View: Ludwig Augustinsson seems to be done at Aston Villa with no way back under Unai Emery
Aston Villa had a very busy summer transfer window under Steven Gerrard, but it’s still hard to decipher whether or not it was a success.
The club signed seven first-team players during the off-season with Boubacar Kamara, Diego Carlos, Philippe Coutinho, Leander Dendoncker and Robin Olsen signing permanently.
There were also two defensive loan deals done, as Jan Bednarek and Ludwig Augustinsson joined the club to bolster the defensive ranks and provide cover throughout the season.
For the most part, the window has been a flop. Kamara has been an excellent addition to the midfield, battling away and earning a spot as a regular starter but everyone else has a big question mark.
Coutinho has been awful, Dendoncker and Bednarek haven’t featured regularly enough to be fairly judged by fans or anyone else, Carlos has missed the whole season with a serious injury picked up in his second game and Olsen is a back-up goalkeeper.
But for Augustinsson, the deal has turned out to be one of the most pointless transfers that anyone at Villa has ever signed off on.
Already immediately behind Lucas Digne for his left-back position, he was fighting an uphill battle to get regular game time this season.
But he’s also found himself behind the veteran Ashley Young at times and he’s essentially been non-existent for the team.
At the time of writing Augustinsson has made two appearances in the Premier League, with one start and one substitute appearance tallying up to 57 minutes of action. He’s also racked up 80 minutes in the Carabao Cup, as Aston Villa crashed out to Manchester United.
Aside from that, nothing. Nada. Zip. He’s been entirely pointless this season and in the return to Premier League action against Liverpool on Boxing Day he didn’t even make the bench.
It’s arguably the worst signing in the club’s recent history and it’s clear that he has absolutely no future at the club once his loan deal expires in the summer at the end of the season.
The club should arguably consider terminating his loan deal in January and accelerating plans for whoever his replacement would be in the summer, because at this point we’re just wasting everyone’s time.
In other Aston Villa news, Philippe Coutinho set for final chance under Emery