Lee Hendrie claims Aston Villa fans are ‘fuming’ and worried the club will go down

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Aston Villa dropped into the relegation zone over the weekend.

Lee Hendrie has shared that Aston Villa fans are worried that they are ‘edging’ towards going back down and how they will be ‘fuming’ following their damaging 3-1 defeat to Southampton over the weekend.

The former Villa midfielder also feels that Dean Smith’s side are over-reliant on midfield duo Jack Grealish and the now-injured John McGinn.

Grealish put in a brilliant display for Villa against the Saints, including netting a sensational consolation goal, but Villa’s inability to win the midfield battle and make costly mistakes resulted in them getting well beat by their fellow relegation strugglers.

Speaking to Sports Report on BBC Radio 5 Live (22/12/19 at 5:15 pm), Hendrie shared his thoughts on Villa’s loss, how the fans are feeling and where the problems lie.

“To go and lose 3-1 at Southampton, something has got to change, big time,” Hendrie told Sports Report. “The main reason behind this is that they are really struggling to score goals. There’s a lot of reliance on Jack Grealish and the likes of McGinn.

“They have some big fixtures coming up. Massive games, they need to win. That’s the problem [the big expectation]. I felt if they could get something [from Southampton] it would just bring that bit of momentum back, stop the rot and it gets the fans back on side.

“The fans are going to be absolutely fuming. I can tell you that for sure. I have been speaking to a lot of them, they are certainly edging that they are thinking that the club are going to go back down. I cannot wait for the next fixture to come and they need to stay strong.”

Villa did start their defeat to the Saints in a pretty encouraging fashion, but the signs began to creep in that they were going to be facing a defeat.

The midfield were unable to win second balls, whilst the two centre-backs were once again exposed because of the lack of protection in front of them and were punished on the day.

The third goal Villa conceded summed up their afternoon, as they are now sitting into the relegation zone and face a very tough and important fixture against Norwich on Boxing Day.