I feel a bit sorry for Darren Bent, not much has gone right for the (former) England front man in the last few years.
The Mail reports that despite the possibility of their top scorer from last season Christian Benteke being snapped up, Villa have told Bent that he can leave.
The club apparently prepared to swallow a massive loss on the £24million fee they splashed out to take him from Sunderland.
I feel sorry for him for a number of reasons. The name was never going to be a good start, not for a striker, not for a human who has to go through school.
He clearly conquered that, possibly used it as a motivational tool and embarked on a professional footballing career.
He made his debut for Ipswich in a Uefa Cup tie then scored his first goal in the League Cup. He then made five Premier League appearances, scoring his first league goal, the team got relegated.
The next three seasons were spent plying his trade in the Championship. The first year they finished in seventh, four points off the playoff places.
The next two seasons they amassed enough points for the post season competition only to lose both times in the semi finals.
Bent who had set about building a useful reputation and scoring rate felt the time had come for him to play at the highest level.
He joined Charlton for £2.5million and promptly scored on debut and in the next three consecutive Premier League games.
He proceeded to be the top scoring Englishman in the division that season and despite eventually making his full England debut after 14 under-21 games, he was not included in the 2006 World Cup squad.
The next season Bent was again Charlton’s top scorer with 13 league goals, unfortunately this could not prevent the second relegation of his young career.
Another move followed, West Ham agreed a fee with Charlton but he didn’t want to go there, he held out for Tottenham and got his wish in a £16.5million deal.
His Spurs career never really got off the ground. The competition was strong, Berbatov, Keane and Defoe.
His full league debut ended in a 3-1 home defeat against Everton. He then scored his first goal against Derby, in fairness everybody scored against Derby that season.
The die was essentially cast a few games later when during his first North London derby with the scores level at 1-1 at White Hart Lane; he was through on goal with just the keeper to beat but somehow managed to strangle a shot wide. Arsenal went onto win 3-1.
He then had some good moments but mainly bad ones, culminating in the worst of the worst moments when Harry Redknapp basically cussed him out with a Sandra inference; it was pretty much over for him at Spurs after that.
Bent then had Twitter rage at Daniel Levy before securing a move to Sunderland. It was here that he enjoyed the best form of his career, 24 goals in 38 league games, but this somehow wasn’t enough to earn him a place in the 2010 World Cup squad, this is despite being in the preliminary 30.
Bent then decided halfway through the next season to hand in a transfer request to force through a move to Villa.
Why he had chosen to join the club just as they were in the midst of breaking up their most promising team in years only he will know.
It’s been very much downhill ever since, another omission from an international tournament (Euro 2012) included.
Who knows what comes next for Darren Bent, I for one hope he makes a good decision, or even better maybe asks a trusted friend or family member to make the decision for him.
Hopefully he can then enjoy an uncomplicated and productive end to his career.
Allen Whyte