Clement Lenglet’s future has the subject of significant speculation over the last few weeks, with interest growing in the on-loan Aston Villa defender, who – outside of the last couple of weeks – has struggled for regular playing time in the Premier League this season.
Barcelona, Lenglet’s parent club, are keen for the French defender to play as much as possible during the remainder of the season so that his value increases ahead of the summer. At this stage, it looks looks unlikely that this will happen at Aston Villa.
Barcelona would ideally like to recall Lenglet this month in order to loan him out to another club, and according to Il Mattino (via Sport), Napoli are preparing an offer for Lenglet. This would come with the stipulation that an agreement is reached between the Catalans and Aston Villa in order to terminate the current loan deal.
Barcelona are desperate to sell Lenglet, but this won’t happen in January. The best they can hope for is that he puts himself in the shop window from now until the end of the season, but given his projected lack of minutes at Aston Villa, it’s unlikely to happen. The bad news too is that Unai Emery wants to retain the 28-year-old.
