Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests/History of Aston Villa F.C. (1961–present)

History of Aston Villa F.C. (1961–present)

 * This is the archived discussion of the TFAR nomination for the article below. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article/requests). Please do not modify this page unless you are renominating the article at TFAR. For renominations, please add   to the top of the discussion and   at the bottom, then complete a new nomination underneath. To do this, see the instructions at TFAR nom/doc.

The result was: not scheduled by Brianboulton (talk) 14:39, 29 April 2016 (UTC)



The history of Aston Villa F.C. from 1961 to the current season covers the fluctuating fortunes of the club during the 1960s and 1970s, the European Cup victory in 1982 to the present. The late 1960s was a turbulent time for the club and pressure from fans led to a change of ownership and management. In 1967, the club was relegated from the top tier of English football for the third time, under manager Dick Taylor. Within two years, pressure from supporters had led to the resignation of the board of directors. The club was then relegated to the Third Division. In the 1971–72 season Aston Villa returned to the Second Division as champions with a record 70 points. In 1974 Ron Saunders was appointed manager and by 1975 he had led the club back into the First Division and into European competition. The club continued to flourish under Saunders and won the league in the 1980–81 season. Saunders' resigned suddenly halfway through the 1981–82 season, with the club in the quarter-final of the European Cup. He was replaced by his assistant manager Tony Barton who guided them to 1–0 victory over Bayern Munich in the European Cup final. However, the club fell steadily down the League standings over the next five years and was relegated in 1987. However, the club was promoted the following year and achieved second place in the Football League in 1989. Since then the club has been inconsistent, with indifferent league positions despite winning two League Cups. They reached the FA Cup Final for the first time since 1957 in 2000, but lost 1–0 to Chelsea. In the summer of 2006, David O'Leary left under acrimonious circumstances, to be replaced by Martin O'Neill. After 23 years as chairman and largest shareholder, owning approximately 38% of the club, Doug Ellis decided to sell his stake to Randy Lerner, the owner of NFL franchise the Cleveland Browns. After several years of narrowly avoiding the drop, Villa were relegated at the end of the 2015-16 season.
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 * Promoted: February 24, 2008
 * Reasons for nomination: Aston Villa will be relegated from the top tier for the first time since 1987. momentous. last day of EPL season.
 * Support as nominator. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:24, 17 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Comment: The article was promoted in 2008, and the last eight years are covered very sketchily by material added since then. There is also the issue of uncited material. I honestly don't think this can be got ready for TFA in time – sorry to be such a bore. Brianboulton (talk) 19:02, 20 April 2016 (UTC)