Aston Villa player’s father-in-law plays role in late deal that ‘wasn’t that easy’

On Saturday, Belgian club Anderlecht broke the news that they signed Leander Dendoncker from Aston Villa on a loan deal with the option to buy.

Het Belang van Limburg provides an insight into how the loan deal was made. The Villa defender/ midfielder was of interest to a few different clubs across Europe including, Las Palmas, Everton and an unnamed German club.

Everton did not end up going through with the deal because they decided to go for a younger player. The German club could not make progress on the deal therefore leaving Las Palmas and Anderlecht as the two main options.

The current joint leaders of the Belgium top flight had the advantage as Dendoncker had a previous spell with the club making 171 appearances.

It is claimed that Anderlecht chairman Wouter Vandenhaute called David Steegen to sign the Belgian international. Steegen is Belgian’s former press secretary but is now Dendoncker’s father-in-law.

Steegen got in touch with his daughter Anna, who informed him of the Jupiler Pro side’s interest and Steegen was in favour of this move to Belgium because his grandson Matteo can live in Brussels.

Despite it seeming like a straight forward deal to complete “it wasn’t that easy” for Dendoncker to complete the deal. He had to take a pay cut and the Midlands giants agreed for an affordable loan deal. They also included an option to buy for €7m that can be paid in instalments.

Dendoncker played 36 games for Aston Villa scoring just the one goal and clocking in zero assists. He will hope to make an impact for the Belgium side on his loan spell.

Aston Villa have had a busy summer transfer window as they are competing in the Champions League this season and need as much squad depth as possible.

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Aston Villa manager Unai Emery spoke to the press about their summer signings, “Yes very happy [with transfer business].

“We did the things we were planning at the beginning.

“The squad we have now with some very important player like Mings, Cameron, Emi Buendia, they are coming back progressively.

“They are getting better and feeling better.

“The players we have added this year into the squad I am very happy.”

Aston Villa have had a good start to the season winning two games from three and are sat in joint sixth place on six points. They will now look to their game against Everton on Saturday night football after the international break.