A pretty decent summary of the situation from The Athletic
Harvey Elliott: What now?
There’s a saying in football that ‘the nice guys finish last’. If true, Harvey Elliott might have to consider changing his ways.
The transfer deadline came and went last night with no move for Elliott, whose season-long loan move from Liverpool to Aston Villa — signed last summer, shortly after his standout performance in England under-21s’ European Championship victory — has turned into a nightmare.
Elliott, 22, has been frozen out by manager Unai Emery for much of the season, largely due to appearance-related clauses written into that deal.
Should he reach 10 appearances, Villa would be obliged to pay a fee they say is £30million (Liverpool say £35m) to make the move permanent this summer, a commitment Emery has little intention of sanctioning.
Elliott is now up to seven appearances after featuring in the last two games following a midfield injury crisis, but the amount of time left for him to make an impact is limited.
Sources close to Elliott, speaking anonymously to protect their positions, say he hoped for an early return to Anfield as he was unable to join another European club after representing both Villa and Liverpool this season.
That would have required the agreement to be terminated, but with no recall clause in place, Villa would have had to pay a fee to do so, something they were unwilling to consider. Liverpool, for their part, did not want to waive it. Elliott waited for a compromise that never came before the deadline passed.
Despite his frustration, Elliott has refused to down tools. He remains both a tough trainer and a polite, friendly presence around the club, where he’s unlikely to have any long-term future.
This has turned into a sad story for one of England’s brightest young players, who won the player of the tournament award at the Euros and was only allowed to leave Liverpool on the summer deadline day once a record-breaking deal for Alexander Isak was secured.
When he signed, there was an expectation that he would be a key figure at Villa this season, but things quickly changed as Emery, who failed to land his preferred target in Lucas Paqueta, focused on other tried and trusted performers in his position.
With Elliott staying at Villa until the end of the season, the remaining months of the campaign may become even more difficult, with Emery unlikely to change his stance.
It was on a trip to the venue where Elliott first announced himself that his season began to implode.
He was desperate to make an impact for Villa and a start against former employers Fulham in late September looked like the ideal opportunity.
Just 12 days earlier, Elliott had scored Villa’s first goal of the season and even reacted positively to some surprisingly sharp criticism from Emery, who singled out his decision-making after a difficult day at Sunderland. Emery had been irked, in particular, by a diagonal pass that went out of play for a throw-in.
At Fulham, however, it was other attributes that went against Elliott, as he was hauled off after just 45 minutes with the scores tied at 1-1.
To those in the stands, Elliott hadn’t done much wrong as he moved the ball neatly from his right No 10 position and successfully completed 16 of his 17 passes. Yet Emery — an intense and demanding coach — asks for specific traits from his No 10s, including the ability to shield the ball from opponents and defend as intelligently as a full-back while also offering a clear goal threat.
The manager, who has all the authority at Villa, decided very quickly that Elliott wasn’t matching up and there was no obvious place for him to fit into his strongest team. With a number of clauses inserted into the loan deal, including a specific number of appearances before and after January 1 that would trigger an obligation to buy, Emery decided against the idea of a permanent move, and therefore stopped selecting him.
If the agreement had been a straight loan, Elliott might have had other opportunities to feature, and perhaps more of a chance to show that he could adjust his game to suit Emery’s demands, but the structure of the deal, designed to help with Villa’s battle to comply with profit and sustainability rules (PSR), made it difficult.
Until last week, Elliott had been stuck on three Premier League appearances and five in all competitions since October 2. His last involvement in the Premier League had come at Fulham, where Villa turned the game around in the second half without him to win 3-1 and kickstart their season.
“We decided two months ago that we are not convinced to sign him, spending the money we would need to,” Emery said in a press conference on January 2.
When asked last weekend if the situation had changed after Elliott’s start against Red Bull Salzburg in the Europa League and substitute appearance in the 1-0 defeat to Brentford, Emery said it remained the same, even with crippling injuries to midfielders Boubacar Kamara, John McGinn and Youri Tielemans.
The bottom line is that Emery doesn’t trust Elliott to carry out his specific tactical instructions and prefers other players instead.
Although Elliott had been heavily recommended by Villa’s scouting and data department for some time, he was not a top target for Emery and the deal only came about late into the summer transfer window when the relationship with former sporting director Monchi was already breaking down, and Villa were desperate for players after a worrying start to the season.
When he arrived, Villa were bottom of the table and hadn’t scored a goal. Their transformation into title contenders also went against him as Emery favoured Morgan Rogers and McGinn as his starting No 10s, with Emi Buendia, Tielemans, Jadon Sancho and Ross Barkley all offering enough in support.
It all became a slow-burning nightmare for Elliott, who started to recognise his fate late into October when Villa lost 2-1 to Go Ahead Eagles in the Europa League and he wasn’t even called off the bench.
He then only made the matchday squad on two other occasions — both in the Europa League — but failed to get on, and watched as youngsters George Hemmings and Jamaldeen Jimoh-Aloba were selected ahead of him for games around the festive period.
To his credit, Elliott remained professional throughout and earned respect from players and staff at the club for the way he handled a difficult time. He trained hard and contributed to activities within the community, including the club’s hospital visits over Christmas, and was a supportive presence for his team-mates at matches.
To train every day with the first team for around three months and be the only player not considered was particularly bruising, especially as moving to Villa was supposed to be a fresh start.
He had been reluctant to leave Liverpool, the team he helped become champions last season. Elliott made 147 appearances for the club and contributed at important moments, but was never recognised as a first-choice starter.
German side RB Leipzig were interested in signing him last summer, but the move to Villa, and remaining in the Premier League, held greater appeal.
After his standout performances for England Under-21s, Elliott’s aim was to push for Thomas Tuchel’s senior World Cup squad this summer. When he moved to Villa, that seemed a realistic aim: instead, his season has unravelled and it has, understandably, been difficult to take.
To succeed under Emery as an attacking wide player, Elliott needed to be a physical monster (like Rogers and McGinn), able to cover lots of ground, drive forward, and be diligent defensively.
He’s not the first attacking midfielder or winger to struggle under Emery. Philippe Coutinho, Moussa Diaby and, to a lesser extent, Leon Bailey, all fell out of favour. Tielemans also needed three months at the club before he started a game in the Premier League, so seeing a player struggle in that position is nothing new.
For the time being, unless both clubs agree to any future changes to the agreement, Elliott seems to have run out of options.
The fact that he came on as an 89th-minute replacement for Liverpool at Newcastle in August means he cannot represent another team this season — making it one of the season’s more consequential late substitutions — and while he could join an MLS side for the start of their 2026 campaign, when Charlotte FC expressed an interest in offering him an escape route last month, he was not interested.
The suggestion that Elliott is simply not cut out for the Premier League following an aggressive shift towards physicality and set-piece domination is lazy, but there’s no hiding that Villa was simply not the right fit.
For his age, he’s not only got time on his side, but also plenty of experience in big moments after winning six trophies with Liverpool. A player with his technical brilliance should also not fall away after one disappointing season, but no doubt he will have to pick his next move more carefully.
There’s no winner in this current messy situation, but Elliott should not be written off. The quicker he can get back to showing his worth on the pitch, as well as off it, the better.
