Aston Villa Rumours

Aston Villa Club Honours

Aston Villa have a history filled with major honours, they were one of the founder member of the football league and finished runner up in the first ever football league in 1888-1889 to Preston North End. They were also one of the founder members of the Premier League and as of 2015 are yet to be relegated from that division. This proud club is the 5th most successful team of all time in England but despite their rich history their last major title was in 1996 when they won the League Cup.

European Honours
  European Cup:
  Winners (1): 1982

Aston Villa European Cup Winning team of 1982)

Aston Villa qualified for the 1981-82 European cup for the first time in their history by winning the First Division title the previous year. Although the team managed by Ron Saunders were not highly fancied to win the competition they had some quality in their ranks in the shape of Gordon Cowans and the man who scored the decisive goal in the final, Peter Withe amongst others. Villa knocked out European giants Anderlecht and Dynamo Kiev to go into the final in Rotterdam as huge underdogs to Bayern Munich.

By the time of the final Ron Saunders had handed in his resignation and Tony Barton had stepped in for the Quarter final stage, the game is remembered by Villa fans as the rise of Nigel Spink. The Villa legend came off the bench due to an injury but played the hero in keeping a clean sheet giving Villa a narrow 1-0 win in the game.

  European Super Cup:
  Winners (1): 1982–83


Villa European Super Cup Wining team of 1983

In the Season after their European Cup triumph they went on to beat Spanish giants Barcelona 3-1 in the Super Cup after Gary Shaw made the aggregate score 1-1 in the second leg at Villa Park, Villa went on to score twice more in extra time to seal the victory.

  Intertoto Cup:
  Winners (1): 2001

Villa progressed into the UEFA Cup proper along with PSG and Troyes by defeating Basel in the final match having already knocked out Rennes and Slaven Belupo.

  NextGen Cup:
  Winners (1): 2013

Domestic Honours
League
  Football League First Division / Premier League

Villa’s 1987 league and cup double winning team

  Winners (7): 1894, 1896, 1897, 1899, 1900, 1910, 1981



In a period of dominance in the game likened to recent spells by Man United and Liverpool, Aston Villa were the English First Division Champions in 1894, 1986, 1897, 1899 and 1900 winning a remarkable 5 titles out of 7 during this period of dominance. Villa then had a lean period over the next decade until 1910 when they returned to the top of the league.

Villa spent much of the following decades in lean form where the league is concerned winning the league again for over 70 years.

1981 was the last time Aston Villa were the top team in the English League, it was the team of Gordan Cowans, Peter With, Dennis Mortimer and Tony Morley and all those famous names you’ve heard from the greatest period in Villa’s history in a generation. Villa only used 14 players this year and included 7 ever presents as they won the league by four point ahead of Ipswich Town who in turn were 3 ahead of Arsenal.

  Football League Second Division
  Winners (2): 1938, 1960
  Football League Third Division
  Winners (1): 1972
Cups
  FA Cup:
  Winners (7): 1887, 1895, 1897, 1905, 1913, 1920, 1957

Aston Villa’s 1957 FA Cup winning team
The Fa Cup final of 1987 was the first Villa had contested the match and they defeated West Brom 2-0 with goals from Archie Hunter and Dennis Hodgetts.
In the 1895 season Aston Villa had won the competition again beating midlands rivals West Brom in the Final 1-0. This year is famous as the cup was stolen from the shop window of W. Shillcock in Newton Row where it was on display and the cup had to be replaced with a copy. Villa went on to win the cup 2 years later in 1897 during a great period of dominance in the English game.
In the 1905 FA Cup Final George Ramsay’s Villa overcame Newcastle United 2-0 with both goals coming from Harry Hampton.

The 1913 FA Cup Final was contested between Aston Villa and Sunderland, Aston Villa won the match 1-0 with the goal coming from Tommy Barber. To get to the final Villa had knocked out Derby County, West Ham, Crystal Palace before facing Bradford Park Avenue in the quarter final, a team who still exist but probably wouldn’t find their way into a quarter finals nowadays. Villa played Oldham Athletic in the semi-final winning 1-0.

Huddersfield town were the opposition when Aston Villa won the first FA Cup competition since the end of the First World War in 1920, they won 1-0 after and extra time goal from Billy Kirton.

It was nearly 3 decades until Villa won the Fa Cup again in 1957 when they beat Manchester United by 2-1 with 2 goals from Villa legend Peter McParland who had earlier had a collision with the United Goalkeeper Ray Wood leaving him unconscious with a broken cheekbone. Before the days of substitutions, Wood later returned to the pitch as an outfield player but finished the game back in goal. Villa have not won the FA cup since having reached the final twice, once in 2000 when they lost to Chelsea and more recently in 2015 when Tim Sherwood’s team lost to Arsenal.

  Football League Cup:
  Winners (5): 1961, 1975, 1977, 1994, 1996

Brian Little’s 1996 League Cup winning team

The first ever League cup competition in 1961 was won by Aston Villa, the final was a 2-legged affair played both home and away against Rotherham. Villa lost the away leg 2-0 but matched the in the home leg to take the game into extra time where Peter McParland scored to win the game for Villa to score winning goal in a cup final for Villa for a second time.

The 1975 League Cup final was memorable as the only cup final to be played at Wembley between two team not playing in the top flight, the other team was Norwich and Villa won the match 1-0. Only two years later Villa were back in the League cup final in 1977 in the only League cup final to have taken 3 matches to settle. After the first match against Everton finished in a 0-0 draw a replay also ended in a draw. The third game was a blockbuster, a 40 yard screamer from Chris Nicholl and a last minute winner from Villa legend Brian little gave the cup to Villa 3-2 after extra time.

Villa denied Man United a domestic trebly in 1994 when Ron Atkinson’s Villa beat Alex Ferguson’s team 3-1 with 2 goals from Dalian Atkinson and another from Dean Saunders. This is a team that many fans look back on fondly, Captained by Kevin Richardson and including Tony Daley, Dean Saunders, Dalian Atkinson, Andy Townsend, Steve Staunton and Paul McGrath. Having finished second in the League the previous year this couple of years of modest success represented the best Villa have achieved in the Premier League era.

The 1996 season is the last time Aston Villa have lifted a major honour, only 3 players from the 1994 team were in the starting 11 this year, Captain Andy Townsend, Mark Bosnich and Paul Mcgrath. Brian Little had returned to the club as manager nearly 2 years after lifting the trophy as a player and his team beat Leeds United by 3-0 with goals coming from Savo Milosevic, local boy Ian Taylor and Dwight Yorke.

  FA Charity Shield
  Winners (1): 1981 (shared)
Ay be surprised to hear that Villa actually shared the trophy with Tottenham and held it for 6 months each after drawing the 2-2.
  Football League War Cup
  Winners (1): 1944

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Rumours From Aston Villa

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