Aston Villa manager Steven Gerrard explains reasoning behind new Matty Cash deal with glowing reference

Aston Villa manager Steven Gerrard was full of praise for Matty Cash ahead of the game with Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday and gave his own personal reasoning as to why he believes the Poland international deserved his new deal.

Cash, who joined from Nottingham Forest in 2020, signed a new five-year contract at Villa Park this past week and in doing so fended off the interest of a number of clubs who were expected to come in for the 24-year-old this summer.

The attack-minded full-back has been one of the few mainstays in the Villa side since the arrival of Gerrard and the former Liverpool captain gave him a glowing reference claiming that he epitomises everything he wants from one of his players.

On why he felt he was deserving of a new deal, the manager said: “He’s all in.”

“He’s been fantastic to work with, I love his energy, I love his character and his personality. He brings a lot to the group on a daily basis.

“In the main he’s been extremely consistent. I think he’s the one in the team that has had the most difficult one v one challenges throughout the fixtures we’ve played and I think in the main he’s handled himself extremely well.

“I joked with him last week at Wolves - I felt like he was still in Poland for part of the game.

“But listen, I absolutely love working with him, he’s very infectious, a good kid and what strikes me about him is he’s desperate to improve, he’s desperate to get better.

“He wants to be a good Premier League player, he wants to be a good international player and you can see that in the gym, after training doing extra work, coming up for clips and wanting to get himself as best prepared and in a position to improve.

“They are the people you want to work with.”

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