Aston Villa transfer rumour: Liverpool defender enquiry made

According to Nick Mashiter, one of the most reliable journalists around, Aston Villa have made an enquiry into Liverpool centre back Tiago Ilori. That's uh... that's an interesting thing to do there, Villa. Joleon Lescott is thought to be on his way into Villa Park after having reportedly completed a medical today and despite the fact that Nathan Baker is thought to be headed out on loan, the addition of Ilori would mean a lot of central defenders for Tim Sherwood.

So what gives, here? Is Lescott not actually headed to Villa? Is Sherwood considering a six-at-the-back approach under the idea that "if one person makes a stupid mistake, there will be five others to cover for him!"? Or is this simply Villa doing due diligence after Ilori's rumoured loan to Sunderland fell through?

It's not to say that Ilori would be a bad move for Villa to make. He's a talented 22-year-old Portuguese player who cost Liverpool £7 million when he signed in 2013. But thus far he's yet to break into the Reds first team, and it's tough to tell what he would bring to Aston Villa.

And there remains the question of where he would fit in. If playing-time concerns actually did scuttle the move to Sunderland, I'm not sure why he would come here. We've already got Ciaran Clark, Micah Richards, Jores Okore, and Philippe Senderos with Lescott on the way. There's no way Villa would want six centre backs on the roster. So either this won't be happening, or there is an unexpected outgoing transfer to keep our eyes open for.