Gary Cahill, Steven Davis and Marc Albrighton
Three ex-Aston Villa academy graduates who are now arguably playing at the top of their games in the Premier League. Cahill is, without, doubt, Villa’s worst piece of business in terms of losing a home-grown player for such little money. His £5 million departure to Bolton back in 2008 raised eyebrows amongst many of the villa faithful. One year into his spell at Bolton, Cahill had already been called up into the England squad and O’Neill’s decision to sell him was described as a “big mistake”. Now a regular in Chelsea’s starting XI, his career at Villa is often overlooked and hardly remembered.
The same can be said for Steven Davis, although his 91 appearances for Villa indicate he was more of a first team regular than Cahill.
The 2005-06 season saw Davis pick up ‘player of the season’ award, however, he was sold to Fulham a season later. Now a lynchpin in the heart of the Southampton midfield, many are questioning our decision to get rid of such a talent.
With his increasingly impressive link up play with Mahrez and Vardy this season, the transformation of Marc Albrighton will have left some Aston Villa fans pondering where it all went wrong for him, especially when the Holte End are crying for a homegrown creative hero.
These high-profile ex-Villa academy departures for such low fees demonstrates an inability for several seasons that Villa have had to be able to introduce academy players into the first team and ensure they continually improve. The performances by Jack Grealish last season briefly offered fans some hope for the future.
However, with Premier League clubs currently looking at ex-academy product Daniel Johnson, could there be another player that is allowed to leave Villa Park under the radar?
Jordan Graham continues to impress for Wolves and a host of Premier League teams are monitoring his progress as well, but villa may well need him next season. Looking back to the success of the youngsters in the next gen competition 4 years ago, only Grealish has forced his way into the first team, which leads to the question “where are these so called best youngsters in Europe now?”
Are we simply not giving youth players a chance at Aston Villa due to our continual struggle with relegation, or are the hierarchy of the opinion that many of these youngsters are not good enough? This theory would perhaps explain the departures or Cahill, Davis and Albrighton.
In a time when relegation is almost certainly inevitable, one must argue that a mix of youth players must be given a chance. Not only will we have little money to spend, but surely players like Rushian Hepburn Murphy deserve a chance?
Could we be about to rue the decision in loaning out Gary Gardner for a second spell at Forest as he looks increasingly likely to join permanently?
It raises the question who has been charged with bleeding these youth players into the first team and if so why are we seeing continual failures in Clark and Baker and not the unproven likes of Graham and Johnson?
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