By Paul Brown

Ashley Young has targetted six points from the final two games as Villa look to see off Everton's challenge in the race for fifth.

Young was frustrated with Villa's second half display at Fulham but believes Martin O'Neill's men have the character and spirit to bounce back from the annoying defeat.

He told AVTV: "The Everton draw against Tottenham means we are still in the ascendancy in that race for fifth.

"We just have to put all our efforts into those final two games now - and make sure we win both. We want six points.

"We have responded to set-backs before and I am confident we will do again. We have plenty of character and spirit in the squad and that will see us through this season.

"They are important games for us - and they are also massive for Middlesbrough and Newcastle in the relegation battle.

"They'll be on the front foot - desperately trying to win the games. Hopefully that will lead to two open matches. That could play into our hands because we break quickly and our counter-attacking style would be perfectly suited to that scenario."

Young pulled no punches after the Craven Cottage clash - insisting Villa's second half performance was simply not good enough.

He added: "They obviously scored an early goal but we managed to equalise fairly soon after that. At that point, we thought we were more than capable of going on to win the game.

"But our second half performance was just not good enough. When we scored, we were very much on the front foot. If we had continued to play like that, we felt we could have won. But their early goal in the second half was a massive turning point and you simply can't win games if you play like we did after the break."