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Lucas Digne could face Aston Villa axe as Alex Moreno watches on in Fulham win
Aston Villa headed into the international break in excellent form with Unai Emery’s side easily beating Fulham 3-1 on Sunday 12 November.
Strikes from John McGinn, Ollie Watkins and an own goal from Antonee Robinson ensured that Villa entered the break well and truly in the hunt for the Champions League places and only a point behind the early season favourites Tottenham.
While a majority of the mood around Villa Park was positive, there were a few indifferent displays in the Aston Villa side that could give Emery some food for thought, including another subpar outing from Lucas Digne at left-back.
The Frenchman played the full 90 minutes against Fulham as he continues his impressive record of starting every game in the Premier League, but he was unable to impact proceedings as he failed to even attempt a single cross in the match [Sofascore].
Digne had 65 touches in the match and was incredibly erratic with his passing, only completing 76 per cent of his 46 attempted efforts and the former Everton man failed to find his target with either of his two long-range efforts.
There was one single moment of quality as Digne did make one key pass from his three attempts into the final third, but that was his single involvement in the opposition’s third throughout the match and the opportunity was ultimately spurned.
Defensively, the 30-year-old didn’t have loads to do given Emery’s side’s dominance in the match, but the French international did lose his only tackle in the match and only came out on top of four of his eight duels both on the ground and in the air.
In possession Digne was incredibly wasteful, losing possession 15 times over the course of the 90 minutes which included being tackled twice in what was an incredibly sloppy and wasteful outing for the full-back.
Sunday’s disappointing performance came off of the back of a difficult evening for the defender in Europe against AZ Alkmaar, where Digne failed to find a teammate with any of the ten crosses that he fired into the opposition box.
This dip in form has come at a poor time for the Frenchman as Alex Moreno is now fit, ready and waiting in the wings for his opportunity to return to the starting XI having missed the majority of the season so far with injury.
Last season the Spanish defender was Emery’s preferred option on the left side of defence and impressed, picking up three assists in 15 Premier League outings and the expectation was that he would keep Digne out of the team this season.
That could well be the case after the November international break given the French left-back’s dip in form. He last picked up a goal involvement back in September and Emery may be tempted to axe him when Aston Villa return to action against Tottenham.
In other Aston Villa news, Pau Torres has suggested that Ezri Konsa deserves an England call-up given his recent impressive form