Youri Tielemans proves why he shouldn’t be near Aston Villa lineup after shocker v Everton
Youri Tielemans proved why he shouldn’t be anywhere near the Aston Villa starting line-up with his performance against Everton on Wednesday (27 September).
The Belgian international was handed just his third start for Villa as Unai Emery looked to hand him the opportunity to impress against the Toffees.
But the 26-year-old didn’t take his chance as he put in a less-than-impressive display as his side were knocked out of the Carabao Cup following a 2-1 defeat to the Toffees.
It certainly hasn’t been the start to life Tielemans would’ve been hoping for in Birmingham after making the move from Leicester City over the summer.
The midfielder had been highly sought after for a number of years by several big clubs, but Emery persuaded him to make the move to the Villans after qualifying for the Europa Conference League last season.
Although his chances have been reasonably limited to impress and force his way into the starting lineup, he hasn’t pulled up any trees when he has been handed an opportunity.
The Belgian’s last start before the clash against Everton came in the 3-2 defeat to Legia Warsaw on 21 September, where he played 90 minutes in Poland.
But he once again didn’t make a good enough impression on the Villa boss to earn back-to-back starts, having been benched for the 1-0 victory over Chelsea on Sunday (24 September) and coming on for the last nine minutes.
After being brought back into the lineup against the Merseysiders, he failed to impress again after being dragged off on 78 minutes with his side 2-0 down.
Within minutes of being taken off, his fellow midfielder Boubacar Kamara scored to halve the deficit and prove why he is ahead of him in the pecking order.
Tielemans was handed a 5.9 rating by SofaScore – the lowest of any player on the pitch – to show just how poor of an evening it was for him.
He had 62 touches and registered an impressive 93 per cent pass success rate, but he only made one key pass and didn’t complete any successful dribbles as he offered little going forward.
The midfielder lost possession 11 times while he was on the field and one of those occasions saw him play a poor ball short of Ezri Konsa, with Dominic Calvert-Lewin reaching it first to put his side 2-0 ahead.
He had three shots but failed to hit the target, made three fouls and only came out on top in two of the nine duels that he was involved in – a pretty poor return for a central midfielder.
Those stats and his huge error for the second Everton goal prove exactly why Tielemans doesn’t deserve to be near the starting lineup at this moment in time.
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