Andre Green has returned to Aston Villa after his loan deal with Portsmouth was terminated earlier than planned.
The Villains announced via their official Twitter account on Thursday that the 20-year-old is back in the West Midlands after a mixed spell at Fratton Park, where he only made 12 appearances in all competitions after joining the League One side on a season-long deal in the summer.
We can confirm that @AndreGreen_ has today returned to the club following his loan spell at Portsmouth.
Welcome back, Andre!#PartOfThePride #AVFC pic.twitter.com/EJ3RMltKHR
— Aston Villa (@AVFCOfficial) January 17, 2019
Although he found game-time limited, Green had quite the impact in front of goal for Portsmouth, scoring five times, including a late winner against Norwich in the FA Cup earlier this month.
OPINION
Just as Green was getting to grips with playing for Portsmouth, Aston Villa have recalled him. The young attacker is a great prospect for the Villains, but he will only reach his potential if he is playing regular first team football. He wasn’t starting many games with Portsmouth but you had the feeling that he was close to getting into their starting line-up because his recent displays have been very good. Dean Smith ought to throw him straight into his first team squad now, otherwise tearing up his loan deal early makes no sense. Yannick Bolasie and Anwar El Ghazi are only on loan at Villa, so maybe Smith would rather give the club’s own players more of a chance to shine in the second half of the campaign. Or, Villa could be looking for Green to go out on loan to a team in the Championship, rather than spend the rest of the term in League One with Portsmouth. Either way, it doesn’t matter, as long as he is playing.