Lambert keeping the belief and spirit high, insists Aston Villa star

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Under-fire Aston Villa boss Paul Lambert has the full backing of goalkeeper Brad Guzan.

Aston Villa goalkeeper Brad Guzan has given his backing to under-fire manager Paul Lambert, insisting the Scot has kept sprits in the dressing room high during their recent dismal run of results.

After two relegation-threatened seasons under Lambert, Villa got off to hot start to this term, taking 10 points from their opening four league games to sit second in the table for a time.

Things have since gone backwards, however, with the west midlands outfit enduring a run of six straight defeats before Saturday’s nervy 0-0 draw at West Ham United.

Having scored just once in almost 11 hours of football, the pressure is mounting on Lambert to get wins on the board, but Guzan believes the beleaguered boss is the right man for the job, and argues there were a lot of positives to be taken from the West Ham result.

“The gaffer’s been good. We know it’s not easy, the pressure you go through being a football manager,” he told Sky Sports News HQ. “When you go on a run like that the pressure increases, and you have to find a way to deal with that.

“You have to be professional and get past the difficult times, and we’ve been able to do that with the manager keeping the belief and the spirit high.

“It’s been difficult, that’s no secret. We obviously want to do well as a team and for our fans and supporters. When you go on a run like that it’s difficult for everyone involved at the club so for us to stop the rot was important.

“It was important for us to pick up a vital point, and hopefully now we can use that to jump start a run of good results.”

With Villa hosting Southampton in their first match back after the international break, before subsequent fixture against Burnley, Crystal Palace, Leicester City and West Bromwich Albion, Guzan now sees the team being in a prime position to make a run up the table.

“It’ll be important for us now to go back to Villa Park and try to get another positive point against a team that is not only doing well on paper but has assembled a very strong side over the summer,” he said.

“Then those next games are where you want to get results. We know the Premier League is competitive from top to bottom and there’re no easy games. We’ve just come off a very tough run of fixtures but we’ll hopefully use the West Ham result to build on.”