Analysis: Unai Emery still searching for answers as Aston Villa slide continues

It is likely nothing more than a blip. By Saturday night the mood will quickly feel very different should Villa beat Brentford and Southampton in back-to-back home matches. That is really all it would take to make this season once more feel alive with opportunity.

Yet those games suddenly feel rather big ones, in a campaign where right now nothing is coming easy. Emery, the man who seemingly knew all the answers from the moment he walked through the doors of Villa Park two years ago, is struggling for the solutions required to arrest a slump which has now seen his team tumble into the bottom half of the Premier League table.

For long periods on Sunday afternoon at Chelsea, the answers seemed further away than ever. The home side, who trailed in Villa’s shadow the past two seasons and who Emery’s men would like to consider rivals in the race for Champions League football, fizzed with energy and belief. 

Villa, by contrast, just fizzled. They had their moments, yet the manner in which Ollie Watkins let a golden early chance slide, shooting weakly straight at goalkeeper Robert Sanchez having first done well to shrug off Wesley Fofana, summed up their current lack of conviction.