Aston Villa boss Unai Emery has addressed speculation over Jacob Ramsey’s future, and insisted that he wants to keep him at the club.
The 22-year-old has established himself as a key figure in the Villa squad, and although injuries have severely disrupted his season thus far, there are high hopes that he’ll have a strong second half of the campaign and continue to be an important piece in the long-term future.
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However, after The Athletic’s David Ornstein reported on Monday that Villa could consider offers in excess of £50m for the midfielder as we have possible PSR concerns ahead of the end of June, fears grew that we could potentially be forced to sell our prized asset to help balance our books.
It was added that the likes of Tottenham, Newcastle Utd and Bayern Munich were interested in the England U21s international, but the hope moving forward is that we can move other pieces and avoid a scenario in which we lose one of our top Academy players.
Fortunately, Emery was on hand to allay fears later on Monday in his pre-Newcastle press conference, as he reiterated that he wants to keep Ramsey at the club and insists he is an important player for him.
“Maybe there are teams involved in the possibility to sign him because he has a big, big potential at Villa and in England. I want to keep him here, 100 per cent,” he told the media, as per VillaTV.
“Jacob Ramsey is a very important player. He grew up in the academy and his progression is getting better. His level is increasing a lot and I want to keep him here with us. Of course, there are movements [speculation] around him.”
That will go a long way in easing concerns over Ramsey’s future, but ultimately if the numbers don’t add up come the summer, we could still face the risk of losing him, or another key players, if we aren’t able to adhere to the PSR parameters.
Nevertheless, Emery has made his thoughts clear on the situation, and so it’s hoped that there are other solutions available to ensure we remain as competitive as we’ve been while continuing to strengthen the squad without losing our best players.
The Villa boss also noted in his press conference that he ‘doesn’t want to move the main players we have in the squad’, and so hopefully that materialises and we’re able to keep the current core together and strengthen around them moving forward to continue to progress.