The following analysis was
performed utilizing data from the Individual Plus/Minus series published on the
site throughout the year. You can find the
full data set in the Room of Informational
Illusions. Should you wish for a glossary of
terms used in this article, it
can be found here.
Overview
Villa finished the season in
fifteenth position on the EPL table, when, pre-season many expected them to
challenge for a top-half berth.
2013-14 was hardly a success for
Aston Villa. After assuming control of the midlands club prior to 2012-13, Scotland’s
entry for World’s Most Charismatic Man Paul Lambert orchestrated something of a
revolution-on-the-cheap by marginalizing the overpaid stars who had taken Villa
to the brink of Champions League football and then almost to relegation. Little
was heard of Alan Hutton, Darren Bent, Charles N’Zogbia and Jean Il Makoun,
while young players from lower divisions like Matthew Lowton and Ashley
Westwood came in as accoutrements to centerpiece Christian
Benteke, who was acquired from Genk.
While some Villans – not least captain
Ron Vlaar and central midfielder Fabian Delph – had solid seasons, many of the
players who finished 2012-13 so promisingly regressed or struggled to impact
games in 2013-14 as they had the previous season.
One of the more notable examples
was Lowton, who managed only 23 matches for the term. The right-back, who
scored the
goal of the season against Stoke City the year before, was a defensive
liability and spent
vast stretches of the season either on the bench or unselected. While
Andreas Weimann’s numbers according to the Individual Plus/Minus system
compared quite favourably to his teammates, far more was expected from the Villa
player to whom the
Spiderman Principle most obviously applies.
