From The Athletic
PICKING ASTON VILLA’S BREAKTHROUGH PLAYER FOR 2025-26: GEORGE HEMMINGS
Young players typically acquire first-team minutes in pre-season.
The reasons are threefold. A manager may not have his senior players available due to truncated return dates or a need to manage minutes carefully. In that respect, young players enable rotation.
Third — and most desirable for any youngster — is that the manager wants to take a closer look, with an eye to the player stepping into his environment for the season ahead.
It is not yet known what end of the scale 18-year-old George Hemmings sits, but early impressions have been compelling.
Aston Villa’s first-team players have been struck by Hemmings’ ability this summer. He is described as a highly technical, composed midfielder who has a game understanding beyond his years.
He possesses the attributes Unai Emery wants in a midfielder — press resistance, malleability, and reliable decision-making — with senior team-mates impressed by how quickly he has adapted to the increase in intensity and quality. He was introduced at half-time in Villa’s first two pre-season fixtures against Walsall and Hansa Rostock, before playing the final half an hour against Roma and starting away at Marseille.
As The Athletic covered in March, Hemmings’ burgeoning reputation at senior level is not a surprise to those in the academy. The England youth international has long been name-checked by multiple sources — scouts, coaches, recruitment staff and agents — as a leading talent and, arguably, Villa’s most promising.
Hemmings officially arrived in January 2024 from Nottingham Forest. Forest did not want him to leave, so negotiations were far from easy. Villa’s academy recruitment staff worked to finalise an agreement and training compensation fee, bearing in mind the player was 16 and unable to sign a professional contract until his next birthday.
Villa knew their efforts and patience would be vindicated. They had the connections and resources to convince Hemmings to choose them and had been captured by his natural stylings as a player; silky in how he moves, effortless when carrying the ball, with a poise that few at that age share.
Hemmings waited while Villa and Forest negotiated. The broader issue was that, approaching the mid-point of the season, Hemmings did not have a club to train at. He was not allowed to train at Villa or Forest, so he was left to do his own work at his family home in Derby for four months.
This invariably disturbed his start at Villa once a deal was finalised, having to get up to speed and settle in a new environment.
Landing Hemmings provided Villa staff with immense pride. They share a similar viewpoint to wider scouting circles, where people believe he can play for England Under-21s in the not-too-distant future, even if he only turned 18 in March.
Hemmings is quiet and naturally introverted, but he plays with a high degree of confidence, even if there has been a feeling that he can take greater control of midfield battles and dominate. Coaches have tasked him with showing more personality on the pitch and becoming a leader.
He needed to catch up physically after joining Villa and this was tested further last season, when Hemmings was promoted to Villa’s under-21s while still playing a starring role in the under-18s treble-winning success. They became only the second team to win the FA Youth Cup, the league’s southern division title, and the national final.
His midfield partner, Aidan Borland, is similarly well-regarded, with their partnership demonstrating a maturity and balance ordinarily expected from players far older.
Hemmings trained with the first team last season, yet mostly on the days after their matches, where substitutes and unused players participated in practice games.
This summer was an opportunity to take the next step. Entering his second pre-season, the 18-year-old wanted to show that his age should not belie the fact that he could compete and was buoyed by signing a new five-year contract at Villa.
Emery has not yet fully integrated an academy player into his squad — Lamare Bogarde was on loan in League One and Jacob Ramsey was established when he arrived. Often, graduates train and form a part of some cup competitions and are widely there to offer depth. There has not been a player who has competed or surpassed a senior member in a position.
Academy players must not only be Premier League standard, but Emery expects they can play at a Champions League level, given his ambitions are for Villa to qualify regularly for the competition. It is then that he will put trust in them. Yet Hemmings was viewed as someone who could draw the manager’s attention.
Operating centrally, the teenager can play in multiple positions: a deep-lying No 6, a box-to-box runner, or a No 10 at different points.
Academy staff have been reticent to pigeonhole Hemmings, though his best traits are when he receives in deep positions before driving through midfield. Watch him closely and his head is on a constant swivel, scanning for space and looking where pressure is coming from. Playing in a position where he is more involved in Villa’s build-up is favoured.
“He is very smooth with the ball and is two-footed,” said one observer this year, speaking to The Athletic on the condition of anonymity to protect relationships. “He can evade pressure and break lines with his dribbling and forward passing.”
Pre-season has encouraged Hemmings’ prospects of being the one to break through under Emery. Will he get a chance alongside Boubacar Kamara or Youri Tielemans in the engine room this term?
