Kodjia goal is to mix it with Villa’s striking elite
JONATHAN Kodjia has nine games left to take his scoring tally for the season to 20 goals or more.
He needs another five, having extended his total to 15 with a winning double against Sheffield Wednesday at Villa Park on Saturday.
If he achieves the feat he will be the first Villa striker to score 20 league goals in a campaign since Peter Withe in 1980-81.
Okay, so Withe’s came in the First Division title win rather than the Championship, but it would still be an impressive return for Kodjia in his first season at the club.
In all competitions, seven players have made it to 20 goals a season since Withe – and this week is actually the 13th anniversary of Juan Pablo Angel doing just that.
On March 14, 2004, Angel reached that milestone and the Holte End hero went on to finish with 23 overall.
Only Christian Benteke has matched that feat in the intervening years, finishing with the same total tally during a stunning debut season in 2012-13.
Benteke scored 19 in the league with his other four coming in the League Cup.
Angel’s double in a 4-0 Premier League victory over Wolves at Molineux 13 years ago brought up a ‘score’ for the Colombian scorer.
Eight Villa players have made it to the 20-goal mark in the previous three decades. Angel was the most recent in 2003-04 – with John Carew’s 17 goals in 2009-10 the nearest anybody had come between JPA and Benteke.
Angel did not enjoy the same instant success as Benteke, but the 23 goals (16 league, seven cup) scored 13 years ago catapulted the Colombian firmly into the Holte End’s affections.
His goals helped Villa finish sixth in the Premier League and make it to the League Cup semi-finals during David O’Leary’s first year in charge.
Before Angel, Villa had to go back to Dwight Yorke for their previous 20-goals-a-season man in all competitions – and, in fact, Yorke memorably made that milestone in two successive years.
In 1995-96 he hit 25 goals (17 league, eight cup), the best tally from a Villa player in the past generation as the first full season under Brian Little produced a fourthplaced Premier League finish and a League Cup triumph.
Yorke also hit 20 goals (17 league, three cup) the following year, 199697, as Villa finished fifth under Little .
Half-a-decade earlier, David Platt also notched 20 goals in back-toback seasons, a remarkable achievement as he was largely employed as an attacking midfielder rather than an out-andout striker.
Platt hit 24 goals in 1989-90 as Villa finished top-flight runners-up under Graham Taylor and he got 24 again in 1990-91, despite the club narrowly avoiding relegation under Jozef Venglos.
In both campaigns he scored 19 league goals and five in the cups, meaning Platt has come as near as anyone to ending Withe’s record as the last Villa player to score 20 league goals in a season. Alan McInally blasted in 22 goals (14 league, eight cup) in 1988-89 during a season of top-flight consolidation under Taylor following promotion from Division Two. Three years earlier, in 1985-86, Simon Stainrod rattled in 21 goals (10 league, 11 cup) for Graham Turner’s strug- glers, sparked by a four-goal debut blast in the League Cup win at Exeter. It is perhaps unsurprising that during Villa’s early 1980s glory years they boasted two strikers who scored 20 goals or more in a couple of seasons – Withe and Gary Shaw.
In his first year, £500,000 record signing Withe hit exactly 20 league goals to fire Villa to the 1980-81 First Division title, and also notched once in the League Cup to take his overall tally to 21.
Withe also netted 20 goals (16 league, four cup) in 1982-83 and 22 goals (16 league, six cup) in 1983-84.
He was ably supported by Shaw, who made it to 20 in all competitions (18 league, two cup) during the 1980-81 championship-winning year, and who rattled in 24 (17 league, seven cup) in 1982-83.