Kevin MacDonald warns Aston Villa players to start taking responsibility
Saturday 31 October 2015 23:37, UK
Aston Villa caretaker manager Kevin MacDonald believes the players have to start taking responsibility for the position the team are in.
Villa are sitting at the foot of the table, and last weekend's defeat by Swansea resulted in Tim Sherwood getting the sack.
The board decided to act with the team having lost six successive league games ahead of Monday's trip to Tottenham, live on Sky Sports 1.
While some critics believe Villa's summer signings have yet to settle at the club, MacDonald reckons that is no excuse, looking back to his playing career when he was brought to Leicester by then manager Jock Wallace.
MacDonald said: "We keep making excuses for them, you can't keep making excuses. They are professional footballers who are getting well paid in the Premier League. There are no excuses.
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"People say give them seven months. When I came down from Scotland all those years ago you were given three weeks.
"Jock Wallace said to me 'three weeks Kevin, get yourself fit and if you're the best player, you're in the team'.
"That's the way I worked before. If you are the best player in training, you get the chance to be the best player on the pitch.
"If you're the best player on the pitch you stay in the team, that's what's going to happen here."
Sherwood was sacked just eight months into a three-and-a-half year contract, but MacDonald has not ruled out contacting the former Spurs boss for advice.
"I would probably do that but we also have to look at little things ourselves," MacDonald said.
"Sometimes you have to listen to other people and be open-minded, but if it comes to it I'm sure Tim would help if I did speak to him."
Villa were last relegated from the top flight in 1987 and MacDonald knows his players fear the drop.
He added: "We're bottom of the league. They do worry about the situation and where we are.
"There is a big difference between being known as a Premier League player and being known as a Championship player."
