Aston Villa have confirmed the signing of Marcus Rashford from Man Utd in an initial loan deal for the rest of the season.
The 27-year-old has endured a difficult two years at Old Trafford having struggled for form, and after falling out of favour with Ruben Amorim, a fresh start was needed to get his career back on track.
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As confirmed by Villa’s statement, that fresh start will come with us, as Villa have signed the England international on loan for the rest of the current campaign, while Fabrizio Romano reports that an option to buy clause is included in the agreement for £40m, while we’ll cover 70 percent of his wages during the loan stint.
The Athletic’s Jacob Tanswell has since reported that the initial salary coverage is 75 percent, potentially rising to 90 percent with performance-related bonuses, and so this is a significant financial investment from Villa regardless of it being a loan.
It’s added that should we opt to make his move a permanent transfer in the summer by exercising that option to buy, Rashford will potentially put pen to paper on a three-and-a-half-year deal to commit his longer term future to us.
Given his struggles and the doubts raised over his performance levels in training at Man Utd, there will be scepticism over this move from Villa, as it comes with a risk of not working out as hoped.
As noted above though, this could be the fresh start that he so desperately needed, and in Unai Emery he has a coach with a proven track record of getting the best out of players who are struggling to reach their full potential, or at least that’s certainly what we’ve seen him do since he arrived at Villa time and time again.
Rashford adds a fresh dynamic and threat to our attacking options as it remains to be seen where Emery intends on playing him and how that fits in with the likes of Morgan Rogers, Jacob Ramsey and Ollie Watkins.
That attacking unit should undoubtedly get us excited though, and it’s hoped that this proves to be a genius move from Villa to add more firepower, quality and experience to the group with Rashford having a point to prove himself to show that he is far from finished at club and international level.
