Aston Villa journalist Gregg Evans has been sharing his thoughts on how Villa midfielder John McGinn got on during their 0-0 draw against Sheffield United.
This comes after Evans recently made an appearance on The Athletic’s Villa based, 1874 podcast to discuss Wednesday’s match that saw Dean Smith’s side draw against the Blades.
When asked for his thoughts on how McGinn fared in his first competitive appearance for Villa since fracturing his ankle back in December, Evans said: “Not quite at his dazzling best. I think that he still needs a bit of time to find that top form. He hasn’t played a professional, proper game for the last six months. So to expect him to come back and be fit and firing and as good as we know he can be, it was always going to be a tough ask.
“I watched him quite closely actually, because I was really intrigued to see how he got on and there were times where he was charging from one defender, to the other defender, to the other midfielder and clearly those short sprints that Villa would have been working on have helped him and you could see that he’s got it in his legs, but just didn’t get on the ball as often as he previously had.
“He had the one chance, brilliant save from Dean Henderson, but other than that, I think [there’s] definitely more to come from him, which is a good thing because if Villa played like they did today, and McGinn wasn’t quite at his best, it just shows signs that there’s still some room for improvement.”
Were you impressed with McGinn's performance against Sheffield United?
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The midfielder played over 70 minutes of the match before being substituted off the pitch, resulting in McGinn picking up a match rating of 6.9/10 (per WhoScored).
TIF Thoughts…
It was great to see McGinn back in action for the Birmingham club after suffering such a serious injury back in December.
If Evans believes that McGinn has more to offer on the pitch in these coming weeks, then this will be a big positive for Villa.