Villa and Leicester safe as Hull’s plight deepens

By Toby Davis

Aston Villa, despite being on the receiving end of a 6-1 thrashing at Southampton with Sadio Mane scoring the quickest hat-trick in the top flight, joined Leicester City in celebrating their Premier League survival on Saturday.

Leicester, who drew 0-0 at Sunderland, can look forward to another season among English football’s elite after Steve Bruce’s relegation-threatened Hull City lost 2-0 at Tottenham Hotspur.

Hull will now have to beat Manchester United in their final game to avoid the drop.

North-eastern rivals Sunderland and Newcastle United, who took the lead against relegated Queens Park Rangers before falling to a 2-1 defeat, also remain in danger.

Hull are 18th with 34 points and must hope that Newcastle, two points ahead in 17th, fail to win at home to West Ham United.
Failing that, Hull will need Sunderland – with a game in hand – to lose both of their final two encounters at Arsenal on Wednesday and Chelsea next Sunday.

It was a day of mixed emotions for Tim Sherwood’s Villa who were mauled by Southampton in the day’s early fixture where Senegal forward Mane rewrote the record books with the fastest ever hat-trick in the English top-flight inside three minutes.
His treble was timed at two minutes and 56 seconds, breaking Scotland striker Graham Leggat’s record of three minutes for Fulham in a club record 10-1 win over Ipswich Town in 1963.

Villa’s gloom, however, was lifted by Hull’s defeat at White Hart Lane, with Tottenham completing a comfortable victory with second-half goals from Nacer Chadli and Danny Rose.

That result was also enough to complete a remarkable act of escapology for Nigel Pearson’s Leicester, who were seven points adrift of safety at the beginning of April.

Both Leicester and Villa have 38 points, with one game to play.
Leicester’s 0-0 draw with Sunderland edged their opponents closer to safety, but there could still be a sting in the tail for Dick Advocaat’s team, who face daunting final fixtures and have a worse goal difference than Hull.

Newcastle’s brief celebrations were dampened at Loftus Road when Emmanuel Riviere’s first goal for the club was cancelled out by a second-half leveller for QPR from Matt Phillips and a stunning winner from distance from Leroy Fer.

Elsewhere, Everton came from behind to beat West Ham United 2-1 and Stoke City drew 0-0 with relegated Burnley.

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