Taylor mystified by goal-shy Villa

Aston Villa boss Graham Taylor admitted that scoring has become “a psychological barrier” for his players after a goalless draw against Blackburn.

Villa may have six strikers in the squad but none of them have scored more than a single goal in the Premiership, and Dion Dublin was guilty of a shocking miss at Ewood Park.

Taylor said: “No goals again – it’s a pretty regular occurrence for the Villa. I don’t think I have managed such a low-scoring team before – in 12 games we have managed only seven goals.

“It is becoming quite mystifying and very frustrating. We had what was obviously the best chance of the game and Dion cannot believe it.

“It is becoming a psychological barrier and we have had some quite incredible misses this season.

“Only two teams have a better defensive record than us this season and only one has a worse scoring record.

“We have six strikers and all of them have had runs of two or three games in the team but none of them are putting the ball in the back of the net.”

Dublin was not the only culprit because Juan-Pablo Angel was guilty too, but fortunately for Villa their keeper Peter Enckelman was in superb form and denied Blackburn with three top-class saves.

Enckelman thwarted Andy Cole twice – in the first and last minutes of the match – and also did brilliantly to save with his foot from Damien Duff when he was going in the opposite direction.

Blackburn looked weary however, and manager Graeme Souness blamed tiredness from Thursday’s UEFA Cup trip to Celtic where they ended up losing 1-0 despite playing some excellent football.

Souness said: “I don’t think it’s any coincidence that both in this game and the Tottenham game after our trip to Sofia we looked a yard short for most of the match.

“The most obvious reason is that after a hard game, the travel and the emotional factor we looked jaded.

“That’s a fact of life and something we have to live with as long as we are in the UEFA Cup even though the competition is not a priority.

“On a normal day I think we would have caused Aston Villa a lot more problems than we did today.

The people who had been stars on Thursday found it difficult to get anywhere near that.

“We had a good 10 minutes at the start of each half and if Andy Cole’s header had gone in near the start it would have been a different game.”

Souness, though, was relieved that Blackburn did not perform their usual trick of conceding a late goal.

He added: “I have seen us lose games like that before so I suppose I should be happy.”