Gabby set to blow the whistle on his 17-year Villa career
GABBY Agbonlahor’s time at Aston Villa will come to an end this summer, regardless of whether the club are in the top flight or the Championship.
The striker has scored just two goals since Villa dropped out of the Premier League in 2016, and has been sidelined for a significant chunk of the season through injury.
He has played almost 400 times for the club since making his debut a little over 12 years ago, and has scored just shy of 100 goals.
Agbonlahor, whose record in West Midland derby matches continued to blossom even up to the winner he nabbed against Blues at Villa Park last season, is said to be considering a move to the MLS in the summer.
His current contract, which he signed under Paul Lambert in 2014, will expire at the end of the season and will bring to an end his 17-year association with the club.
Micah Richards and Ross McCormack are also set to leave in the summer, with Villa looking to trim the fringe players from their squad.
Decisions will be made on a number of other senior squad members, including players out on loan.
Richards has fallen out of favour since Villa suffered relegation and the 29-year-old will move on in an attempt to kickstart his career.
McCormack is back at the club after a successful spell in Australia with Melbourne City, but he is way down the pecking order and won’t under manager Steve Bruce.
Decisions will also be made on skipper John Terry, while five players currently on loan at Villa Park will return to their parent clubs.
Bruce has been handed a fitness boost ahead of his return to Hull City on Saturday with Axel Tuanzebe and Neil Taylor back in training.
Tuanzebe has been absent since the 1-1 home draw with Preston in February when he limped off with a hamstring problem.
Taylor came off in the 3-1 home loss to QPR earlier this month with a groin issue, but the pair were back on the Bodymoor Heath fields this week and could feature at the KCOM Stadium.
Added to the comebacks of Alan Hutton, Andre Green and Jonathan Kodjia, their returns are a welcome tonic for Bruce as he looks for a strong finish to the campaign.
Villa’s internationals reported back for training, including young English trio Josh Onomah, Keinan Davis and Rushian Hepburn-Murphy.
Onomah played the full 90 minutes as England Under-21s beat Ukraine to open up a five-point gap at the top of Euro 2019 qualifying Group D.
Davis scored his second goal in as many games for England Under-20s as they defeated Portugal 3-0 in Manchester on Tuesday night. He was replaced by Hepburn-Murphy 14 minutes from the end.
Meanwhile, Scott Hogan is confident in his ability to provide the goals to fire Villa to the Premier League.
The 25-year-old made his Republic feature of Ireland debut on Friday and had their best chance in a 1-0 defeat in Turkey.
That extended his scoreless run to nine games – but he is not panicking.
“This is a bit of a barren spell at Villa but I’ve always scored goals in my career,” said Hogan.
He is now turning his sights to the Premier League promotion race. Villa were on a superb run of eight wins in 10 games only to lose their last two on the spin. Fourth in the table, they are seven points behind Cardiff, who occupy the second automatic promotion spot and have a game in hand.
But Hogan said: “Everyone has gone on a run at the same time. Someone is going to drop off.
“We’ve had a little blip and you’ve got to have little blips and we’ve got to play Cardiff. There are eight games to go and that’s 24 points.”
Hogan started the Republic’s friendly defeat in Antalya and could have capped it with a first-half goal but instead found the side-netting with a close-range, angled shot. He said: “If I got the same chance again I’d do the same thing. It just skipped away on the turf. My touch was fine.”