Lichaj Offered New 3 Year Contract, Expected To Challenge For First Team Place
Eric Lichaj impressed most observers during his brief cameo in the senior team during last summer’s Peace Cup tournament in Spain. Although he may have seemed a little green around the gills positionally, he was definitely an exciting prospect going forward, while his pace and aggression allowed him to make up for the odd mistake most of the time. Definitely one for the future.
After a couple of successful loan spells at Lincoln and Leyton Orient under his belt last season, I was curious about what the future held for the 21 year old and I was delighted to learn just now via MLSsoccer.com that Eric has been offered a new three year contract. Apparently it’s just a matter of his agent, Steve Kelly, flying over from America next month to finalise the deal.
This will obviously add to the speculation surrounding the future of both Luke Young and Habib Beye at Villa, but there’s no suggestion that Lichaj is expected to be first choice right back.
“He’s very close to the first team,” said Kelly.”I’ve had many discussions with Martin O’Neill. He’s had interest from other clubs, but they are showing how badly they want to keep him. This is a serious contract.”
It would seem unlikely in any case since Carlos Cuellar will almost certainly be returning to full back next season, making Young and/or Beye’s Villa career look all the bleaker. Lichaj’s best bet, perhaps, will be to aim for some playing time during the domestic and European cup competitions and hope to impress enough to get the nod at right back should Carlos have to cover for either Collins or Dunne.
My suspicion is that MON would prefer deeper cover there as far as the Premiership is concerned, but it may well be a question of priorities and he’s certainly demonstrated in the past that he’ll look to fill other gaps in the squad first.
Hopefully we’ll get a clue about MON’s plans during the pre-season, but we won’t know for sure until the transfer windows slams shut at the end of August. In the mean time, I’m extremely pleased to lean that Lichaj is more than likely among those plans in some form or another.
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That’s pretty good news, but why do I have a feeling that there is no way MON will consider him for the prem?
Contary to his rep (and it’s one thing that has quite disappointed me) of bringing kids through, who has actually broken through during his reign?
Our best prospect (Fonz) has had nowhere near as many minutes as he’d have got under me last season (although I’ve already proven I know nowt about it
) and I really don’t expect that to change much this season.
I guess what I’m trying to say is how much of this decision is down to MON and how much is down to the other staff/club policy?
i’d have to think about who we would have expected to come through in the last 4 years, but haven’t been given a fair crack?
for instance, zoltan steiber was a player i thought looked good, but we released him in the end, so i guess not. i certainly wouldn’t drop anyone for him, so it wouldn’t seem a bad decision tbh.
if they’re good enough, they’ll make it as far as i’m concerned.
i think lichaj’s interesting as he could well be one of the first foreign youngsters that were scouted after MON came on board and it’s coming to the time where we should expect to see the benefits.
the fonz has been tipped for a while, but as he only won his first england under 21 cap last season, i’m not sure he’s exactly getting less of a chance than we ought to expect.
he’s also part of a much stronger squad than previous youngsters, so he’s not doing too bad. i’m sure he’ll get plenty of time this season, especially if he’s actually part of pre-season this time. same goes for albrighton.
I have to wholeheartedly agree with you on this. If the youngsters are good enough they will force the managers hand. If not they won’t make the break trough.
I hear a lot of fans having a go at O’Neill for not giving the youngsters more pitch time, but what are they basing this on? They haven’t got the slightest clue how good these youngsters are.
Case in point being Barry Bannan, there was a clamour for himself and Albrighton to be seeing more pitch time and what was this based on, a pre season friendly tournament. Come on!
He couldn’t make the Blackpool first eleven for their crunch end of season games yet O’Neill was getting it in the neck for not giving him playing time.
It’s a results driven business and if a youngster is going to to give you the edge in getting the result he is in if he is not up to it yet he stays on the sidelines. It’s as simple as that an anything else is just bull.
i know a certain blogger out there likes to moan about youngsters such as delfouneso not being given a run of 10 games to see what they can do!
really? how ludicrous!!
who would we be dropping for 10 games? how would the fans treat a manager who used 10 league games, say, as a little experiment only to find the player isn’t yet ready? totally destroying the young player’s progress and confidence in the process btw.
10 games is only 30 points, right? we can afford to just play around with the youngsters for 10 games!?!
honestly, you couldn’t make this stuff up.
bannan is a great case in point, you’re right. good enough little player, did well at blackpool, but hardly the first name on their team sheet.
that said, MON could have given albrighton and delfouneso in particular a few more run outs from the bench, just a few extra minutes here and there to help them get used to the big stage.
hopefully we make the europa league this year, because that’s their chance to shine. then we’ll see what they can really do.
“but what are they basing this on? They haven’t got the slightest clue how good these youngsters are.”
Well, I’m basing it on Albrighton looking by far the best crosser of a ball in the Villa squad, especially when running at full pelt.
How many times did we complain about Young and Downing’s crossing?
And I’m basing Fonz on Heskey.
Enough said.
“MON could have given albrighton and delfouneso in particular a few more run outs from the bench, just a few extra minutes here and there to help them get used to the big stage.”
Exactly.
I certainly wasn’t calling for majorly long runs, but Heskey/Fonz, I can definitely see the reasoning.