Aston Villa may be closing in on some midfield reinforcements, as the club are reportedly advancing in talks to sign free agent Leon Goretzka.
The 31-year-old, who has been without a club since leaving Bayern Munich at the end of last season, has a wealth of experience with 312 appearances for the Bundesliga giant, as well as 73 caps for the German national team.
Villa have been looking for midfield cover for Amadou Onana, who tore his ACL on World Cup duty with Belgium and is expected to miss most of the 2026/27 season.
They also lost Youri Tielemans this summer, replacing him with João Gomes, who picked up a short-term injury of his own in the Super Cup defeat to PSG.
They had been pursuing a loan deal to sign João Palhinha from Bayern, but he is now set to join Benfica on a permanent deal, which Villa were not willing to do.
Now they have pivoted to Goretzka, and according to Matteo Moretto, who first had the news of Villa’s interest, the deal is “very close”, with the midfielder expected to give the green light shortly.
Goretzka started 25 league games for Bayern last season as he helped them to yet another Bundesliga title. WhoScored ranked him as the league’s 8th best central midfielder among players who played at least half the games, indicating he still has something left in the tank.
Although he is an imposing midfielder like Palhinha at 6’2”, Goretzka is a different profile of player and specifically is a more accomplished passer.
His 91.4% pass accuracy ranked in the 93rd percentile within the Bundesliga last season, while Palhinha’s 82% accuracy ranked in just the 18th percentile in the Premier League.
Goretzka’s long ball accuracy of 68.5% and expected assists of 0.18 per 90 minutes dwarf Palhinha’s numbers of 41% and 0.03 respectively, and his dribble success rate of 78.6% is far better than Palhinha’s 43.5% mark.
The trade off is that Goretzka is far less effective when it comes to winning duels in midfield, coming out on top in just 48.8% compared to 61.7% for Palhinha.
For what Villa need though, Goretzka may be a better fit. While Gomes (50.4% duel win rate) and Boubacar Kamara (56.9%) are not as dominant as Onana (63.9% duel win rate), they are good enough.
What Villa looked less likely to replace was Tielemans’ ability to progress the ball and create chances, as that is not Gomes’ forte. Goretzka could fill that void and also bring a wealth of experience at the highest level as Villa get ready for a Champions League campaign.
On the flipside, there is probably a reason he is still unsigned with less than two weeks left of the transfer window. Perhaps he is being selective, but if he had an attractive offer, he would have taken it before now.
Still, Villa have had success with aging free agents before, as Victor Lindelöf became a valuable role player at both centre-back and in midfield – where he started the Europa League final – after signing on deadline last year.
With Onana only needing to be replaced for this season, Goretzka seems like a logical solution to Villa’s short-term midfield depth issue.
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