Always expect the unexpected

All this fuss about expenses.

It reminds me of the tale I was told a couple of years ago of the club director here in the midlands who used to claim mileage from his midlands home to attend home matches.

Yes, home matches.

Nothing in football should ever surprise you.

Nothing.

I've just finished one of those live web chats we do every three weeks, or so.

The level of criticism levelled at Martin O'Neill was in part understandable. This has been a truly wretched 15 game run. Moscow was bad enough. But throwing away fourth place and then fifth.

If ever Villa needed to finish on a high it is Sunday.

The most important final home game since, well, since Sunderland in May 2003. Then it was all about staying in the division. Now it is all about sending out a ray of hope for next season.

Villa were four points clear of West Ham with two games to go six years back. Sunderland and Albion were already down but the Hammers were making a fight of it.

No one fancied the final game, away at struggling Leeds.

Marcus Allback scored with ten minutes to go and Villa stayed up by the skin of their teeth - four points clear of West Ham who went down on 42 points, a Premier League record high.

Sunday represents an incredible occasion for Villa but not for the reasons you would have imagined last August.

A Villa win and Newcastle, one of the best supported teams in the country, will be down.

I know an awful lot of Villa supporters who can see the funny side in that.

Indeed, a great many football fans in general will have little sympathy for Mike Ashley.

As for Villa? Is fifth really worth fighting for?

Is beating last season's 60 points worth anything whatsoever?

Is attaining 62 points and therefore getting the most points since 1996 worth anything?

Well, it will never make up for the way Villa have tossed away such a tremendous position on February 7.

It will never make up for Moscow and the decision that announced to the world that silverware meant little and that the finances of fourth meant everything.

But still the level of criticism of Martin O'Neill shocks me.

We are in a league where results mean everything. Look at Stoke. Playing hoof-the-ball football for eight months having spent a small fortune and where Tony Pullis is talked about as a contender for Manager of the Season. Laughable.

So if it is results you want then fifth or sixth place should not see the manager facing the level of criticism he is now facing, both on the internet chat rooms and in our letters pages.

Everything he has done, or is doing, is now under scrutiny.

All of a sudden the bad buys, they often point to the likes of Harewood, Shorey, Cuellar, Davies, Knight, Sidwell, Reo-Coker, Milner and Heskey out-weigh the good: Ashley and Luke Young and Petrov (admittedly after an 18 month wait).

All of a sudden the substitutions are laughable (taking off to full-backs at Fulham) and the team selections puzzling (Milner at right back) when only three months ago the Irishman was a tactical whizz, playing five in midfield and out-thinking Arsene Wenger at home and away (undoubtedly, the best 45 minutes of the season was in the draw at Villa Park and the best 90 minutes came at The Emirates).

It's going to be a massive summer as ever.

Martin Laursen has already gone. Gareth Barry may decide to join him in the fulness of time - although Rafa Benitez' promise to play Barry as a left-back or a left-sided midfielder has not gone down well with the player. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement of his qualities.

Villa have kept Petrov, which was great news. They may well decide to cash in on John Carew should a big offer come in, but that is down to them.

You never know. Bouma could be back to finally hand the club a quality left-back.

Shorey, Osbourne, Knight, Sidwell, Reo-Coker, Harewood, Taylor, Salifou and Gardner will each have decisons to make: whether to make a break or to sit on their contracts.

I can forsee any one of them moving on, but of course not all.

Then the tricky part. Spending wisely to take the club forward.

Only then, come October or November at the very earliest, should O'Neill's management of the club even start to be questioned.

Just thank your lucky stars that you are not a Newcastle supporter.