THE VILLA 92/93 PL TABLE
railing Villa’s charge.
The return game with United at Old Trafford ended in a 1-1 draw — ordinarily a decent result, but Villa desperately needed points as their rivals were hoovering them up.
Villa were stumbling, drawing with Spurs and losing to title rivals Norwich.
United, for their part, stuffed Norwich 3-1 at Carrow Road with the visiting fans singing “Big fat Ron, big fat Ron — is it true your bottle’s gone?”
When the dust settled, United were champions with plenty to spare and, but for Paul McGrath, Villa mightn’t even have made the top three. His season was one of the greatest by an Irish player in English football.
Talking to this writer in 2016, Ron Atkinson made it clear that
Incredible
P W D L F A Pts
Man United 42 24 12 6 67 31 84 ASTON VILLA 42 21 11 10 57 40 74 Norwich 42 21 9 12 61 65 72 Blackburn 42 20 11 11 68 46 71 QPR 42 17 12 13 63 55 63 Liverpool 42 16 11 15 62 55 59 Sheffield Wed 42 15 14 13 55 51 59 Tottenham 42 16 11 15 60 66 59 Man City 42 15 12 15 56 51 57 Arsenal 42 15 11 16 40 38 56 Chelsea 42 14 14 14 51 54 56 Wimbledon 42 14 12 16 56 55 54 Everton 42 15 8 19 53 55 53 Sheffield Utd 42 14 10 18 54 53 52 Coventry 42 13 13 16 52 57 52 Ipswich 42 12 16 14 50 55 52 Leeds Utd 42 12 15 15 57 62 51 Southampton 42 13 11 18 54 61 50 Oldham 42 13 10 19 63 74 49 Crystal Pal 42 11 16 15 48 61 49 Middlesboro 42 11 11 20 54 75 44 Nottm Forest 42 10 10 22 41 62 40
McGrath was something special.
His former Villa manager deserves credit too for the way he nurtured and helped him.
That McGrath became Footballer of theYear at a time when he had so many off-field issues was both a testament to him and to Atkinson’s man-management.
“I read Paul’s book. It’s incredible, it’s the most emotive sports book I’ve ever read,’’ he said.
“In the first four years of the Premier League, Paul missed just two games. A lot of people don’t realise that.
“Talk to Villa fans of any age and 90 per cent of them will say Paul was their greatest ever player.
“The only one that challenges him is Gordon Cowans.
“Paul is the greatest centrehalf in the history of the Premier League.”
That he played so well while battling so many demons is extraordinary.
Just a couple of weeks after being named Footballer of the Year, McGrath went AWOL on international duty. Ireland were due to play Albania in Tirana in a World Cup qualifier but McGrath was on a bender and couldn’t be contacted.
Jack Charlton had said McGrath was injured but, from a brief conversation, RTE reporter Marty Morrissey quickly discovered that wasn’t the case. He tracked down the Dubliner, leading to a remarkable interview on a runway at Dublin Airport.
McGrath jumped on a plane to Birmingham then caught another (above) one from there to Tel Aviv in Israel, drinking for days.
Incredibly, he played just a fortnight later for Ireland in a 2-0 win in Latvia. Even more remarkably, McGrath scored the second goal.
Greatest
A year on, he would put in the greatest performance ever by an Irish player, completely dominating Italy in the Giants Stadium at the World Cup.
McGrath had also won the League Cup that season. Villa beat United in the final.
A small measure of revenge for what happened in the previous campaign, but Villa will always have regrets about that inaugural Premier League season.