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Aston Villa resisting the temptation to sign this 26-year-old Serie A star would pay rich dividends – Here’s why

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Why Aston Villa should not be tempted into signing Mattia Perin

According to the Birmingham Mail, Italian heavyweights Juventus are urging Aston Villa to sign out-of-favour goalkeeper Mattia Perin in the January transfer window. 

The reigning Serie A champions are keen to offload the 26-year-old shot-stopper during the mid-season trading period, with the former Genoa star apparently not featuring in new manager Maurizio Sarri’s plans moving forward. 

Villa were heavily linked with a move for Perin but Dean Smith ended up signing Tom Heaton from Burnley instead. Sporting Lisbon were also keen on the player at that time but the Portuguese giants have taken their name off the table, the Birmingham Live understands. 

Now, as the story goes, Juventus are hoping that either Aston Villa or French outfit Monaco would come back with an offer for Perin in January, although a specific price tag hasn’t been mentioned in the report. 

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The 26-year-old, who rose to prominence in Italy with his boyhood club Genoa, was regarded as one of the best-emerging goalkeeping prospects across the nation.

Perin made a total of 150 appearances for Genoa across six seasons in the Serie A and also made his international breakthrough for Italy before securing a move to Juventus last summer.

However, things haven’t gone according to the script for the Latina-born shot-stopper and he is yet to make a first-team appearance since April last season, having featured on only 9 occasions in his debut campaign at Turin. 

Perin has largely played second-fiddle to undisputed No.1 Wojciech Szczesny between the sticks and the arrival of Sarri has seen him completely frozen out of the picture, with the former Chelsea and Napoli boss not keen to rotate his players too much. 

The former Genoa man showed a lot of promise earlier in his career, with his vast potential earning him the status of a wonderkid in Italian football, however, he hasn’t really taken significant strides towards fulfilling his potential. 

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Now 26, the shot-stopper finds himself stuck in limbo at Turin until at least January and with his future at Juventus looking completely dead and buried, a move away from the club would be e fair settlement for both parties. 

To that end, though, Aston Villa should not be too keen to offer Perin an escape route, given that they already have enough competition for places between the sticks in their ranks. 

Tom Heaton has established himself as the No.1 following his arrival in the summer and his stellar run of form has hardly allowed the likes of Orjan Nyland, Lovre Kalinic and Jed Steer to get a look in from the manager. 

With all due respect to Perin’s talent and abilities, it would make little sense for the Lions to invest in another goalkeeper in January, particularly after breaking the bank to sign as many as ten new players in the summer. They haven’t had a great start to the season but that has hardly got to do anything with the goalkeeping department.

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Truth be told, Villa should look to sort out the futures of Nyland and Steer, given that they are unlikely to feature in the Premier League and getting them off the books would probably save the club some unnecessary wages. 

That being said, Aston Villa should not be tempted into signing the out-of-favour Juventus goalkeeper in January and if Smith is keen to bolster his squad further, he might as well look at bringing in a few attacking reinforcements.