Rather than pass comment on anything said by any of the players or the manager or the press, I'm just going to pass on some statistics today and comment on them. Statistics don't lie. How you interpret them is another matter, but a number is a number and the number isn't wrong.
Some things that are wrong are just crazy wrong and some things that are wrong are just stupid wrong. Some things are wrong because there is a basis for not getting it right and some things are wrong because the alternative just isn't nice.
Numbers are not wrong and we have one more player in the top 100 list as John Carew enters at position 98. This means we now have nine players in the top 100, which isn't a bad number and if I really did know how these numbers were worked out, I might actually be able to say it was a very good number but I suspect it is and that is good enough for me, in this particular case.
Big Brad has moved up from the last time we looked at these numbers and Ricardo Dunne stays third in his top ten but all other players in 'the top tens' have moved down, but they're not tired and it has nothing to do with fitness. It is probably build up of games and maybe not playing as many as other players. I don't know, but we just know what it isn't.
Current Form
If we were looking at current form, which is the last six games - we would be ninth in the table, a place behind Liverpool and a place above Wolves and if you were to look at our remaining six fixtures, four of them are below us in the current form table and two of them are above us; Everton and Manchester City.
Win Rate
Our win rate under Martin O'Neill has been 41.76%, which is somewhere between two and three out of six. Of the last six matches we have won two and drawn three. What we do with the next six, anyone can have a guess at, but if we win more than three I'd be surprised - only because, at the end of the day, you guessed it, the numbers don't lie.
Aston Villa Players in Actim Top 100 - April 5th 2010
- 5th: Gabby Agbonlahor - 490 points
- 16th: Ricardo Dunne - 437 points
- 21st: Milly - 421 points
- 22nd: Webcam - 417 points
- 23rd: King Carlos - 416 points
- 30th: Big Brad - 379 points
- 66th: Stiliyan Petrov - 308 points
- 89th: The Ginger One - 288 points
- 98th: John Carew - 278 points
Top 10 Keepers
- 3rd: Big Brad
Top 10 Defenders
- 3rd: Ricardo Dunne
- 6th: King Carlos
Top 10 Midfielders
- 5th: Milly
- 6th: Webcam
Top 10 Strikers
- 5th: Gabby Agbonlahor