Maloney Wants To Get On With It

Shaun Maloney has spoken of his move to Villa in the Scotsman

‘There are reasons why I left the club which, I guess, should remain private and it’s unfortunate that things like that are said but to be honest it doesn’t really offend me, people can have their opinions. I’m certainly not bitter towards the club or the manager or anything like that, it just ended up in a way that I had to make the decision and that was the decision I came to at the time. It was certainly a hard one to make because it was going on for quite a few months. I had been there since I was 16 so I was obviously happy there. The last few months I found difficult, but a lot of players have been through that. I loved playing for the club for as many years as I did but people move on and that happens at a lot of football clubs.’

Adding on Villa: ‘To be honest, in a lot of ways, it’s very similar to Scotland and the only difference I notice really is that when I was with Celtic I was attacking for the majority of the game, whereas with Aston Villa it’s definitely a bit more even and maybe the opposite way, especially when we are playing the top four. That’s when keeping the ball is such a big thing against the top four in England. When you do lose it you are pretty much straight on the defence. The pace of the opposing team to get into your last third is pretty quick and that was one of the things I noticed in the couple of games I’ve played.’

So far he has only made an appearance in the claret and blue of Villa for the games against Reading and Fulham, with first team chances hampered by a virus, he said:

‘Now I just want to play as many games as I possibly can to try to bed myself into the team. I’ve had a couple of games but then missed a few but, yeah, it’s just basically to bed myself into the team and get to know my new team-mates and for them to know me, that’s the plan. I was very motivated when I was at Celtic. I think every year you have goals that you have to win, well you don’t have to but you want to win the league and, obviously, Champions League is a major factor. But I think because it’s very much an unknown for me and I’ve done very little in the English game, it’s the fear factor that I guess is pushing me on to greater heights and that will help improve me as a player. I think I would have done that anyway at my last club but hopefully I will do it at this club as well and that fear factor will probably hurry me along.’