The Aston Villa news that’s happened during the first half of the international break that is actually interesting and worth discussion…
Jedinak Goes On
During the international break, Mile Jedinak returned to the Australian national team to captain them in their World Cup qualifier play-off against Honduras. He declared in pre-match Australian press that he has no plans to finish with the national team any time soon
Jedinak, 33, is back in the Australian squad for the first time in five months. Despite only playing a matter of minutes for Villa, since returning from injury, he started the first leg of the Socceroo’s around-the-world double-header with Honduras.
“Having had a little spell away, (international retirement) is probably one of the furthest things on my mind,” he said.
“I know I had this setback but I’m feeling fresh in the mind. “You love playing for your national team and you’d hate to be told you can’t.”
With the first leg finishing 0-0, the Villa midfielder plays the second leg in Sydney on Wednesday. With a 24-hour flight afterwards back to the UK, it’ll be touch and go whether he’ll be ready for Villa’s Saturday away trip to QPR.
It seems Villans will have to continue to put up with Jedinak’s international travelling exploits (and jet lag) with the player intent on helping Australia defend the Asian Cup in 2019 in UAE.
Meanwhile, he hopes to put his recent injury woes behind him.
“It’s been a drawn out process however I’ve definitely done the work and now I’m really looking forward to … hopefully playing the rest of the season injury free.”
Broken Goods
As you would have probably read already, Aaron Tshibola has been returned to sender by MK Dons, cutting short his season-long loan. It’s definitely tail between the legs time for the midfielder, after not exactly impressing even in a lower division.
Whether there’s any specific reason, beyond his poor performances, that his loan was cut short remains to be seen.
When he signed for the Dons, the local newspaper ran the headline, ‘Dons is the ‘perfect place’ for Villa’s Tshibola’, but during his 16 appearances (and one goal) for the club, as MOMS reported earlier, the knives were soon out.
Initially, Dons’ boss Robbie Neilson defended Tshibola, until the midfielder was sent off after only four minutes against Bradford in the first week of October. After the Dons went on to lose 4-1, Neilson directly blamed Tshibola for the defeat.
Tshibola apologised publicly for the incident on Twitter.
‘I want to apologise to the fans , players and staff, let the team down today, will learn from this,’ he tweeted.
After his suspension, Tshibola played just 71 minutes more for the Dons.
The returning Tshibola is now another problem for Villa to offload, along with the likes of Tommy Elphick and Micah Richards, whom Bruce has seemingly given up on.
Lets hope it’s dealt with swiftly and with little fuss – i.e. in January.
Roundabout
The Aston Villa Fan Consultation Group had been due to meet Villa’s Technical Director Steve Round this month for a catch-up, but while a date is being sorted out, comes a rumour from the Daily Mail that Arsenal have their radar locked in on Round for a sporting director role in North London.
Round, has been at Villa since September 2016 and is currently developing and restructuring the footballing side of the club (and creating the ‘Villa Engine’) from the youth team upwards.
Whether there is any credence in the Daily Mail’s story is questionable, as currently Villa will be very keen to keep their hands on Round.
Remi Finds Employment
Life apres Villa doesn’t normally go well for Villa managers. Recently, McLeish, Lambert, and Sherwood have all seen their management careers go backwards, while Remi Garde seemingly put his career on ice.
The Frenchman though has finally returned to the game after a 15 month or so absence, after being announced as the new boss of Montreal Impact.
It’s unlikely that Garde would have envisaged that Canada would have been his post-Villa destination, as he was once mooted as one of Europe’s promising managers.
The Impact only started their first season in the MLS in 2015, while Garde was still at Villa.
Some Canadian press have tended to focus on Garde’s time at Olympique Lyon, while skipping over his time at Villa, in talking him up and calling his appointment a ‘marquee managerial move.’
If Garde is going to build his reputation as a manager in the game, he’s certainly going to have to do it the long way round.
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