Newcastle United demonstrated the power of the twelfth man – can Aston Villa overcome the empty North Stand?
Newcastle United found themselves in a hole against Bournemouth when they met in the Premier League last weekend.
Marcus Tavernier’s early strike and a bizarre own goal from Malick Thiaw put the Cherries 2-0 up at St James’ Park but Newcastle responded immediately with a Harvey Barnes pearler. Eventually, Jacob Ramsey added a second to salvage a point.
Anecdotally, it was one of those days when it feels as if the supporters deserve a slice of the credit. Noise and colour, colour and noise. The twelfth man might not show up in the numbers but every football fan knows its potential.
Will the Lions’ roar be diminished this season?
It’s a feeling, really. Most of us have to imagine it but it’s hard to believe that the ferocious encouragement of thousands wouldn’t have an effect. How could it not?
Even in the precise and professional world of Premier League football, atmosphere matters. Players might not be unduly intimidated even by the great cauldrons of the game nowadays, but the sense of uplift for the other side must be intoxicating.
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It’s difficult to say what might theoretically happen when it’s taken away or drastically reduced, but elsewhere in the Premier League there is a practical example about to get underway.
Aston Villa have already played in front of the building site that was the North Stand just weeks ago, but losing 1-0 at home to Arsenal doesn’t tell anyone anything about anything.
On Saturday, Villa welcome Nottingham Forest to a three-sided Villa Park. The North Stand is being redeveloped without getting pulled down in its entirety. It will be closed for the duration of 2026/27 as Villa increase the ground’s capacity ahead of the European Championship in 2028.
After another poor start, Villa need the backing of their diminished crowd. The visit of Forest will serve as a very unfair comparison with the second leg of last season’s Europa League, when eventual winners Villa were swept to a second-leg win on a wave of roars.
The situation is different, certainly, but there was little expectation that Villa would get anything from the visit of Arsenal and that is not the case when Forest return.
Without the North Stand, Villa will need to get to grips with a strange environment that can only truly materialise when a football crowd feel like they’re needed.
Villa’s fans will get behind Emery’s team against Forest and the Holte End will play its part as much as ever.
Not having a stand full of Villa supporters at the other end, bouncing back the noise and exchanging pleasantries with the away supporters who also used to occupy the very same seats before they were shunted around the corner flag into the Witton Lane Stand, will look and sound and feel unusual.
Over the coming months, the fans who make up Villa’s limited capacity will have their work cut out for them. Every now and again, teams need the boost Newcastle got from their supporters against Bournemouth.
That one big nudge over the line can count for a lot. It can be worth a point where there were none. It can be worth three points where there was one.
As the songs of the Holte End echo back from the hollow around which the new-look and expanded North Stand shell is being built, overcoming the sheer weirdness of it all might well prove to be to Villa’s tangible detriment.
