Aston Villa defender Mitchell Clark has returned to the club’s Bodymoor Heath training ground to undergo treatment on a “grade one” muscle tear as he faces three weeks out on the sidelines.
The promising full back has spent the season on loan at Port Vale, establishing himself as a first team player at the League Two outfit, but was forced to the sidelines at half time in the club’s clash with Swindon Town over the weekend.
Now it has been confirmed that the 19-year-old will undergo his recovery process at Villa before returning to his loan side towards the end of December.
Port Vale’s assistant manager Lee Nogan told the Birmingham Mail: “He has a grade one tear. We have got the message from Villa this morning that he will be out for three weeks.
“But we just hope the lad gets back as quickly as possible. He will be in good hands at Villa – a big club and they will have more staff than we have to give him better treatment in certain areas where we couldn’t do that. So, he is in the best hands.”
Opinion
Clark is not in Villa’s plans at the moment but having him return to the club would be a good chance to pick his brains about how he feels his development is going at Port Vale. Having impressed in League Two, it could well be that the youngster wants to test himself at a higher level, and so this injury blow could well be worse than expected for Port Vale – just not in the way you would expect. If he tells Villa boss Dean Smith or another member of staff responsible for his future that he wants a move to challenge himself, you can be sure they will bring him back in January and send him out to fulfil his ambitions. On the other hand, he might be raring to go back at his current loan side, which might show a lack of ambition from the youngster. Either way, this injury setback works well for Villa in that they can have direct contact with him on a day-to-day basis and figure out what is best for the next step of his development.