FIVE-POINT PLAN

1 IGNORE ANY CALLS FROM MANCHESTER

Whether it’s United enquiring about Jack Grealish or City pondering their Douglas Luiz buy- back clause, Villa should mute their smartphones to keep their star duo in the second city. They are essential to the club making any progress this term.

2 SNAFFLE A SCORER

As a collective, Villa’s goal record wasn’t too bad: 41 times they found the back of the net, making them more prolific than Sheffield United, Newcastle, Crystal Palace and Brighton, plus the three relegated clubs. But their forward line could barely have been any more blunt had they played Emily and James up top. Between them, four strikers bagged just six top- flight goals; five came from Wesley, who knackered his knee on New Year’s Day and missed the rest of the season; Mbwana Samatta got one, while Keinan Davis and Borja Baston drew blanks.

3 CHANGE THE RECORD

Not the defensive one – we’ll come to that in a minute. We’re talking about the overused ‘ Allez, Allez, Allez’ chant that dominates every claret- andblue singalong. To be fair, the Villa Park faithful have adapted the continental ditty with a nod to their own European Cup- winning glory, but they need to vary it up by inventing a few new chants or rattling through their repertoire of classics. Whatever they sing, hearing the Holte End in full voice is infinitely preferable to the fake atmosphere noise piped in during behind- closed- doors fixtures.

4 FIX DEFENSIVE LEAKS

Only whipping boys Norwich conceded more goals than Villa’s whopping 65 last term. The backline was right down there with ‘ driving to Barnard Castle to test my eyesight’ when it comes to shocking defences, so Tyrone Mings & Co. must do better.

5 DITCH THE CALCULATOR

Villa really don’t want to be working out how many snookers they need with any more last- gasp maths in 2020- 21. Getting Premier League survival pencilled in for early March rather than late July would be nice.