Aston Villa forward Evann Guessand remains available to leave the club this summer with a permanent move to Crystal Palace not expected to materialise.
The 25-year-old spent the second half of last season on loan at Selhurst Park, with our Premier League rivals having both an obligation and option to buy clause inserted into the agreement.
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However, the criteria needed to trigger the former wasn’t met, while Palace opted against exercising the latter in order to make Guessand’s move permanent this summer and so while he currently enjoys a post-World Cup break, he is expected to return to us in the coming weeks.
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That in turn sparked speculation that the Ivorian international could get a fresh opportunity at Villa in the upcoming season, with his loan stint at Palace proving to be slightly more successful than his difficult start to life with us in the opening months of last season.
However, according to The Athletic, while they note that Palace have indeed turned down the opportunity to sign Guessand outright and aren’t looking to negotiate new terms, it’s added that he is still available to leave us this summer, but it remains to be seen if any suitable offers arrive to convince us to part company.
Aside from not being able to make a decisive impact in the final third, Guessand struggled to have any real positive influence on our play during his short time with us last year, while there were question marks over what his best position was and where he could be most effective for Unai Emery.
If no offers arrive, the Villa boss will have to find a solution and try to get the best out of him having had more time to adapt to English football at Palace, but it seems that with our rebuild gathering pace as the weeks go on, ideally we would receive a decent fee for Guessand and put that towards signing a priority transfer target this summer to give us a more impactful option.
Time will tell how the situation plays out, but what seems clear at this stage is that Guessand will not be joining Palace on a permanent basis, and so doubts remain over his future heading into pre-season.