Rashford signing already a massive HEADACHE for Aston Villa

Tom Weber
Tom Weber
  • Updated: 4 Feb 2025 10:33 GMT
  • 4 min read
Marcus Rashford, Aston Villa
© IMAGO

Aston Villa were one of the busiest Premier League clubs in the January transfer window.

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Unai Emery and recruitment chief Monchi dipped into the market after an underwhelming start to the domestic campaign in a bid to rectify the situation.

In the Champions League, it was a different story, with Aston Villa comfortably qualifying for the Round of 16 after victories over Young Boys, Bayern, Bologna, Leipzig and Celtic.

READ MORE: Premier League January transfers 2025 - All the Done Deals

However, it is precisely in the Champions League where their January business is now set to give Emery a major headache. Villa brought in five new recruits over the past month, but the rules of Europe's premier competition only permit the registration of three additional players after the league phase.

Aston Villa sealed a Deadline Day move for Axel Disasi
© IMAGO - Aston Villa sealed a Deadline Day move for Axel Disasi

Who will Aston Villa register for the Champions League?

This means that two of Aston Villa's new signings will have to be omitted from their Champions League squad for the knockout stages. Considering that they lost five players who made appearances during the league phase, deciding who to include will be anything but easy.

Aston Villa signed Donyell Malen from Borussia Dortmund for €25 million and Andres Garcia from Levante for €7m, while they loaned Axel Disasi from Chelsea (with a €6m loan fee), Marcus Rashford from Man Utd and Marco Asensio from PSG.

They sold Jhon Duran to Al-Nassr for €77m, Jaden Philogene to Ipswich for €23.7m and Diego Carlo to Fenerbahce for €10m. Emi Buendia and Kosta Nedeljkovic left on loan for Bundesliga sides Bayer Leverkusen and RB Leipzig. All of them featured in the league phase.

All of the outgoings were more or less replaced like-for-like. Garcia replaces right-back Nedeljkovic, Diasi replaces Carlos and Malen, Rashford and Asensio replace the departed attackers.

READ MORE: Deadline Day - Every confirmed transfer around Europe

Marcus Rashford hasn't played since early December
© IMAGO - Marcus Rashford hasn't played since early December

Emery will have a big decision to make to choose just three players and it would not come as a shock to see a high-profile star like Rashford omitted from the Champions League squad. Emery will be extremely demanding of the Man Utd loanee and his alleged poor training performances won't go down well with the Spaniard.

Alternatively, of course, Villa could omit youngster Garcia and this is likely the most obvious decision. They targeted Disasi precisely because he can play as a centre-back and a right-back, so he is almost guaranteed to replace both Nedeljkovic and Carlos in the squad.

Asensio, Rashford and Malen have all had relatively poor campaigns to date, so it appears to be a coin toss as to which of the three will be left out of the Champions League squad.

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