Vote Of Confidence - Sort Of!

Vital Villa, in a very tongue in cheek way (!), asked last week who you would prefer as manager at Aston Villa. The choices were David O'Leary, Graeme Souness or Noddy. Noddy started as the clear favourite with 66% but following our impressive 4-0 win over Boro at the weekend the result soon changed to give O'Leary a vote of confidence - of sorts!

It seems no one wants former Liverpool, Blackburn and now Newcastle boss Graeme Souness and if reports are to be believed, he is considering retiring from the game. He only polled 2%.

Noddy was given a vote of 48% which illustrates that the Villa fans are yet to be convinced with our manager who managed to poll 50% in favour.

There are certainly signs of improvements and O'Leary now has a much stronger squad to choose from with only Wilfred Bouma and Martin Laursen currently out for a long period (Bouma more than 3 weeks, Laursen the season) and Baros likely to be fit shortly following a tight hamstring.

What Villa now need to do is improve their home record, although the away win at the weekend was a great result we have to taper that with the fact we only have 7 wins this season, with 9 draws and 9 losses. Get the wins above the draws and losses and we may have an outside chance of Europe! Our away record is respectable with us currently lying 5th in the away form league, but the home record - most unusually for Villa, is woeful as we stand 17th (3 wins, 4 draws, 5 losses).

Villa are currently 12th in the league, which isn't far off where I expected us to be considering the small squad and lack of investment. With an FA Cup run on the boil and improving results, the end of the season should certainly be more fun than the dismal start!