You remember Nicklas Helenius, right? The Danish striker that Aston Villa brought in from AaB Aalborg over the summer? Not ringing a bell? How about this:
There we go. Memory cleared.
Helenius has had almost no chance to prove his worth in an Aston Villa kit since he came here, having only made three league appearances (totaling 49 minutes) and three cup appearances. In that extremely limited time, he's only managed to find the back of the net once, against Sheffield United in the FA Cup loss.
Now his agent is subtly hinting that Helenius may want to move on over the summer if he can't find a place with Aston Villa in the final five matches of the season. I say subtly because the agent frames it as the natural result of an ultimatum that probably won't be made.
"If, after the last few games in the Premier League he is told that he must find something else, then a club like AaB will be very interesting for Nicklas."
While Helenius hasn't featured with the club much, there is absolutely no reason to think that he'd be told to find a transfer over the summer, so this strikes me as the agent trying to get his client some playing time. Given the current state of the club, though, one would think this move isn't too rash.
Christian Benteke is, of course, out for the remainder of the season. So, too, is Libor Kozak. The remainder of Aston Villa's strike force have proven woefully ineffective, scoring only 25 goals in 33 Premier League matches. We have no idea if Helenius is any good at this point, but we can say with some certainty that it would be hard for him to be worse than his teammates. Might as well play the guy.
If Paul Lambert can't find a place for the striker, though, I'd expect the rhetoric from his agent to heat up over the summer. Given the paucity of striking options that this club has, it'd be a shame to see a perfectly useful one go to waste.