New Aston Villa board eye Thierry Henry

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Bengaluru, July 22: Championship side Aston Villa are lining up a potential deal to make former Arsenal player and current Belgium assistant coach Thierry Henry their manager, according to reports in England.

Villa who have former Hull City boss Steve Bruce as their present manager missed out on a premier league spot this season after their playoff spot defeat against Fulham.

Following their loss, the Championship side later found themselves in a deep financial loss and were on the verge of being bankrupt. However, they have now received a significant investment from NSWE, a company jointly owned by Egyptian and US billionaires Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens.

Sawiris and American financier Wes Edens have answered Dr Tony Xia’s desperate SOS to rescue the crisis-club. Xia accepted a cut-price deal worth £46million to hand over the controlling stake in the club, less than £30m he paid to buy it from Randy Lerner in June 2016.

The new owners have purchased 55 per cent of Xia’s shares, with a complete buyout likely once the new investors satisfy the EFL’s Owners and Directors’ test.

And now following the initiation of new control, the new owners have apparently hinted that they are ready to inject cash in the squad and their first move will be a key addition in the managerial role, which is now believed to have zeroed them on Henry.

The Arsenal legend recently has quit his £4 million-a-year role at Sky Sports earlier this week with the intention of entering management following his success as Belgium assistant boss at the World Cup and it is now believed that he has been contacted by the new owners for the role.

Current boss Bruce amidst of all such rumours also has confirmed the rumours and suggested they are as of now in the dark on their futures.

Speaking for the first time about the enormous events of this week, Bruce acknowledged: “The new owners might want to sweep things clean and have their own man in.

“All the indications I’ve heard are that’s not the case but until I get in front of them we won’t know. That meeting could be as early as Tuesday, obviously the quicker, the better.”

Henry has not yet responded to the speculation though should he get the job this will be his first big test at the senior level. The French man as a player has overcome all sorts of challenges during his whole career, however, this time his struggles will be pretty different.

The legendary Gunners forward has to cope with the pressure of a money and result-oriented system time for the first time which only looks at the ultimate effects, not the efforts.