Martin O’Neill has taken the heat off Villa’s misfiring strikeforce by insisting he’s not bothered by their lack of goals.
Villa travel to Manchester United on Saturday tea-time having failed to score in their last two games, the longest spell the club have gone without finding the target for a year.
Gabriel Agbonlahor hasn’t netted for 11 games and has only scored once in 18 matches, while strike partner and nine-goal top scorer John Carew hasn’t hit the target for five games.
But boss O’Neill isn’t overly concerned. He said: “It’s not that important for me that our front two fire.
“With the best will in the world, Gabby missed a chance on Saturday and at Portsmouth, but that wasn’t a worry.
“All centre forwards concern themselves about goals, but for me it’s not a concern.
“The best example I can give is Peter Withe.
“The year Nottingham Forest won the Championship, he started like a house on fire with something like 11 goals in his first 14 games, but then didn’t score for over four months and he was still the best centre forward in the country of his type.
“We’d rather Gabby have scored because we’d have been right back in the game at that stage. The same applies to John.”
Villa have been fortunate to have had plenty of goals from other areas this season, with centre-half Martin Laursen and wide man Shaun Maloney both on six and Ashley Young having hit five.
“The point is we have scored goals this season and other people have contributed,” said O’Neill. “Martin Laursen has contributed goals and Ashley Young has chipped in with some.
“If we’re getting the goals, I’m not personally overly concerned about who gets the final touch to put it in the back of the net – and I’m sure the centre forwards would be quite pleased to hear me saying it.
“That doesn’t mean to say that as centre forwards they want to go a long time without scoring.
“For their own personal satisfaction, I’m sure they’d want to be finding the net regularly.”
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