Is Gerrard Houllier’s managerial style helping or hindering Aston Villa?

Despite Martin O’Neil’s departure before the season started, a mid table finish was the minimum required by new manager Gerrard Houllier from the fans. Now with only nine games left, Aston Villa now sit just two points off the relegation zone.

Since his arrival in September last year, the amount of players that have reported to have fallen out with their new manager has been huge.  Stephen Ireland only moved to Villa Park in the summer, and he is already on loan at Newcastle after several disagreements with the villa manager. Houllier is known from his Liverpool days as being very old-fashioned in his managerial style, but when you come into a new club and try to change too much, and try to make too much of an impact too quickly, there is always likely to be a backlash from the current players.

The Villa season so far has been hugely underwhelming, fighting to stay out of the relegation zone all season, getting knocked out of the Carling Cup by fierce rivals Birmingham City. This of course wasn’t helped by numerous injuries throughout the campaign, but one thing is certain, Houllier’s ‘his way or no way’ style doesn’t seem to have had the effect he wanted. 

Centre back pairing Richard Dunne and James Collins were recently involved in a bust up with the Villa backroom staff on a team bonding evening, both players have since publically apologised for their behaviour, but this isn’t the first time of reported bust up’s between players and staff this season.  Maintaining and creating discipline within the side was ironically what Houllier had been renowned for.

I would not be surprised if in the summer, there is a big exodus of players to leave Villa Park, Houllier is an experienced manager and will not be think twice about getting rid of any dead weight within the club, especially with the clubs’s high wage budget at present. Only time will tell whether Houllier will be a success at Villa Park, and with the signing of Darren Bent a definite sign of commitment from chairman Randy Lerner, there is still hope that Houllier can bring success back to Aston villa.

Jamie Hopkins