Birmingham Live! piece together the Gerrard to Villa jigsaw

The Birmingham Live! Website has been putting together the jigsaw pieces to link Steven Gerrard with Aston Villa.

Most of the pieces go through Christian Purslow, Villa’s CEO who spent a year as Managing Director of Liverpool before the arrival of Hicks and Gillett in 2010 and a new era of success.

Purslow then spent four years with Chelsea as Head of Global Commercial Activities before taking up his present job at Villa.

Lifelong van Dean Smith took over from Steve Bruce but was sacked yesterday after three mainly successful years in the job.

It seems that the glamour of Gerrard, a key figure of England’s failed Golden Generation, has caught the attention of Villa fans but it remains to be seen if Pulslow will call in a favour from an old friend.

Birmingham Live reports:

Aston Villa are searching for a new manager after they sacked Dean Smith on Sunday afternoon.

Rangers boss Steven Gerrard has emerged as the early favourite to succeed Smith, while former Villa assistant coach John Terry, Southampton boss Ralph Hasenhuttl, Denmark national team manager Kasper Hjulmand and Paulo Fonseca are all also in the frame.

Villa CEO Christian Purslow, alongside sporting director Johan Lange will lead the search for the right candidate to lead Villa away from the bottom three and up the Premier League table.

Villa currently find themselves within two points of the drop after the first 11 games to the campaign and haven’t picked up a single Premier League point since September after losing all five of their league games since the start of last month.

Purslow, Liverpool’s former managing director, has previously lauded Gerrard’s credentials to become a top football manager.

Back in May 2018, before Gerrard was announced as the new Gers manager, Purslow tipped him to put Rangers “back on the map” and insisted his reputation could be key in restoring the club to former glory.

“Ten years ago Rangers were in a major European final and the trials and tribulations of that club since then are well documented,” he told Sky Sports in 2018.

The Rangers that Purslow of course went pop in 2012 with 140 years sent into the liquidation.

Gerrard followed in the footprints of Ally McCoist, Mark Warburton, Pedro Caixinha and Graeme Murty who had two stints as caretaker before signing off with 4-0 and 5-0 defeats to Celtic.

After yesterday’s 4-2 win over Ross County no-one in the media asked Gerrard about the Villa vacancy. In 2005 Gerrard was heavily backed to join Chelsea from Liverpool but withdrew from the deal for reasons that have never been fully explained.