Steven Gerrard has been sacked as Aston Villa manager after a poor run of results in the Premier League.
Gerrard was fired 90 minutes after Aston Villa fell to an embarrassing 3-0 defeat by Fulham at Craven Cottage last night.
Gerrard paid the price for Villa’s wretched start to the season, which sees the club languishing just one place above the Premier League relegation zone.
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The 42-year-old has been in the job for less than a year and has been unable to make a success of his first management role in English football. “We would like to thank Steven for his hard work and commitment and wish him well for the future,” a Villa spokesman said.
It is unclear who will take charge of Villa when they host Brentford on Sunday. They will hope to make a swift appointment and have considered an ambitious move for Mauricio Pochettino.
It remains to be seen if the former Tottenham manager, who is out of work after being sacked by Paris Saint-Germain at the end of last season, would be willing to enter a relegation battle.
Outside football
Gerrard’s cousin, Anthony Gerrard, became a professional centre-back. He came through at Everton, where he did not make the first team, and spent most of his career in the Football League. The two faced each other in a professional match for the first time in the 2012 Football League Cup Final, when Steven’s Liverpool defeated Anthony’s Cardiff City in a penalty shoot-out in which both Gerrards missed.
Gerrard and his wife, Alex Curran, married on 16 June 2007, the same day as the weddings of his England teammates: Gary Neville, and Michael Carrick. The ceremony took place at Cliveden House Hotel in Taplow, Buckinghamshire. They have four children together.