Danny Ings said Aston Villa owed the club’s supporters a big performance after dismantling Brentford at Villa Park on Sunday.
The striker was on target twice in a 14-minute, three-goal blitz that put the home side firmly in control from the outset, with Ollie Watkins finishing off a 4-0 thrashing in the second half.
After a run of two wins in 11 Premier League games, Ings says the team were motivated to respond for the fans.
He said: “Today, we owed the fans that performance and that result.
“Naturally, you always see a reaction from a team when something happens like what happened this week with the gaffer leaving.
“For us, we knew how much frustration the fans have. For what we have in the dressing room, it was quite simply not good enough for a long period of time.
“We all felt that the crowd really helped us today, and sometimes I think the fans don’t understand how much impact they have on a football team."
Danny Ings
“For us today, it was important to go out and run ourselves into the ground to try and get the three points.”
There were strong performances all over the pitch as Villa notched a third clean sheet of the campaign and scored more than one goal in a Premier League game for just the second time this season.
As well as praising his teammates, Ings felt the Villa Park crowd had more than played their part in the result.
“It’s so hard to pick somebody out from today’s performance,” he said.
“We all felt that the crowd really helped us today, and sometimes I think the fans don’t understand how much impact they have on a football team.
“You could see at the end of the game everyone coming together, and there’s no better feeling than that after a great result.
“We need to keep trying to build momentum and keep trying to improve as a team.”
