Mitchell Clark was released by Aston Villa last summer and he is now on the books of Leicester City.
Christian Purslow has stated at Aston Villa’s AGM that if there are players of the age of 21, 22, or 23, still playing for the club’s U23’s, then they are ‘not good enough’ and Villa’s youth development has ‘failed’.
They are comments which have attracted the interest of former Villa academy product, Mitchell Clark on Twitter, with the young defender being released by the club last summer.
Clark, who is now at Leicester City and currently on-loan at Port Vale, has stated that Purslow’s comments are ‘disrespectful’ to the players who are still at the club and of the age the Villa chief mentioned.
The 20-year-old sent a series of messages from his personal Twitter account where he was talking about Purslow’s comments with fellow fans, and whilst he understood where the 56-year-old was coming from, he feels more respect needs to be shown to those currently in the set-up:
Last season, as Villa were stagnating in their push for promotion, and then eventually getting themselves over the promotion line, the club decided to part ways with a number of its academy players.
The influx of youngsters that were told they were free to leave did surprise some quarters of the Villa fan base, as did certain players who were told their services was no longer wanted.
The biggest surprise of them all was perhaps Clark himself being told he could leave, and it’s a decision which the club may live to regret down the line with the versatile fullback. [Read Here].
But prior to Clark leaving Villa, he had a very promising pre-season under Steve Bruce. At the time, Villa had just lost the play-off final, big-name players were seemingly going to leave because of financial problems, and left-back was one area of concern.
As a result, Clark’s performances in pre-season were providing the Villa faithful with some light that they desperately needed, but he wasn’t given a chance in the first-team and was sent out to Vale.
That’s when his journey to Villa’s exit door started, but he is now on the books of Champions League-chaser Leicester City. The last time the Foxes signed a Villa academy product on a free transfer… well, he went on to win the Premier League title!
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