‘On sticky ground’: Graeme Souness explains why Steven Gerrard needs to watch his back at Villa now

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New TalkSPORT pundit Graeme Souness has claimed that Aston Villa manager, Steven Gerrard, needs to be careful after his comments on Tyrone Mings.

The Villa boss watched on this weekend as his team lost to newly-promoted Bournemouth on the opening day of the season. The big talking point, though, was his decision to leave out Mings, who seems to have been cast aside by the former Liverpool skipper.

And speaking on TalkSPORT today, former Newcastle manager Souness thinks Gerrard could face a tricky task now.

“Let me tell you how a dressing room works. As a manager you walk in, you’re a player, I’m digging you out. There’s 25 players in that dressing room, listening to it. You sit there and look at me and don’t say a word. When I walk out of that dressing room, you say to your best mate ‘I’m not having that off him’. And then he’s got a best mate, and it’s a chain reaction. By the time they’ve had their shower, and they’re driving out the car park, they’ve spoke to their agent,” Souness said on TalkSPORT today.

“Me as a manager, I’m on sticky ground. I’ve fallen out with half a dozen of you who, collectively, might be worth £150m. And then one of the agents leaks a story, ‘you know, he’s fallen out with the dressing room’, that’s leaked to the press, chairman, etc. You’re then on a sticky wicket.”

TBR’s View: Gerrard Needs Results Before Pressure Builds

Steven Gerrard will get some time at Villa and he’s been backed enough by the board. But his results aren’t exactly brilliant and with little things like this now creeping in, results will be more important than ever.

The Villa boss will be keen to start winning now. If he doesn’t, and this sort of thing with Mings continues, then it won’t take too long for certain shouts to come from the terraces.