On Saturday, 18th placed Premier League club, Aston Villa, will visit the Anfield Stadium to play against the new champions of the League, Liverpool, and Dean Smith the manager of the relegated threatened club believes that the club would survive relegation.
Liverpool‘s players are still licking their wounds after the 4-0 battering they suffered in the hands of second-placed Manchester City on Wednesday, July 2. And unfortunately for Aston Villa, they are the next club that would face the battered champions three days after their worst defeat in the season.
Dean Smith and his boys just suffered a routine 0-1 lost to Wolves on Saturday, June 27, which has further sunk them down the relegation water. They are now third from the bottom with 27 points from 32 matches. They are only better than 20th placed Norwich City that currently have 21 points from the same number of games.
Yet, Smith said since a relegation-threatened club like West Ham United can beat a top placed team like Chelsea football club 3-2, they can also perform a miracle when they face the raving Premier League champions.
Beyond performing a miracle against Liverpool, the manager stressed that he has never been relegated in his career as a manager and he would not start with Aston Villa. Smith reminded the world that he did the unthinkable in the 2010-2011 season when he managed to rescue Walsall football club from being relegated, saying, he has been “in great escapes”.
He said: “The points tally hasn’t shown that we played Wolves last week and they are pushing for the Champions League and there was nothing between the two teams. The only quality on show was the goal.
“If we manage to stay up this season, which I believe we will, there will be a better Aston Villa next year.
“Only two of the teams in the bottom six have won [since the Premier League restart] and both were in the last minute: Brighton against Arsenal and West Ham against Chelsea.
“We’re all battling for points. Every day you’re drawing on experiences you’ve had. At Walsall we were eight points adrift and the following season was a battle as well and we managed to come through that by being a team that was together.”
Can Aston Villa really survive Relegation?
Just like what the manager of the club had said, the relegation battle is a battle of 6 teams – Brighton, West Ham, Watford, Aston Villa, Bournemouth and Norwich City. He has also described himself as a manager that has never been relegated. However, going by the current form of Aston Villa and the calibre of clubs they still have to play in their remaining 6 games, they stand no chance.
This season, Brighton, 33 points, West Ham, 30 points and Watford, 28 points, have shown that they can compete with the best teams in the Premier League on a very good day. They have had records of beating the big boys in the league. For instance, Brighton has beaten Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur this season, West Ham has beaten Chelsea this season, and Watford broke Liverpool’s unbeaten run this season. Hence, the trio have the potentials of beating difficult opponents.
In the case of Aston Villa, they can also pull some surprises once in a while, but they have proven that they can not go further since the beginning of 2020. Take, for instance, the last time Aston Villa won a match was on 28 January 2020, when they defeated Leicester City in EFL Cup. Since then, they have failed to win in 9 matches.
Since the Premier League returned from the coronavirus break, Aston Villa have lost 2 matches and drew two in four games. This means that they are yet to win any match since the return of football in England.
Unfortunately for them, after playing Liverpool on Saturday, they have a date with Manchester United. Everton, Crystal Palace, West Ham and Arsenal are still waiting for them. In fact, it will really take a miracle for the club to survive relegation this season.
