RICHARD Dunne reckons Alex McLeish and the claret and blue backline will work together to provide a case for Villa’s defence this season.

Dunne is delighted to have a former centre-half as manager as the club’s rearguard strive to reduce the number of goals they conceded last term.

The Irish international’s stormy relationship with former boss Gerard Houllier and assistant Gary McAllister coincided with his dip in form.

But Dunne insists McLeish’s appointment has given the Villa players a new lease of life, particularly defenders keen to get back to their best.

“I think as soon as the manager got announced a lot of the lads knew him, knew of him or had spoken to him before,” said Dunne.

“He seems to be a man who respects his team, wants them to do well and is all about team spirit. That’s what we had at Villa, a good team spirit. If he can nurture that I’m sure we’ll have a very good season.

“It could help that he used to be a defender, but he could also pinpoint our faults more easily.

“I think as a team we’ll be defensively tighter. I think that’s where you should start from and that’s the basis.

“With us bringing in Shay Given, he’s the perfect replacement for Brad Friedel and Stephen Warnock will be back in the squad. So we’ll have a strong backbone and maybe it will be more settled than it was last year.”

Villa conceded 58 goals in the Premier League last season, 20 more than the previous campaign, but Dunne believes the entire team must take the blame. 

Dunne, central partner James Collins and understudy Ciaran Clark will be Villa’s specialist senior centre-halves if Carlos Cuellar is sold this summer.

“It was frustrating because we had such a good season the year before and then last year no matter what we did it didn’t seem to come off for us,’’ Dunne added.

“Any mistake was punished. Before we might have got away with little things but last year every error was being highlighted.

“But I think as much as the defence takes the blame, as a whole team we didn’t work on our defensive side hard enough and I think that’s something that we all realise.

“To have a good season you need to be good defensively. Front to back we need to make sure we put the hard work in defensively.”

Setpieces were an Achilles’ heel for the back four during Houllier’s reign with Villa regularly conceding from free-kicks and corners.

Dunne admits the players were caught between two systems – man marking and zonal marking – with the confusion costing them goals.

“We’ve flitted between man marking and zonal marking in the past few seasons and never really pinpointed which one we should be doing,” he revealed.

“But I’m sure over the coming weeks, before the league starts, the manager will have it nailed down and he’ll tell us exactly what we’re doing and who we’re marking and what way we’re doing it.

“It’s hard, whatever one you’re doing people will always think the other one’s better.

“There’s so much blocking in the penalty area going on nowadays from corners that it’s difficult to man mark people.

“But if you stand too far away and give them a run then you’re going to be beaten when people have a running jump at you.