Taylor philosophical as Villa draw blank

Aston Villa manager Graham Taylor saw his side draw another blank in the goalless draw with Leeds and then groaned: “That has been the story of our season.”

Villa had 18 shots but managed only three on target as they failed to hit the net for the sixth time in nine Barclaycard Premiership matches during the current campaign.

Leeds goalkeeper Paul Robinson was only called into action to make one save worthy of the name from England striker Darius Vassell.

But Taylor is confident his side will turn the corner if they maintain the general level of performance produced against Terry Venables’ side.

He said: “We have dominated the game but we have not been able to convert our chances and we did not work their goalkeeper enough.

“That has been the story of our season. But at least today we did not lose which sometimes happens when a team fails to make the most of their chances and it is fair to say that Lee Bowyer did have the best chance of the game.

“I have got nothing but praise for the commitment of the players and it is not easy when you are dominating and not scoring.

“But I do know that if we keep performing like that that the goals will eventually come. It is a simple game and the only thing we are missing is putting the ball in the net.

“There is no magic wand to sort it out. You just have to keep working things and the time I would be concerned is if we weren’t creating chances.”

Norwegian duo Ronny Johnsen and Oyvind Leonhardsen both collected injuries during the game but Taylor will allow them to report with their country for next week’s European Championship qualifier.

Leeds boss Venables said: “It was a hard-fought game which we expected because Villa have been doing well at home this year. They have put the pressure on and knock long balls into the box.

“You have got to put in challenging headers to deal with that and we did well and competed well at the back.

“I also thought we had the best two chances of the game from Danny Mills and Lee Bowyer but it has not been a bad week for us.

“We have had two difficult games with the one in the UEFA Cup and now this one and we’ve ground out a couple of good results.

“You have to do that sometimes. The Arsenals and Manchester Uniteds do that sometimes and I thought for the whole 90 minutes that we worked very hard.”

Venables left French midfielder Olivier Dacourt out of his 16 even though he has just earned his first international call-up for nearly two years.

Venables admitted: “I would think he will be disappointed but we had no midfielders in there in terms of substitutes.

“We were covering the defence in case of injuries and in case it did not go well with the two strikers.”