The Bill Howell Column: Why Aston Villa fans should not be blaming Gareth Barry
An excellent blog from Bill Howell last week has sparked a lively response from Aston Villa fans - if you haven't read it already - here it is!
GARETH Southgate was never forgiven.
As proud a Villa stalwart as you can get, one who led the team out in an FA Cup Final and played a club record 42 times for England whilst at Villa, branded a 'judas' and jeered and booed at every turn over the last eight years.
All for muttering the word "ambition".
Gareth Barry might find it a little tricky too...at least in the short term. I hope not.
Martin O'Neill lauded Stiliyan Petrov a fortnight ago for never wanting to run his contract down, not at Celtic and neither at Villa.
Surely the selfish thing for Gareth Barry to do would have been to stay for 12 more months and then to fly off?
Went for the money? Don't make me laugh.
Villa offered Gareth as much as City...well, almost.
£80,000 a week and a testimonial was there for the taking had he stayed on.
Liverpool came in after the deal was done. All that messing about last summer. Left Barry hanging out to dry they did.
Then 12 months on tell him he will be playing at left-back, then allow him to agree everything with City... and then come in with a bid.
"Too late Rafa. That boat has already sailed!"
Laughable really.
But this was never about Liverpool.
Or about money.
This is about first team football and ambition. Oops, there's that word again. Uttered by Southgate all those years ago.
