Twelve months ago, Aston Villa were in a dogfight with Arsenal for fourth spot in the Premier League. Or so it seemed. A 1-0 loss at home to Chelsea in late February was the club’s first since November, but by then the gas had run out. Villa wouldn’t win another match until May, and they took just 11 of the season’s remaining 36 available points. And Gabriel Agbonlahor scored just a single goal.

Until that point, the quick, young striker had notched 11 domestic tallies and was among the top goalscorers in the division. But like the rest of the team, his performance hit a sudden wall when the games mattered most. You might say Agbonlahor was a symbol of everything that happened to Villa last term. As a matter of fact, you could make the same comparison this season.

Until last weekend, Agbonlahor had been held scoreless in the league since his match-winner at Old Trafford on December 12. His team, meanwhile, had been mired in a four-match winless skid and had failed to take a full three points since 2009.

Then they snapped out of it. Fast. And it was Agbonlahor—striking twice in the span of four minutes at Craven Cottage—who inspired them. First turning a Stiliyan Petrov cross into the bottom-right corner of Mark Schwartzer’s goal and then pouncing on a Carlos Cuellar pass to finish nicely with his left foot, the 23-year-old broke his own goose egg and rejuvenated his club’s season in a single swoop. It was by far his most important performance in five seasons at Aston Villa, and it gives the club’s fans reason to hope for Champions’ League football with 15 matches remaining on the schedule.

First up is Tottenham Hotspur at White Hart Lane on Saturday, followed by the visit of Manchester United next Wednesday. Beating, or at least drawing, Spurs is paramount, as the London club currently hold the fourth place position Villa covet. And they’re only separated by two points.

After the tricky United appointment, Villa will embark on a stretch of very winnable matches against Burnley, Hull, Sunderland, Stoke, Wigan and Wolves. It seems straightforward, but it will be the most crucial stretch of Villa’s league campaign. There will be chances to score plenty of goals, and Agbonlahor will fancy scoring a good many of them.

He hasn’t done enough to make the England team, but the striker has been invaluable to his club. If he can maintain the form he rediscovered against Fulham, he will be looked back on as the player who grabbed his club by the scruff of the neck and saved their season.

And his Saturday brace will go down as the moment when Aston Villa finally refused to buckle when the games were important.

Twitter.com/peterssoccer