Delaney Hands Out Villa Warning

Aston Villa’s Wales international defender Mark Delaney believes the club learn from the harsh lessons handed out this season or risk another difficult mid-table ending season.

The former Cardiff City player said: "It's hard to put a finger on why defensively we're making mistakes, but as we've done it quite a bit recently then we're not really learning either.

"We are going to be criticised but we have to take it on the chin.

"If we don't start learning from this we're going to be in the same situation next season."

Aston Villa are not a club who widely receive criticism compared to other clubs but Delaney says it is fully deserved after their performances in recent weeks.

Villa have suffered many injuries to key personnel but unforgiving defensive errors have prevented the Midlands club from challenging for a European place.

With a slim chance of a UEFA Cup place to play for, Villa needed to beat a resurgent Manchester City side, managed by Stuart Pearce, however, yet another defeat ended those hopes and Delaney admitted that he was partly to blame with a "pretty shocking" second-half performance.

"We put a lot of pressure on ourselves in the last three games to try and win a UEFA Cup spot, but the lost points at home have cost us," he added.

"We are a small squad but, as a team, we are good enough to be challenging for Europe.

"It's just that we've let ourselves down in the last three or four games and that's because we've not been as strong at the back as we would like to have been."

Mark Delaney has been called up to Wales manager John Toshack’s summer training camp in San Sebastian this month to give the former Swansea manager a few days to assess some options available to him.