With just five Premier League games remaining for Aston Villa this season, the battle for Champions League qualification is now reaching a thrilling conclusion.
As things currently stand, Villa sit level on points with Chelsea and Nottingham Forest, albeit the latter have a game in hand, while we’re a point adrift of Manchester City, and two behind Newcastle Utd in third place.
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With an eight-point buffer over eighth-place Bournemouth, it’s hoped that we’ve solidified our spot in terms of having European football in some form for next year, but ultimately the objective for Unai Emery, the players and all concerned is to return to the Champions League to build on our progress and success in the competition this season.
As we gear up for a trip to Man City at the Etihad on Tuesday night, the stakes remain as high as ever as we look to make it six consecutive league wins and continue to build on the momentum we’ve created which saw us sweep Newcastle aside this past weekend in a comprehensive 4-1 win.
While we can hope that we receive favours from elsewhere, starting with Forest dropping points at Tottenham on Monday night, Emery will undoubtedly be telling his players that all that matters is what we do, and if we continue to win games between now and the end of the season, we’ll hopefully get what we both deserve and desire.
With home games against Fulham and Tottenham still to come at fortress Villa Park, we also face difficult trips to City, Bournemouth and Manchester United.
That is a difficult set of fixtures at any stage of the campaign, but with no room for error in the closing weeks, the pressure will be amplified as we hope we’re peaking at just the right time with Emery’s rotation and man-management allowing for the squad to look healthy, fresh and raring to go at the most critical of times.
It’s in stark contrast to what we saw last season as we eventually limped over the line to seal fourth place, and so it seems as though lessons were learned from that campaign, while getting injured players back and strengthening the group in January have made a significant difference.
Villa also have an FA Cup semi-final to look forward to this weekend as we take on Crystal Palace at Wembley, but full focus will be on our next game, and that has to be the mentality at this time of the year.
With Newcastle still having difficult games against Brighton, Chelsea and Arsenal, City have yet to play us, Bournemouth and Fulham in what could be tricky assignments for them.
Chelsea still have Liverpool, Newcastle, Man Utd and Forest to face, while Forest have difficult encounters ahead against Spurs, Brentford, Palace and Chelsea on the final day of the season.
Emery will have the squad locked in on our job and what we have to do to get to where we want to be, but when looking at the fixture schedule, there are going to be so many more twists and turns between now and the end of the campaign, but the margin for error becomes increasingly smaller and our excellent recent form must continue deep into May.
Villa needed 68 points last season to secure fourth spot, while it’s taken a points tally of 66, 67, 69, 66 and 62 over the past five seasons to land fifth place in the Premier League. Will four wins from our last five games be enough? A win away at Man City would certainly be the ideal start to this decisive final stretch.
