Aston Villa News 24/7We’re 10 games into the 2010/11 Premiership season, so it’s time to compare this season with last season both chronologically and using an apples-to-apples comparison, or as close as is practically possible. This is the 2nd in the series this year, you can see the first post, which was a snapshot after five games, here and you can also check the 2009/10 vs 2008/09 comparison after 10 games here.
Since the form over the last five games is WLDLD, you probably won’t be surprised to find the tables don’t make encouraging reading:-
| Season | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | Pts |
| 2010/11 | 10 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 9 | 13 | 12 |
| 2009/10 Chron | 10 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 14 | 9 | 18 |
| 2009/10 Apples | 10 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 15 | 8 | 17 |
The good news is that although the goals against column is alarming, 6 of those were at St James’ of course and we’ve actually only conceded four in the last five games. The bad news is that we’ve only scored three ourselves.
More of a concern, at the current pace, we’re on course now to pick up just 46 points by the end of the season, a tally that has achieved a best placing of 10th since the Premier League was reduced to 20 teams, but will generally place a team around 12th.
| Season | Pts/gm | GF/gm | GA/gm | GF/GA | W% | D% | L% |
| 2010/11 | 1.20 | 0.90 | 1.30 | 0.69 | 30.0% | 30.0% | 40.0% |
| 2009/10 Chron | 1.80 | 1.40 | 0.90 | 1.56 | 50.0% | 30.0% | 20.0% |
| 2009/10 Apples | 1.70 | 1.50 | 0.80 | 1.88 | 40.0% | 50.0% | 10.0% |
| Projections: | 46 | 34 | 49 |
It goes without saying that a run of good results are required on every level right now, but the fixture calendar isn’t doing us any huge favours. There’s five league games during November: Fulham (A), Blackpool (H), Man Utd (H), Blackburn (A) and Arsenal (H) and the first game in December will be the Carling Cup quarter final at St Andrews on Wednesday 1st.
During those five November games, then, we’ll need to find 14 points to match the 26 points we had after 15 games last season. 14 points from five games isn’t possible though, so we’d have to take 15 to beat it or 13 (four wins and a draw) to get close.
Not impossible, but a tall order in normal circumstances and we’re not exactly scoring for fun right now. Using Portsmouth as the substitute for Blackpool, we took eight points from those same five fixtures last season, so there’s definitely a little room to make up some ground.
The season isn’t a right off by any means, there’s just about three quarters of the way to go yet, much can still happen, but from where we are right now, finishing in a European paying spot looks like some achievement.
Curiously though, while we currently sit in the bottom half of the table, just three points from the relegation zone, we’re simultaneously also three points behind Tottenham in 5th place. Is your glass half empty or half full?
This does highlight the value of the exercise of comparing our performance against ourselves, the table is a little like a 400m race where you don’t truly know where the runners are in relation to each other until the bends have been run, the stagger has been unwound and they’re in the final straight.
Some teams will be artificially high in the table because of a less stressful fixture list, others will be suffering in the lower reaches having had to take on a string of tough opponents, but could get a surge with an easier run for a spell.
Right now though, if that Carling Cup match was already a big deal, it just got a lot bigger.
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14 Comments to “This Season Vs Last Season #09”
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what I worry about Dan is that we had an easy start as such and as you say we are going into a difficult run, the next two games are totally vital to the future.
Look beyond November and it hardly gets better !
indeed. december is a monster of a month tbf.
it’s why the “we’re only 3 points from 5th” view is optimistic to say the least.
given our lack of resources, the way Houllier manages all this will be one of the greatest tests as a manager he faces
yup, he’s in at the deep end right now.
i suppose we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that we’ve had a couple of summer sagas; milner & MON, two managers this season already & a bunch of injuries.
that’s a stern test in anyone’s book.
personally, i think it’s a matter of just hanging in there and seeing what sort of shape we’re in come new year.
hanging on is the word, Gabby can not come back soon enough, but has to be fully fit
I’ll accept the ‘transitional phase’ thing if I see some genuine ‘shoots’ of new life in the side. I’ll expect some of these signs to be visible by the New Year, so like you, I will hold fire. For now.
ah, the old green shoots of recovery…. spring seems a long way off, doesn’t it?
More sobering than the three goals in five games is six goals in the last nine games; the latter is a higher per game rate but a six-game drought is a lot more significant than a three. 254 minutes (plus extra time) of league play now without a goal; you can analyze and compare endlessly, but probably safe to say that if they cannot find a way to score, there won’t be much to talk about.
When does Delfouneso get a chance?
that’s pretty much why i haven’t motivated myself to knock up a statshack for the last one, there doesn’t seem much to look at.
not sure what the deal with delfouneso is, but we could have played drogba up front on sunday and it wouldn’t have made any difference.
I don’t think it’s about the strike force, although obviously we’d benefit from a world class striker (I’d say there is only one in the Prem at the moment).
It’s about midfield. If Heskey or Carew played for Arse, Chels, United etc, he’d have about 7 or 8 goals by now. We are simply not creating enough chances. It is only truly world class strikers that consistently put away rare goal scoring opportunities. It is what Torres did ( and unfortunately may be about to start doing again) to mask the dire problems at Liverpool.
When our midfield turns to face the opposition and starts trying to shift the ball in triangles through the middle, there may be hope…….
……..but the patio furniture is under canvas and the rotting leaves are clogging the earth under a smothering slate sky.
yes, this oft repeated notion that “all we need is a 20-a-season-striker” never fails to draw a wry smile.
as you say, better than we have now would obviously be welcome, but no one can score if you don’t create the chances. that goes for the perennial flavour of the month; robbie keane, or the latest must have solution to all our ills; roque santa cruz.
Well, who knows what Drogba would have done; Heskey, as I recall, was a step late on at least one good chance, and inexplicably passed away on one reasonable chance. Even if there are only five reasonable scoring chances in a game, you have to assume Drogba is more likely to convert than Heskey, or Carew, or Agbonlahor, for that matter.
But I fully understand your basic point about the 20-a-season-striker. You could take it one step further and say the key to winning is to score more goals than your opponent, but having said that doesn’t really provide a path to victory.
If the offense can be figured out, there are more than enough players capable of scoring goals – the above, plus obviously Young, Albrighton, Ireland, Downing… 20 goals is the same regardless of the source, and, indeed, just plunking down a 20-goal scorer (even if such a commodity were available) in the midst of the current situation will not necessarily accomplish anything, except perhaps to convert him into a 10-goal scorer.
the 20-a-season thing inspired a windy post where i think the main point was lost. oh well.
a couple of seasons ago we were scoring goals for fun. third best behind utd & arsenal as i recall. goals all over the team, i wasn’t worried that we didn’t have one striker delivering all those goals.
in fact, it struck me that sharing the goals around was a good thing since it didn’t place all our eggs in one basket.
then the goals dried up. i actually don’t know why tbh and what’s most vexing (to borrow a seinfeldism) is that i look at those attacking players and i see nothing but goals.
i christened the ash, downing, milner, gabby foursome the four horsemen last season, i really thought they would terrorize teams. didn’t happen, not the way i anticipated.
maybe one single striker *is* the missing ingredient that will unlock all their potential, but what i’m trying so badly to say is that whoever you play up there will fail for the same reason the incumbants are.
i just don’t know why that is.
But, of course, since that dominant striker is not available, why even think about it? I think people are saying that while Drogba could not do with Villa what he does at Chelsea, you would still have a better chance with Drogba than with Heskey, but so what? This is not a choice Villa is presented with. They couldn’t even keep Milner, whose absence is, I think, a major factor in the current malaise.