Aston Villa must avoid flushing millions down drain on Clement Lenglet after Fabrizio Romano transfer exit update
Aston Villa loanee Clement Lenglet has been resigned to a bit-part role since his summer move and there’s now a real danger of the club flushing millions down the drain at Villa Park.
Unai Emery’s defence has been solid this season, with almost half of the 21 goals conceded in the Premier League coming across two defeats to Newcastle and Liverpool earlier in the campaign.
And much of that is down to the partnership developed at the heart of the defence between Ezri Konsa, Diego Carlos and £33million-signing Pau Torres [Sky Sports, 12 July] which has seen Lenglet largely on the periphery.
Torres was signed from Villarreal in the summer to reunite him with Emery and after Tyrone Mings was ruled out long-term with an ACL injury the new man stepped in immediately and hasn’t looked back since.
Torres’ immediate impression has made the decision to bring in Lenglet from Barcelona on a deadline-day loan deal look like an expensive mistake, as the French international has still yet to play a minute in the Premier League for Villa, after making 26 appearances in the top flight on loan at Tottenham last season.
According to The Sun on 16 November) his £150,000-a-week wages make him the most expensive bench-warmer in the league, ahead of Spurs’ Hugo Lloris on £100k-a-week.
The sum of Lenglet’s involvement so far five appearances in the Europa Conference League, where errors at the back contributed to a surprise 3-2 defeat to Legia Warsaw on his debut which Villa News pundit Alan Hutton felt was in part down to his lack of action otherwise.
The centre-back is now around 13 weeks into his career at Aston Villa, meaning he has so far earned £1.95m from the club, averaging out to around £390,000 for each of his five European outings.
His contract at the Camp Nou is what it is so Lenglet isn’t necessarily to blame as the club knew what they were taking on, even if his statistics from SofaScore in his five appearances don’t scream of a player who is banging the door down for league minutes.
As per SofaScore, Lenglet has started all five of their European games so far this season, recording 92.8 touches per game, completing 95 per cent of his passes, recording 0.4 key passes from centre-back, averaging 1.2 tackles per game, 5.4 balls recovered, completing 100 per cent of his dribbles and 64 per cent of his total duels.
Despite his limited minutes, it hasn’t been all doom and gloom for Lenglet but given his age, experience and profile the Frenchman certainly won’t be totally satisfied and a fresh opportunity to seek pastures new in the winter may well have arisen already.
According to SportBild German journalist Christian Falk, taking to his personal Twitter account (6 December), German champions Bayern Munich are interested in the Barcelona loanee in January.
Fabrizio Romano also reported on 15 December that Italian giants AC Milan have also joined the race and have made their intentions to sign him clear to his parent club and there is a chance Lenglet could leave in January.
With no Europa Conference League football until March and Lenglet struggling for Premier League minutes, that could see Aston Villa waste millions on the French benchwarmer with his wages amounting to around £1.5m until March should he not feature again until then.
When the likes of Bayern Munich and AC Milan come calling, you have to sit up and take notice and that could well see Lenglet call it quits in January to seek pastures new.
Aston Villa may well be tempted to keep him around but given the amount of money which could be lost, football President Monchi and Emery simply have to avoid that decision.
In other Aston Villa news, Ian Wright has waxed lyrical over a first-team player and has dubbed him “fantastic” after what he did recently.