Pakistan international Easah Suliman has spoken about the lasting impact Aston Villa had on his development, admitting he owes much of his football education to the club where he spent 13 years.
The centre-back joined Villa’s academy at the age of eight and remained there until he was 21. Now playing football in Azerbaijan, Easah Suliman still holds Aston Villa close to his heart. He also hopes to use the experience he gained in England to help improve football in Pakistan.
Easah Suliman credits Aston Villa for his development
Easah Suliman came through the Aston Villa academy before signing a two-year professional contract in January 2015. The club moved quickly to sign him amid interest from Bayern Munich and Liverpool.
Easah made his senior debut for Aston Villa under Steve Bruce, coming on as a late substitute in a 4-1 League Cup win over Wigan Athletic on August 22, 2017.
Easah Suliman later gained solid experience through loan spells at lower-league clubs including Cheltenham Town, Grimsby Town and Dutch side FC Emmen. He later moved to Portuguese club Vitoria SC in 2020, followed by loan spells at Nacional and Vilafranquense, before joining Azerbaijan Premier League side Sumgayit in 2023, where he is the club captain now and enjoys immense fan support.
Speaking exclusively to Read Aston Villa about Villa’s influence, Easah Suliman said:
“Yes, Aston Villa played the biggest role in shaping me as a footballer and in my development because I signed when I was eight years old and I was there until I was 21.
“So right from the very beginning, shaping my technical ability and then growing up, the tactical ability, tactical understanding of the game, and then, even getting older and learning about the game management and physical aspects.
“So in all aspects of the game, it helped my development, and I kind of owe all of my football education to Aston Villa and all the great coaches that I worked with during my time there.”
Easah Suliman wants to use his experience to help Pakistan football
The defender represented England at Under-16, Under-17, Under-18, Under-19 and Under-20 levels. He also became the first British Asian to captain an England side in an official match, doing so at Under-16, Under-17 and Under-19 level.
His biggest achievement with England’s youth teams came in 2017. Easah Suliman started every match at centre-back during their victorious UEFA European Under-19 Championship campaign alongside the likes of Mason Mount, Trevoh Chalobah, Reece James and Aaron Ramsdale. He also scored the opening goal in the final against Portugal, which England won 2-1 in Georgia.
Eligible to represent Pakistan through his heritage, Easah Suliman made his senior international debut on June 14, 2024, in a 1-0 friendly defeat to Kenya.
Representing Pakistan has also made him reflect on the opportunities he received at Villa and how those lessons could benefit young players back home.
“Something that I’ve reflected upon more recently, as I’ve gotten older and started to represent Pakistan and seen the conditions that my fellow players in the national team, how they grew up and didn’t have access to the kind of football coaching and education that I had at Aston Villa growing up.
“So I reflect on it and I realize how fortunate and grateful I am for that.
Easah Suliman’s plans to help Pakistan Football
“So I think there are many ways that I can use that experience to try to help football in Pakistan and provide some sort of value, because even if it’s just things like how to prepare for games, how to prepare for training, how they taught us to take care of our bodies after games and recovery, and even individual sessions and how we can improve away from team sessions and analysis sessions, how we can look through our data, our clips of our games and analyze and try to improve, and game understanding.
“There are many other things that when I reflect now, were very normal to us growing up, but I can see that on where the national team, it’s not something that things that I was learning at 10, 11, 12 years old are probably being taught to kids growing up in Pakistan.
“So yeah, there’s definitely, I think, ways that I could hopefully help.”
Aston Villa will always have a special place for Easah Suliman
Despite building his career outside England, Suliman has not closed the door on a possible return to Aston Villa in the future.
Growing up in Birmingham and spending most of his formative years at the club has left a lasting connection, even as he remains focused on his career abroad.
“Yeah, of course, being a Birmingham boy and obviously spending so much time at Aston Villa growing up, it’s always close to my heart and a club that’s always close to my heart and always will be.
“Who knows in the future what might happen. Obviously now I’m fully focused on, you know, my career and obviously being abroad.
“But yeah, I would obviously welcome it and in the future we can see what might happen.”
Easah Suliman is one of the biggest names in Pakistan football right now and is a modern great for the South Asian nation. He has also captained the Pakistan side and now he hopes the lessons learned during his years at Aston Villa and in major European leagues can help the next generation of Pakistani footballers.
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