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BIRMINGHAM. — Sky Sports pundit, Jamie Carragher, feels Aston Villa’s defensive frailties could see Dean Smith’s men sinking into the English Championship at the end of the season.

Marvelous Nakamba was again pushed to the bench, in the 1-2 defeat to Chelsea on Sunday, and sent into battle in the 70th minute.

By then, Villa were already on the back foot, despite having taken the lead, and they remain second-from-bottom, have picked just one point from the last 18 available and scored just once in their last four games.

They are the only side yet to win against a team in the top half of the table. Kortney Hause put Villa into the lead, two minutes before the break, but Christian Pulisic was allowed to ghost in past Ezri Konsa to volley home a deep Cesar Azpilicueta cross.

Then, less than two minutes later, it was the Chelsea skipper Azplicueta who was at it again, this time finding space down Konsa’s side to cross for Olivier Giroud.

Smith said Villa looked better, defensively, but Carragher disagreed.

“It’s almost as if they’ve got to score three goals to win a game,” he said.

“I really fear for Villa. I know it’s still tight and they’re a point off West Ham and a couple of points to Watford — it’s nothing, it can change in one game – but they’re just so poor defensively.

“They’ve conceded so many goals and I just don’t see where they’re going to get the goals from to rectify that. It’s almost as if they’ve got to score three goals to win a game and, for anyone down there, that’s almost impossible to do.

“The only way you can improve is to be tighter defensively. They’ve got a big problem in goal as well. I think they’ve used three goalkeepers this season.

“You see some of the goals they’ve been conceding, defenders on the line trying to block shots, it just doesn’t look good.”

Liverpool legend, John Barnes, also agreed during the post-match analysis.

“I fear for Villa. They’re down the bottom and you look at West Ham and they’ve got good players. They are in trouble. Brighton are safe,’’ said Barnes.

‘’Watford are picking points up and, of course, Norwich and Bournemouth are in free-for-all. If you look at the performances Villa have been putting in, defensively they’re all over the place.

“The way Giroud scored. You don’t see Premier League defenders defending in their six-yard box. Villa seem to be doing that a lot. They don’t have enough to score enough goals.”

A defiant Smith believes Villa have what it take to stay up despite the club’s fifth defeat from six in the Premier League.

“We’re no further away from Bournemouth and the other teams down there,” Smith replied, when asked if his side have enough to beat the drop. “We’ve got a good enough chance as the other teams down there.”

The boss also responded to a question asking should Villa be asking more questions of the opposition given their current predicament.

He said: “I’d love to ask more questions, yeah. You’ve got to get the ball off the opposition. We showed a lot of spirit in the last 15 minutes.

“Today, we’ve come up against a top-four team in the last 15-20 years. It was never going to be easy.

“We took the lead and remained hopeful we’d keep the clean sheet. A bit of quality and a little bit of fortune made a difference.”

It was the second game without supporters inside Villa Park and, when asked if having no fans could drastically affect the club’s survival chance, he said it did not worry him.

“It doesn’t worry me. The advantage you lose is at home now is the influence supporters can have over officials. That’s one of the biggest advantages you probably lose.’’ — BirminghamLive/The Athletic.