Jonathan Kodjia will not play as Aston Villa face a tricky Championship clash at Ipswich Town’s Portman Road on Saturday.
If Aston Villa are to seal a return to the Premier League this year, they could do with last season’s 19-goal top scorer Jonathan Kodjia being fit and firing in the final few weeks of the campaign.
But, speaking ahead of Saturday’s trip to Ipswich Town at Portman Road, Villa manager Steve Bruce has confirmed that Kodjia will not be among his 18-man roster as he continues to recover from a broken ankle that ruined most of his season.
The £15 million striker has played five times for Villa since returning last month, including 67 minutes from the start in the 1-0 win against Leeds United last Friday. But with Kodjia set for another spell on the sidelines, Villa fans seem far from happy about the treatment of their star man.
Only the Villa medical staff can legitimately answer whether the 28-year-old has been rushed back and is now paying the price. But a total of five games in just three weeks is certainly a heavy workload for a player who had not featured for five months before that.
Then again, a rest could do Kodjia some good. With just one goal all season, he has not been at his sharpest of late and will perhaps benefit from missing Saturday’s visit to Ipswich with the play-offs on the horizon.
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