Aston Villa pundit and presenter Dan Bardell has been sharing his thoughts on Villa captain Jack Grealish, his return from injury and the influence he has on his teammates on the pitch.
This comes after Bardell hosted the latest episode of The Villa View Podcast where he spoke about a number of subjects concerning Dean Smith’s side, including their recent 2-1 win over Tottenham Hotspur.
On the topic of Grealish, who made his first start for the Villans against Spurs since recovering from a shin injury, Bardell had this to say about the Englishman.
He said: “[Grealish is] nowhere near full fitness, you can absolutely tell when he’s running at full tilt. He’s not at his optimum levels at all, but even at 50%, 60% match fitness, he’s still so, so dangerous, he causes so many problems.
“What I was noticing was, he just ups the game with everyone around him. People want to give him the ball with the right weighted pass because they know if they don’t, he’ll shout at them and it’s almost like when they make a bad pass, they’re so sorry, they’re so worried about Jack shouting at them, they know what a good player he is and what a weapon he is for Aston Villa.
“If Jack makes a bad pass, it’s almost like the players think, ‘it doesn’t matter, it’s Jack, he’ll do something really good in 30 seconds’ time’ and it doesn’t matter.
But just having him on the pitch – even pre-game I tweeted out just seeing his name on the teamsheet you think yeah, we’ve got a good chance of getting something today, and that’s how the game turned out from there.
“We got 70 minutes out of him, but in that first half, he was the dangerman despite not being anywhere near his best level.”
Since making his senior debut for the Midlands club back in 2014 under former Villa manager Paul Lambert, the 25-year-old, who is currently valued at £54 million, has made 212 appearances for the club across all competitions in which he has managed to rack up a total of 32 goals and 43 assists along the way (per Transfermarkt).
TIF Thoughts on Dan Bardell’s comments on Grealish…
Given how Grealish made more key passes than any other Villa player in the game against Spurs alongside Bertrand Traore whilst also having three shots at goal, ultimately earning him a solid match rating of 7.46/10 (as per WhoScored), making him the third-highest-rated Villa player on the day, it’s easy to see why Bardell was so impressed with his performance against the north London club.
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Moving forward, if Grealish is fit enough to start in Villa’s final game of the season in their league clash against Chelsea at the weekend, then he might just be able to salvage his current campaign with the club after having such a long spell out injured, ahead of a possible summer tournament with England.