Tim Sherwood insisted he was not concerned by the fact the Aston Villa board have made no attempt to publicly back him amid constant speculation about his future, but the manager did make a point of calling on the fans, players and directors to pull together for Saturday’s crucial home match against Swansea City.
Villa have lost their last five league games and picked up only one point from a possible 24, leaving them second from bottom and cranking up the pressure on Sherwood. The Villa Supporters’ Trust this week criticised the club for remaining silent on the manager’s position but Sherwood claimed that he was comfortable with that situation.
“I can’t control that,” Sherwood said, when asked whether it would help if Randy Lerner, the chairman, or Tom Fox, the chief executive, said that his position was safe. “It’s their decision whether they want to come out and say that. You would have seen people get votes of confidence and it probably means not too much.
“If you win enough games it’s someone else’s turn to have the pressure. The pressure is on me anyway and I always knew that. When you manage a club like Aston Villa there’s always pressure. There was pressure last season when things were going very well for us. We reached our objective which was to stay in the league. No one was talking to me then so I don’t expect [people] to talk to me now.”
Sherwood, who joked he would “be checking over my shoulder to see if anyone is positioning themselves in the directors’ box tomorrow”, backed himself to turn Villa’s fortunes around if given the opportunity. “They bought me in for a reason. They know I can do the job. They saw me do it last season,” he said.
“I think it’s tough on managers when they’re not allowed time to turn it around. It seems to always be that way. It’s part and parcel of it. Unfortunately we’re in this business where we have to take responsibility. It’s not me who makes the decisions. I don’t hire and fire people at this football club. I’m here to be their manager and give everything to the cause. I can’t do more than what I’m doing, to be honest. I’m working hard with the players. I’m trying to find the best formula and it will be successful in the end, given time.”
Without a league win since the opening day of the season, Villa’s position is perilous and they are already four points adrift of safety. Sherwood, though, remains confident that Villa will drag themselves clear and said that the way Leicester City recovered last season should give everyone at the club encouragement.
“We take inspiration from teams like Leicester who were at the bottom of the Premier League last season and they put a run together which we’re capable of doing. This group of players are capable of doing it next year because they’ve had a year experience. It’s been hard and we can’t hide away from it but it will be easier come the end of the season, believe me.”
Whether Sherwood is still in the job then remains to be seen. He badly needs a victory over Swansea to breath new life into Villa’s season and buy himself some time. “We have to collectively stick together, players, staff, directors and get Villa Park bouncing. We need to be as one,” Sherwood said. “Then we can take that confidence into the next game.”
