After the clamour, Scott Hogan is justifying the clamour.
Since declaring to play for the Republic of Ireland last September, Hogan has been talked about as the country's great white hope. He was said to be the main man to lead the line going into the UEFA Nations League and the Euro 2020 qualification campaign but the funny thing was that, back then, he hadn't scored a league goal for Villa this season and he wouldn't do that until January.
The Salford-born striker found it difficult at first to find his feet at at the Midlands club, joining from Brentford during the winter window of 2017. Injuries and patchy form affected his progress and he only managed to muster up six starts between August and December of this season before regaining fitness at the end of the year.
Still, he was being touted as the saviour in many corners of Ireland.
Since the turn of the year though, Hogan has repaid that faith.
Suddenly, he has found some much-needed form and he has bagged five goals from give games for his club. He was recalled to the Villa starting line-up for the Stephen's Day defeat at Brentford but, since then, he hasn't looked back, starting the next six matches to deadly effect.
Scott Hogan's last six games:
- Middelsbrough 0-1 Aston Villa
- Aston Villa 5-0 Bristol City (one goal)
- Nottingham Forest 0-1 Aston Villa (one goal)
- Aston Villa 3-1 Barnsley (two goals)
- Sheffield United 0-1 Aston Villa
- Aston Villa 3-2 Burton Albion (one goal)
Six games, five goals, six wins.
With a friendly against Turkey coming up next month for the Irish, it is the perfect chance for Hogan to give O’Neill some problems about who to select in the striker position for the competitive games starting up again in September.
If you look at the age-profiles of the strikers that have been involved with the Irish squads recently, Hogan is the second youngest at 25 - just pipped to first by Preston’s Sean Maguire at 23 who are both playing at good Championship clubs. With Shane Long, who has been an important attacking threat for Ireland in the last number of years, not getting any younger at 31, maybe it’s time for O’Neill to try and blend new blood into the side, especially with a European Championship campaign on the horizon.
Hogan managed to score 15 goals last season in the Championship, that’s more than any striker who was plying their trade in either the Championship or the Premier League last season, and with him starting to find his groove again, don’t be surprised if he will achieve this feat again come the end of the season.
Hopefully he keeps up his hot streak of goalscoring form to force his way into Martin O’Neill’s plans for the upcoming friendlies and possibly the competitive games in September.
By Sam McKeever.
