Aston Villa are a club steeped with tradition and history but the immediate future of the club is not looking too bright.
Currently bottom of the Premier League with relegation to the Championship almost a virtual certainty, and with plenty of problems on and off the pitch, these are worrying times for Villa fans.
Only three wins in 30 Premier League games this season tells its own story, but things don’t look as though they are in place to ensure the club backs stronger in the short term.
The very quick demise of Portsmouth, who dropped from the Premier League to League Two in the space of three years, will worry many Villa fans who fear similar and here we look at FIVE reasons that the famous Aston Villa could suffer a similar fate…..
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PRESS THE IMAGE BELOW TO SEE THE FIVE REASONS!
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Owners
American billionaire Randy Lerner took over at Villa Park in 2006, but things have quickly downhill during his tenure.
Initial signs were good as then -manager Martin O’Neill steered them to a sixth place finish during Lerner’s first season, but he left four years later after disagreements with the owner.
Since then, Lerner is on his fifth manager in Remi Garde and none of those have been able to turn things around.
Things have got so bad that Lerner hasn’t been seen at Villa Park for months, which perhaps shows what Lerner’s feelings towards Villa now are.
Manager
A big worry ahead of next season is how much about the Championship current manager Remi Garde will know.
It is vital that whoever is in charge knows the league and how to succeed in it.
The Championship is regarded as one of the toughest leagues in Europe and there is a danger, that they will fall desperately short if the manager is not tuned in to the league and the teams in it.
That is somewhere where Pompey also came up short and they are now on their eighth manager in the last five seasons.
Villa will need an experienced manager at that level to stabilise before they find themselves in free-fall.
Players
Teams relegated from the Premier League in recent seasons usually have several players in their squad that are up for the fight of an instant challenge to get back up.
Another big worry for Villa fans is the way that several of their players have seemingly given up without a fight this season, and that will be concerning ahead of next season.
Similarly to the managerial situation, they will need players that are experienced in the league and will be up for the fight to ensure that they compete, and that might mean that a total clear-out of their current squad is needed.
Finance
The Portsmouth situation was purely down to money with several years of financial mismanagement finally catching up with them.
Things, perhaps, aren’t quite as perilous on that front at Villa but with the owner absent, it remains to be seen how he will be willing to back them with them no longer in the top flight of English football.
Parachute payments will be invaluable to them but the main thing for Villa is to live within their means which it appears that Lerner will do, seeing as he looks unwilling to splash out on new players.
Momentum
The biggest thing that can either work, or on the other hand have an adverse effect, is momentum.
Again, Pompey had none at all and just continued to plummet through the leagues.
It is essential that Villa start next season relatively strongly as they can ill-afford another relegation battle in the Championship.
The current squad are not likely to have any momentum at all which is, perhaps, why wholesale changes are needed throughout the club so that a fresh start can be made.
Whatever happens, some pretty important decisions need to be made pretty sharpish otherwise we could be seeing Aston Villa rocking up at the likes of Morecambe and Dagenham in a few years time.
