After being left disappointed last week having been left out of our Champions League squad, Aston Villa forward Donyell Malen produced a positive reaction against Tottenham in our FA Cup tie on Sunday.
While Villa completed five new signings during the January transfer window, we were permitted by UEFA rules to add only three new names to our squad for the knockout phase of the Champions League.
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Our two permanent additions in Malen and Andres Garcia missed out, with Axel Disasi, Marco Asensio and Marcus Rashford, who all arrived on loan, got the nod and will hope to play key roles in our progression in Europe.
For Malen, that would have been a bitterly disappointing blow, not only given his own experience in the competition with Borussia Dortmund, but the Dutchman would have signed for the club with the intention and desire to be competing at the top level in Europe’s premier club competition.
That in turn would undoubtedly have been a difficult conversation with Unai Emery, who conceded as much in his pre-match press conference last week having confirmed his decision, and so eyes were on Malen this past weekend to see how he would respond having been named in our starting line-up to face Spurs.
The 26-year-old produced a really encouraging display against Tottenham, as his hold-up and link-up play was key in adding fluidity to our build up, while his technical ability and movement stretched the Spurs defence and created space for others to exploit.
Further, he showed solid work ethic throughout to press and apply pressure in the final third and contain Tottenham as they tried to play out from the back, and there was a decisive moment too as he created the opening that led to Morgan Rogers applying to finish to double our lead.
Despite his absence in the Champions League, Malen will have a fundamental role to play in the Premier League and FA Cup moving forward, and so this showing of his professionalism, personality and character was a great sight, as others would perhaps react negatively and let that sense of disappointment linger and filter into their displays.
It’s hoped that this was a good starting point for the Dutch international, as he still faces a battle for a regular starting berth given the competition for places in the final third, with the return of Ollie Watkins from injury and the impact from Asensio and Rashford maximising Emery’s selection headache in our upcoming games.
For now though, this is what we needed to see from Malen who also showed off his versatility, and we’ll hopefully see much more from him between now and May, while he’ll no doubt get his chance in a Villa shirt in Europe beyond this season.
