Aston Villa/Tottenham Hotspur Defender Kyle Walker's Loan Deal Contains No Option-To-Buy Clause

Today Mat Kendrick confirms what most have suspected all along; Villa do not have an option to make Walker's move to Villa Park permanent at the end of the season. This deal gave Spurs a chance to see how Walker would fare playing first-team football at the Premier League level and they've gotten an answer; quite well, thanks very much. The 20 year old made an instant impact for Villa, scoring just nine minutes into his debut against former club Sheffield United.

Since then Walker has become a fairly permanent fixture in Villa's XI and his performances have earned him a call-up to England's senior squad. Though he's clearly got some development left to do he's just as clearly a quality Premier League right back right now and the odds of Tottenham Hotspur electing to allow the move to be made permanent seem very slim indeed. Going into next season Walker is towards the top of Spurs' right back depth chart and depending on how he performs the rest of the year with Villa he could end up being their number one option at the position. There's simply no compelling reason for Spurs to accept anything but a huge overpayment in exchange for Walker.

And as excellent as he's been, there's no real reason for Aston Villa to offer a huge overpayment for Walker. Villa have options at the position; Carlos Cuellar has shown he's capable there in the past, as has Luke Young. Although he's fallen out of the rotation this year, Eric Lichaj is still a promising prospect and is set to gain some much-needed first team experience after joining Leeds United on loan for a month. Should Gerard Houllier decide that his options still aren't desirable at the end of the season the club should have the financial flexibility to bring in a new right back at a price much lower than Spurs' valuation of Walker. It's unfortunate that such a brilliant young player will only be with us for a short time, buta move doesn't really make sense for either the club given the reality of the situation. In reality the real loser (at least on a short-term basis) might be Kyle Walker as a move back to Tottenham likely means a temporary end to regular first-team football, unless of course another loan deal is worked out.

Kyle Walker is a brilliant young prospect and very well may be England's right back of the future. It's why we'd all love for him to stay at Villa Park but it's also why that was never really all that likely a scenario. And because he belongs to Spurs, we'll all end up hating him soon enough.