Tommy Elphick signs for Aston Villa

The Xia/Di Matteo era looks set to have its first signing, as Bournemouth’s Tommy Elphick has passed his medical at Aston Villa.

Update:

Aston Villa have officially confirmed the signing on Twitter. Check it out:

Breaking news: @TommyElph4 has this afternoon joined #AVFC on a three-year-deal. #WelcomeTommy pic.twitter.com/HBEodaR3UC

— Aston Villa FC (@AVFCOfficial) June 20, 2016

Earlier this week we reported that Elphick was heavily linked with a move to B6, and after cutting short his honeymoon in Italy this week, it seems that the move will go ahead, with confirmation seemingly coming either tonight or tomorrow.

The 28 year old has today passed his medical with the club, and the reported £3M move is all but confirmed, making this the first transfer for the club under new owner Dr. Xia. It’s not quite the same calibre of player that former owner Randy Lerner’s first transfer was, but like Stiliyan Petrov, Elphick has all the makings of a valuable player for the club.

Although Elphick is set to join Villa from Premier League side Bournemouth, he has spent much of his career playing in the Football League, adding divisional experience to the Villa back line. This signing is somewhat similar to the signing of Joleon Lescott last summer: inexpensive and experienced. The game changer however is that Elphick has far less milage on his body clock, and should serve Villa’s defence far better than Lescott has, thus far.

Defence is of course the position that Villa needed to fix the most this summer, given the disastrous performances that we have witness over the last twelve months. Signing Elphick is a good first step to fixing these issues, but it must be followed by the removal of some dead wood.

Aston Villa’s transfer window has begun, and it could very well be a busy one.