Aston Villa sign Not Tammy Abraham; Atalanta to make a move instead?

Aston Villa confirmed the signing of a new striker yesterday, and his name is ... not Tammy Abraham. His name is in fact Danny Ings, who’s signed a three-year contract after joining from Southampton in a transfer reportedly worth £30m.

That’s a fairly hefty sum even for a team (soon) flush with Grealish cash, considering that they could’ve had the much younger and just about as prolific (though a bit less proven) Abraham for £40m — and doubly surprising as Chelsea have been actively shopping our leading goalscorer of the past two years around, and he’s had some great success with Villa on loan previously as well.

Since we seem to have made up our minds some time ago that Abraham’s got to go, with that becoming ever more clear as we work to bring back Romelu Lukaku in a record transfer, we do still need to find a new team for Tammy.

Tenuous links to Arsenal and West Ham aside, the recent chatter of potential interest from Atalanta may hold some promise.

Every football hipster’s current favorite second team can match Tammy’s ambitions with Champions League football, could make him neighbors with good pal Fikayo Tomori over in Milano again, and most pertinently could offer a decent amount in return by way of transfer fee. Incidentally, it’s Chelsea’s own pursuit of Lukaku that would necessitate and enable this €40m situation, with Inter supposedly looking at Atalanta’s Duván Zapata as their primary Lukaku-replacement at center forward — one of them classic transfer domino love triangles!