Aston Villa shouldn’t even answer the phone to Premier League clubs chasing ‘quality’ midfielder

The financial situation at Aston Villa necessarily leads to transfer speculation around players who could leave the club for whatever reason and represent either a healthy profit or a manageable lowering of the wage bill.

Villa are working hard to compete on the pitch while complying with Premier League PSR and UEFA squad cost ratio rules. It creates a challenging environment for president of football operations Monchi and manager Unai Emery.

Without that backdrop there’s little to no chance Newcastle United would be briefing about any kind of interest in Villa captain John McGinn.

There are four places McGinn should end his career: Aston Villa, Hibernian, St Mirren or Celtic.

His motivations are his own and nobody knows what objectives he has left in his career – winning a trophy with Villa is the exception – but leaving a reluctant selling club because it helps the balance sheet is not how the captain’s time at Villa Park should end.

Nevertheless, there are clubs casting an admiring eye in his direction. After quickly rebuffed interest from Everton earlier in the transfer window, shiny McGinn has been linked with the lusty affections of the Magpies.

“Newcastle United reportedly wish to bring Aston Villa captain John McGinn to Tyneside this summer,” reports BirminghamLive.

“Eddie Howe, who has first choice trio Bruno Guimaraes, Joelinton and Sandro Tonali established in his starting XI, wants more depth and quality in the middle of the park ahead of the new Premier League campaign which commences later this month and McGinn is supposedly on his list of targets.”

It would be surprising if he wasn’t on that list but there’s no reason whatsoever for Villa to entertain the notion. Having already told Everton their captain wasn’t for sale, Villa are extremely unlikely to be more inclined to sell with the season just around the corner.

The £30 million Meatball

Only Villa’s broad need to balance the club’s accounts offers any encouragement to clubs looking to tempt them to let McGinn leave. It doesn’t work for Villa in any footballing or sentimental sense.

It would be a pure, cold, brutal financial decision and Villa won’t even consider it. To understand it, we only need to take the unusual step of considering it from the bidding club’s perspective.

If we assume that every Villa player has his price, McGinn’s is likely to be in the region of £30 million – that’s what’s been reported throughout the summer and it’s around the mark where it might be considered a fee worth thinking about.

The Villa skipper turns 31 in October. He has several years of Premier League experience but all at a single club, the only one he’s played for in England. He’s played one season in the Champions League and is likely to want good money to not be a starter even at a club with that to offer him again in 2025/26.

In many ways, McGinn is the best possible example of a player who’s worth far more to his current club than he would be to any bidder.

£30 million isn’t what Villa want Newcastle to pay for McGinn. It’s what they don’t want Newcastle to pay for McGinn, and that’s the point.

Monchi shouldn’t even pick up the phone.

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