Marc Albrighton announced his retirement from professional football at the end of last month, with the former Aston Villa winger now shedding light on how left the club.
Albrighton started his career in the academy at Aston Villa. Joining at the age of nine in 1998, the fleet-footed winger worked his way up the youth system and progressed into an important first-team member.
Making his competitive debut for the club in February 2009 – a UEFA Cup tie away at CSKA Moscow – the talented winger went on to accumulate 102 appearances for Villa across five years, scoring nine and assisting 19.
Albrighton explained how it was a ‘dream’ to play for his boyhood club Aston Villa while claiming how ‘immensely proud’ it made him feel to play over 100 times in claret and blue.
Sadly, the Villa Academy graduate left the club in acrimonious circumstances; released from his contract at the club in the summer of 2014 as Leicester City snapped him up.
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Marc Albrighton recalls how he left Aston Villa
Albrighton’s career was catapulted to greater heights after leaving Villa Park as he famously lifted the Premier League title with Leicester and won the FA Cup.
Now aged 34, the winger can look back on his career with mostly fond memories but there was one moment at Villa that left the supporters frustrated, and that was when he was let go.
During Paul Lambert’s less than successful tenure at the club, the Scottish manager only used Albrighton in 32 of his 115 matches in charge.
While in the 2013/14 season, he spent the first half of it on loan at Wigan Athletic before returning to Villa and providing four assists in 19 appearances.
Unfortunately, that return wasn’t deemed enough to reward Albrighton with a new contract however, he did recall thinking he was going to get a new deal at the time before finding out through his agent that he wasn’t.
Speaking on the Undr the Cosh podcast, Albrighton said: “Two days after the season finished, my agent, like Tim, phoned me and he was like, I’ve just had a call off Villa.
“There’s nothing for you. Whether Lambert knew that like all the way through that they were going to be getting rid of me, I don’t know, but I was led to believe that I was going to be getting a contract there.
“I had to have a phone call with my agent to find out I weren’t.”
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Aston Villa should have never released Marc Albrighton
Around the time Albrighton left the club, Villa were on a downward spiral and heading towards the Championship.
From poor managerial choices to blowing money in the transfer window, the Villans made continuous wrong decisions – including the one to release Albrighton – and it came back to bite them.
While Leicester were celebrating a Premier League title in 2016, with Albrighton starring down the wing, Aston Villa were relegated to the second tier.
It took them three years to return to England’s top table and during that time, the Villa academy graduate was enjoying his football at the King Power Stadium and even lifted an FA Cup in 2021.
Albrighton perhaps wouldn’t have prevented them from slipping through the relegation trap door in 2016 but he would have given his all for the badge, and that was a rarity during that horrible campaign.
