Our View: £22m man is having a nightmare away from Aston Villa

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Wesley Moraes’ return to Club Brugge is proving to be a nightmare for the Aston Villa striker, as he bids to finally get his career back on track in familiar Belgian surroundings.

The Brazilian returned to the Jan Breydel Stadium this summer to spend the season under Philippe Clement. Villa signed Wesley from Club Brugge for a former club-record £22m in 2019, however injuries ruined his chances in Birmingham.

A challenge from Ben Mee on New Years’ Day 2020 left Wesley with knee ligament damage and ended his season. He did not feature again until this April, but Dean Smith was hesitant to award the forward too many minutes.

After more than a year out of action, Smith sought to manage Wesley’s workload with just 16-minutes over Aston Villa’s final seven Premier League games last season. The arrival of Danny Ings for £25m this summer only pushed Wesley further out of contention, however.

Aston Villa agreed to send Wesley back to Club Brugge on loan in the hope the 24-year-old would play regularly. But he featured for just 74-minutes before the October international break, and has only started one of his two appearances.

Wesley made his second Club Brugge debut in the starting line-up at Charleroi last month. He failed to influence the scoreline and has not appeared in a Jupiler Pro League fixture since. But did play from the bench at RB Leipzig in the Champions League group stage.

Why is Aston Villa striker Wesley struggling at Club Brugge?

Aston Villa will hope Clement deploys Wesley more often in Club Brugge’s fixtures after the international break. The Blauw-Zwart have not enjoyed the best start to their league term, with five wins from 10 games.

Two of those wins came during the five-game period since Wesley returned to north-west Belgium, while drawing their last two. Clement did not feel he would make enough of a difference against Leuven, however, and omitted him entirely at Anderlecht.

Clement explained at the start of September why the striker is struggling back at the Jan Breydel Stadium. He noted, via Birmingham Live: “Wesley still has a [fitness] backlog.” Which Aston Villa will hope the forward overcomes soon.