FROM the get-go, the omens were not good.

When the Premier League season kicked off back in August, Paul Lambert had just Alan Irvine for company. Two Scottish managers among the twenty men at the helm of top-flight English clubs matched the lowest in the 23-year history of the all-singing, all-dancing, all-splurging competition.

Six months on, and, fresh from Aston Villa's dismissal of Lambert on Wednesday night, for the first time in the Premier League era there is no Scot in a top job. Coming less than 24 hours after the outlandish £5.1billion domestic TV rights deal secured by the top division down south, it was another shuddering reality check for Scottish football.

The fact that the managerial blackout comes a mere three years from the heady days of the 2011-12 season makes the managerial meltdown all the more sobering. Back then, Scots occupied over a third of the manager's offices around England. It was a time when Sir Alex Ferguson and David Moyes were firmly ensconced in their more traditional roles at Old Trafford and Goodison Park before the chaos that was to follow. Kenny Dalglish was back at Liverpool, Steve Kean at Blackburn, Owen Coyle at Bolton, Alex McLeish at Villa and Lambert at Norwich City.

It was a time when the former Celtic captain was one of the most sizzling properties in the English game. Hauling the Canaries from the lower reaches of League One to the Premier League in the space of two seasons was little short of miracle work. When he again confounded all doubters and guided Norwich to 11th place, Lambert's reputation was stratospheric. Eighteen months later, it has plummeted at a more terrifying speed than which it ascended.

Wednesday's cull could conceivably have come at any stage in the past three or four months given Villa's unprecedented struggle to win football matches. The most toothless team in the history of the Premier League to this point, it wasn't just goals they struggled for. There was precious little guile from an insipid midfield division and they weren't much better at the back, boasting the worst goal difference in the division. Chairman Randy Lerner could be admired for his patience if he did not seem so disinterested in affairs in Birmingham. Lambert struck the tone of a realist yesterday, not railing against the decision. In the circumstances, it was about all he was going to get away with.

"I am extremely proud to have managed Aston Villa and this sentiment will always remain with me," the 45-year-old said in a statement released by the LMA. "When I came on board the club's owner, Randy Lerner, warned me that I was embarking on the toughest challenge of my working life and he was not wrong. But I have never stepped away from hard work and I put my heart and soul into the job from my first day until my last.

"My initial remit was to conduct a massive overhaul of the playing squad, lower the overall wage structure of the playing staff and achieve this whilst keeping the club in the Barclays Premier League.

"There was also a concerted effort to purchase and develop younger players who would provide a solid footing for the football club to move forward and enhance the value of the playing squad in the future.

"I pay tribute to the supporters who are among the most passionate I have ever encountered. They rightly hold huge expectations for their beloved football club and I sincerely hope they are rewarded with the success they deserve. I completely understand their frustrations and always shared their view that the football club is too big not to be competing at the top end of the table. I hope that can happen."

Villa have very little time to arrest that slide. Scott Marshall, brother of Gordon and one-time Arsenal and Celtic defender whose only appearance in Scottish football came in a 3-0 Old Firm defeat at Parkhead, is one of two joint caretakers along with ex-goalkeeper Andy Marshall.

For Lambert there is time for reflection before plotting his next move. As a player he expanded his horizons to glorious effect with Dortmund. He may look to that managerial class of 2011 and notice that while Ferguson and Dalglish have taken roles upstairs, Moyes, Coyle, McLeish and Kean now occupy managerial offices in San Sebastian, Houston, Genk and Brunei respectively.

It appears that Scottish managers are going global like never before. The worrying thing, however, is that they are doing so after Premier League jobs went nowhere fast.