Aston Villa talent bolsters West Ham starting chances after another ‘impressive’ pre-season display. One Aston Villa youngster is doing his chances of starting in the Premier League opener against West Ham no harm at all with his performances so far in pre-season.
Unai Emery welcomed his players for pre-season in early July and has now overseen Aston Villa‘s first two friendlies of pre-season.
The Villans stayed local for their first game in their preparation for the upcoming season as they faced League Two Walsall on Wednesday night.
Having won that game 3-0 thanks to a Morgan Rogers brace and late goal by Louie Barry, Villa then travelled to Slovakia to face Spartak Trvana on Saturday.
It was another successful pre-season workout as Villa won 3-0 for the second time in a week and one player stood out again as he stakes his claim to start against West Ham on the opening day of the Premier League season.
That player is Kosta Nedeljkovic, who Villa signed in January before loaning him back to Red Star Belgrade for the second half of the season.
The right-back had been identified as one for the future given he is just 18, but he is showing Emery that he could well be ready to make an impact for Villa in the present.
After a strong showing against Walsall in which he combined well with Leon Bailey, Nedeljkovic started against Spartak Trvana on Saturday. Bailey scored the opener in Slovakia, before another pre-season goal from Rogers was followed by a strike from the returning Cameron Archer.
However, it was Nedeljkovic who again caught the eye, with Birmingham Live giving the right-back a seven out of ten for his showing. The comments that accompanied the match rating read: ‘The teenager looked to join attacks at every given opportunity.
He fired the ball over the bar from inside the box early on and appears to be forming a strong bond with Bailey on the right flank. He lost out to Azango on the wing half-way through the first period, but all in all, it was another impressive display’.
Matty Cash has been the first choice in the position for the majority of the four years since his arrival in 2020 but suffered a real drop off in form towards the end of last season as he found Ezri Konsa preferred in his right-back role.
The club have been linked with a move for Inter Milan’s Denzel Dumfries, as well as Jeremie Frimpong of Bayer Leverkusen, but the emergence of Nedeljkovic could save Emery a fortune.
Despite his age, Nedeljkovic already has Champions League experience having featured four times in the group stages for Red Star last season which would help him in Villa’s own forthcoming Champions League campaign.
An exciting prospect, if Nedeljkovic continues his impressive performances when Villa head to the United States to continue their pre-season then he could well find himself an unexpected starter against West Ham on August 17th.
