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Aston Villa draw is turning point for boss Paul Lambert
PAUL LAMBERT claims his Aston Villa young guns deserve credit for the way they have responded to their Christmas nightmare.
After shipping 15 goals in their last three games and failing to score themselves, Villa managed a 2-2 draw at Swansea, although Danny Graham’s injury-time equaliser for the home side still came as a sickening blow.
Lambert said: “We have been beaten heavily in the last three games, so it’s a huge point for the future of the football club.
“We should have seen the game through with 30 seconds to go, but the young lads have been excellent.
“When you get beat heavily, you learn a lot from people and they’ve showed me that mentally they are really strong.
“It always is a building block. This is a long-term thing and I just keep having the belief I’ve always had.
“The lads have taken so much criticism in the last three weeks, but today they deserve a lot of praise for what they’ve done. It’s a massive turnaround for us.”
When you get beat heavily, you learn a lot from people and they’ve showed me that mentally they are really strong
Villa are one point above the relegation zone after Southampton climbed out of the bottom three with a 1-1 draw against Arsenal.
Second-bottom Reading were beaten 3-1 at Tottenham, despite taking an early lead through Pavel Pogrebnyak.