Villa’s Carlos Cuellar has waxed lyrical over his young defensive partner Ciaran Clark, claiming that the 21-year-old has the potential to become one the best centre backs in Europe, let alone the Premier League;
“He is one of the best defenders I have played with. He is superb. He is young but he has some amazing assets. He is quick, he has good technique, he can play, he can tackle and he’s good in the air. He’s got everything you need to succeed and flourish.
“He is also incredibly versatile. He can play centre-back obviously but he’s done an amazing job at left-back too when he’s been asked to play there. And he’s even impressed in central midfield too.
“He will be one of the best defenders in the Premier League and in Europe too in my opinion. He’s that good. If he keeps up this kind of progression, keeps learning, he will definitely be one of the best defenders around. I rate him that highly.
“He has so many great assets but the quality of his left foot is amazing. He is so comfortable on it. It’s incredible.”
Trapattoni is wary of playing Clark in his favoured centre-back role at such a young age, with the English born defender set to play at left-back against Uruguay, a position in which he has impressed for Villa this term;
“Ciaran Clark is still quite young and at times, it is dangerous in that position.
“He is young and young players are always anxious to get on the ball, and that’s the danger.
“If you make a mistake in the box, it’s a goal. With a mistake near the touchline, it’s possible to recover.”
Clark on his chance to gain his second cap against the World Cup semi-finalists;
“I would like to put in a good performance and it is a good chance for me from now until the end of the season to show what I can do.
“There are a lot of good players in the squad and everyone will be fighting for places in the team because everyone wants to play.
“But we have got Tuesday night’s game to concentrate on, then there are the Nations Cup games which will give players a chance to impress.”
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