Villa have won only two of their last 15 games in the Premiership but there has been little sign of the discontent voiced by fans during the final 12 months of O’Leary’s reign.

McCann said: “I think the fans accept defeat better now than they did a year ago because we have generally been playing well.

“In a couple of games we have let ourselves down but overall we have done okay.

“It is quite weird because we are not in the top half of the table, we have only won two out of our past 15 matches and yet the fans seem happy.

“To be fair, in a few matches, we should have won but didn’t. Some of those matches we didn’t win were on television like the Reading one and that meant a lot more of our fans were able to see that we actually played quite well.

“We also played well away to Newcastle but we had a poor start. We went two goals down early on yet could easily have gone in 4-2 up at half-time.

“We have not really got any more points than we had this time last year. The recent victory against West Ham was massive because had we not achieved it, the pressure would have been on.

“But the way we play is such that people enjoy watching us more than they did last year. In the league table, your are where you are because you don’t win games.

“Other teams have won more points but this is a happy place at the moment and the new players have given the place a really big lift.”