Steve Bruce tells talkSPORT he is delighted Aston Villa are meeting expectations
Villa moved into fifth place in the Championship on Wednesday night
Thursday, November 2, 2017
Aston Villa boss Steve Bruce feels his side are beginning to meet the standards that are expected of the Midlands club.
Villa moved into fifth place in the Championship on Wednesday night after beating Preston North End 2-0 at Deepdale – stretching their unbeaten run to 12 games.
And after a start which coincided with the team picking up seven points from their opening seven games, Bruce admitted his delight with how his team is performing.
“We’re Aston Villa – the demands are we’ve got to be there or thereabouts with the history and tradition of our club,” Bruce told talkSPORT’s Jim White.
“And to be fair, we found it very difficult after dropping out of the Premier League. And we’ve seen how difficult it for clubs, last year in particular.
“We’re delighted we’re there or thereabouts. There’s still a long way to go of course, but we’ve given ourselves a nice platform for what’s going to be a really difficult winter.
Villa’s summer recruitment was affected by managing restrictions on the club’s transfer policy due to Financial Fair Play regulations.
Bruce brought in the likes of John Terry, Glenn Whelan, Ahmed Elmohamady and Chris Samba in a bid to add further experience to his squad.
And the 56-year-old said he would be keen to bring more new faces to the club in the upcoming January transfer window.
“We’ve been restricted over the last couple of windows because of the financial fair play issue,” Bruce said.
“But yes, if we can go and box clever and see if we can get anyone who can improve us and make us better, then obviously we’ll try.
“But I’m very pleased with what we’ve got at the moment. There’s a nice balance to the squad. There’s some really good experience and we’ve got some very decent young players as well, which always helps any club.”
