti to stay within my brain because at the moment he`s taking a battering from the negi thoughts in my old noggin!

I think McLeish or any manager had a tricky task to turn things around, get the transition going but the talk of it being impossible - apart from the possibility of him ever being accepted I guess - is just silly talk. IF he is as good a manager as some say, he should have been getting much more out of a squad full of internationals. The players - not all of them to be fair - haven`t helped either.

Other coverage for the match:

Gabby back and looking to get cracking: Click Here
Preview: Click Here
Video preview: Click Here
Hercs: Click Here
Mystic Mug v Lawro: Click Here
Injury news: Click Here

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