Leeds Preview

Our next five games are Leeds, Forest, Chelsea, Fulham and Brentford.

Starting at Elland Road, if Steven Gerrard expects to be taken seriously as a manager, then four wins from those five games is the bare minimum return he should be extracting from this Villa squad.

There are no excuses. The idiocy of his squad management was always going to lead to a depleted roster of players available.

This is not a season in transition. There is no luck involved, the lack of squad depth was Gerrard’s choice.

This is simply the fruits of the error laden spell under Gerrard.

Regardless of the absentees, we should be sitting higher mid-table by the end of this month and at least 12 points better off than where we are today,

Anything less will prove, once and for all, that Purslow erred to a catastrophic degree in appointing Gerrard.