Tottenham Hotspur’s Victor Wanyama has been linked to a number of clubs, including Aston Villa.
Life at Tottenham Hotspur has been pretty difficult for Victor Wanyama this season, but it seems as though he is attracting interest from a number of clubs, including Aston Villa, as reported by the Sun (29 January, page 56).
Wanyama’s previous manager – Mauricio Pochettino – worked with the Aston Villa target, firstly at Southampton and then Spurs, and once dubbed the 28-year-old a ‘beast’, as quoted by The Mirror.
And whilst Wanyama was part of that Tottenham team that was top-quality for the majority of Pochettino’s reign in North London, it ended up turning a bit sour for the man from Kenya, so it has to be questioned whether Villa would really push for another midfielder player that has struggled with game time, injuries and form in recent seasons.
At the start of this current campaign, Pochettino commented on Wanyama’s game time and performance levels, and it’s fair to say that he didn’t hold back on a player who he felt had gone ‘backwards’. This is what Pochettino said about Wanyama in August:
“It’s all about performance,” said Pochettino, as quoted by The Mirror. “Football is for today and tomorrow, not yesterday. You need always to show that you are there and deserve (to be there).
“In the case of Victor, he suffered an injury and another player stepped up and took his place. We are in a team, we are not a charity. I am making clear the answer is not about Victor, but we are not a charity.
“It is about performance and the coaching staff have a lot of different options to play different players. I am the coach, I need to take the decision and hope it will be right. Victor is a very important player and, for different circumstances, went backwards.”
During the 2018/19 campaign, Wanyama had only started four Premier League games for Pochettino’s side [transfermarkt], as injuries and a lack of form had resulted in him, as Pochettino put it going ‘backwards’.
Nothing has changed this term because he is yet to start a Premier League game, and has in actual fact has only played 23 minutes of league football for Spurs [transfermarkt].
Villa do have a number of midfield players to choose from – Marvelous Nakamba, Douglas Luiz, Danny Drinkwater, Conor Hourihane, Henri Lansbury and John McGinn.
From the above, McGinn is currently on the sidelines, Lansbury has struggled for game time, whilst Hourihane has seemingly fallen behind Nakamba, Luiz and on-loan Chelsea man, Drinkwater in the pecking order.
When Villa were thumped 6-1 at home to Manchester City earlier on in the month, a lot of the Villa fan base would have perhaps wanted the club to sign another midfield player, especially one with a defensive mind because others simply weren’t producing the goods.
But since that defeat, Nakamba has perhaps been Villa’s best player, Luiz has earned his way back into the starting XI, and whilst Drinkwater needs more minutes, the Midlands outfit simply don’t need another player on their books who needs to build his fitness, form and get his sharpness back.
At the start of the season, Wanyama would have been a brilliant purchase for Villa, and even before Drinkwater walked through the doors, but Dean Smith and Co. are now better off targetting other areas, such as trying to bring in another striker.
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