‘Crucial’ Newcastle United £30m man opens up on Aston Villa transfer interest

Newcastle United star Callum Wilson has admitted he almost put pen to paper on a move to Aston Villa before joining the Magpies in 2020, and even came close to regretting the decision not to return to the Midlands.

The England international came to the Magpies at a time when the side was fighting for Premier League survival under Steve Bruce management and Mike Ashley ownership. The North East club forked out a fee of £30 million for the talisman's services from Bournemouth, who had just been relegated to the Championship under Eddie Howe.

Since then, Wilson has cemented himself as a mainstay in the first team and always kept an impressive goalscoring record despite a series of injuries. The 31-year-old has 67 goals in 187 appearances in black-and-white.

However, it was almost a completely different story as Wilson had been weighing up a move to Villa Park at the same time as one to St James' Park. The star explained his thought process on this week's BBC Sounds' Footballer's Football Podcast.

He said: "For me, I had a decision to make. There was Aston Villa and Newcastle - Newcastle has great history and the number nine shirt, playing as a striker, I know how much they are worshipped up here. That was something that appealed to me.

"There were times when you've joined a club, you write down your pros and your cons and you stick by them. I joined Newcastle when we were in a relegation battle playing not-so-attractive football. Aston Villa was the other club that was interested at the time, they'd just been taken over and they were starting to fly.

"Things were starting to go well. We played against them and we lost. Everyone was saying that could've been you."

That match Wilson alluded to came in January 2021 at Villa Park when the hosts claimed a 2-0 victory. Wilson completed the full 90 minutes in a side that also featured Andy Carroll, Jamal Lewis and Jeff Hendrick. Ollie Watkins opened the goalscoring for Villa that day, a player the club signed just two days after Wilson turned them down in favour of the Magpies.

The striker added: "I made the decision at that moment based on the facts in front of me and what I felt. I knew to stick to my core decisions and that's what I did and, ultimately, football is a crazy sport, we end up getting taken over and I end up playing in the Champions League and we play Villa and beat them 5-1."