Aston Villa lifted a huge weight from their shoulders on Tuesday night, by finally clinching their second Premier League win of the season, a 1-0 victory at home to Crystal Palace on Tuesday night.
Remi Garde fielded what seemed to be a strange team at the time, but they did the job, with Joleon Lescott's second half header squeezing under Wayne Hennessey, giving Villa the slice of luck they needed to move into double figures for points.
The winless streak is over
The biggest news of the night was undoubtedly Villa actually winning a game, with Garde claiming his first win since taking over from Tim Sherwood, at the 11th attempt. He's lost only five of those 11 games, less than half, surprising given Villa's situation.
However, the win wasn't just a relief for Garde, but for the entire club. Villa hadn't won a game in the league since the opening day of the season, over five months ago, or 157 days. Since then, they'd only managed a 5-3 victory over Notts County in the Capital One Cup, hardly something to shout from the rooftops about.
Things were getting progressively worse, with fans and players clashing after the weekend's draw against Wycombe Wanderers, citing a lack of passion. They certainly got passion on Tuesday night, and they'll be hoping that it's the start of a fight against relegation.
Attentions turn towards survival
Now that they've got a win under their belts, the Villans will hope to gain momentum and pick up wins against Leicester City and West Bromwich Albion in their next two games.
Palace manager Alan Pardew commented that he hoped Villa would stay up, as they're a "great club" to have in the league, and it seems like they'll finally be dipping their toes into the transfer market to do so.
Although the defence was fairly solid on Tuesday evening, it's been an area of concern for much of the season, and Garde is reportedly close to taking defender Lamine Sane from Bordeaux.
