Aston Villa Football Club (The Villa and The Villans, The Lions) is an English professional football club that plays in the Premier League. This club is based in Aston, Birmingham. Since 1897 home of the Villans is Villa Park. The former name is Aston Lower Grounds. It is a UEFA four-star football stadium that consists of four parts: Holte End, Trinity Road Stand, North Stand and the Doug Ellis Stand. Now the capacity of Villa Park is 42,700 places, but it will be increased to 50, 000. This home ground has its own record – it was the first English stadium to stage international football in three different centuries. Villa Park is the most used stadium in FA Cup semi-final history, having hosted 55 semi-finals. The chairman of Aston Villa football club is Randy Lerner. He is an American businessman and sports team owner. Randy Lerner is proprietor of the Cleveland Browns. Martin O’Neill is a manager of the team. He is a former player of such clubs as: Distillery F. C. (1971), Nottingham Forest (1971–1981), Norwich City (1981), Manchester City (1981–1982), Norwich City (1982–1983), Notts County (1983–1985). Martin O’Neill previously managed: Grantham Town (1987–1989), Shepshed Charterhouse (1989–1990), Wycombe Wanderers (1990–1995), Norwich City (1995 ), Leicester City (1995–2000) and Celtic (2000–2005).
Throughout its history Aston Villa had a lot of managers: 1884-1826 – George Ramsey 1826-1834 – W. J. Smith 1934-1935 – Jimmy McMullan 1936-1944 – Jimmy Hogan 1945-1950 – Alex Massie 1950-1953 – George Martin 1953-1958 – Eric Houghton 1958-1968 – Joe Mercer 1964-1967 – Dick Taylor 1967-1968 – Tom Cummings 1968-1970 – Tommy Docherty 1970-1974 – Vic Crowe 1974-1982 – Ron Saunders 1982-1984 – Tony Barton 1984-1986 – Graham Turner 1986-1987 – Billy McNeill 1987-1990 – Graham Taylor 1990-1991 – Dr J Venglos 1991-1994 – Ron Atkinson 1994-1998 – Brian Little 1998-1902 – John Gregory 2002-2003 – Graham Taylor 2003-2006 – David O’Leary 2006 – present Martin O’Neill
Aston Villa is one of the oldest and most successful football clubs in England. The club was formed by four players from the Villa Cross Wesleyan Chapel cricket team: Jack Hughes, Frederick Matthews, Walter Price and William Scattergood. Villa is among four clubs that won the European Cup, the First Division Championship seven times and the FA Cup seven times.
Also Aston Villa is the fourth most successful club in English football history, having won 21 major honours: Premier League Division 1 Division 2 Division 3 FA Cup League Cup European Cup European Super Cup World Cup Championship Runners-Up Champions Runners-Up Champions Runners-Up Champions Winners Runners-Up Winners Runners-Up Winners Winners Runners-Up 1992-93 1893-94 1888-89 1937-38 1974-75 1971-72 1887 1892 1961 1963 1982 1983 1982 1895-96 1902-03 1959-60 1987-88 1895 1924 1975 1971 1896-97 1907-08 1897 2000 1977 1898-99 1910-11 1905 1994 1899-00 1912-13 1913 1996 1909-10 1913-14 1920 1980-81 1930-31 1957 1932-33 1989-90
During the history The Lions have many notable players. Andy Gray, David Platt, Paul McGrath won the PFA Players’ Player of the Year award. Andy Gray, Gary Shaw won the PFA Young Player of the Year title. In 2003 Danny Blanchflower inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame (it is based in the The National Football Museum in Preston).
The present squad of Aston Villa includes such players as: Scott Carson Thomas Sorensen Stuart Taylor Olof Mellberg Martin Laursen Curtis Davies Wilfred Bouma Stiliyan Petrov Patrik Berger Nigel Reo-Coker Isaiah Osbourne Gareth Barry Craig Gardner Moustapha Salifou Ashley Young Shaun Maloney John Carew Gabriel Agbonlahor Marlon Harewood Luke Moore