At this point, it's safe to say that Aston Villa have had one of their more inconsistent seasons, in fact, I'll define and file this 2014/2015 season as inconsistent, or maybe we could top it off and just write the whole damned thing off as the Year of our Inconsistent.
There have been a few bright spots this season; Villa's cup performances, Shay Given against Leicester, Benteke's bender against United, Okore & Clark, and Carles Gil among others. Those lone positives haven't been enough to steady the ship at Villa, which saw a positive start to the season drop off a cliff into hopelessness. Paul Lambert's gone and the team still look just as damned at this point in time.
Remember the running joke that Aston Villa couldn't run their 'Goal of the Month' contest, you know, because there were some months that didn't see the net bulge? I was thinking earlier about another award, one that comes in the summer. Aston Villa's Player of the Season won't be a hard medal to give away. After all, in my mind there is only one candidate.
Ciaran Clark.
Ciaran had a horrible season last year. Mistakes and being caught out of position time and time again lead to smiles on the faces of Villa fans when we signed Philippe Senderos in the summer, because it would obviously force Ciaran Clark down the pecking order. Somehow, down to the injuries of Ron Vlaar, Senderos and Nathan Baker, Clark managed to regain his spot and formed an unlikely partnership with Jores Okore. The chemistry of the two multiplied their talent and Villa managed to anchor the back line - even though they couldn't score, the opposition had to do damn well to score on occasion.
Then Okore's performances dropped. He took the ball too far out and got punished almost every game. He was dropped and Vlaar came back briefly, before signing off the next few months with a token injury. Even in the face of inconsistency, Clark managed to carry on with his high level of performance. Smart, crunching tackles became his trademark as he showed time and time again he could take the ball from the best strikers in the league without penalising Villa. He did manage to get an early bath this season, against Leicester, but many would argue that his skirmish with Matt James showed more passion than any act of footballing this season by the Villans.
We're going to lose a lot of people in the summer. A lot of good footballing talent is on the verge of packing up and shipping off, but even in the face of losing Delph, Vlaar and Benteke, I think the biggest loss would be Ciaran Clark.
Agree or disagree? Let us know below!
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