'Unsmiling' Alejandro Garnacho is turning out to be a problem - ex-Aston Villa employee

Something is going on behind closed doors at Aston Villa in the case of Alejandro Garnacho.

That is according to former senior Villa scout, Bryan King, speaking exclusively to Football Insider.

The 22-year-old joined the Villans from Chelsea in the summer, signing on loan with a conditional obligation to buy worth around £42million.

But after a slow start, Garnacho has not managed to get off the bench for a single minute in any of Villa's last four games across all competitions.

There has already been discussion over the possibility of the loan being cancelled in January, although both sides would have to agree to it.

Villa loaned Harvey Elliott from Liverpool in a similar deal last summer, but he would make just nine appearances across all competitions and ultimately return to Anfield.

'I wouldn't have signed Alejandro Garnacho'

It seemed an odd decision to sign Garnacho in the first place for Villa, after he had failed to impress at all in his single year at Stamford Bridge.

The winger looked set to replace Morgan Rogers, who had gone the other way in a £117m deal, but the likes of Johan Manzambi and academy player George Hemmings have already jumped him in the pecking order.

"I wouldn't have signed him. I would not have brought him to the football club," King told Football Insider. "You've only got to see what his attitude was like at Man United and see what it was like at Chelsea.

"He starts off with a bang, although at Villa he hasn't even started off with a bang yet. Harvey Elliott was a little bit of a different situation - that's another player I didn't fancy for Villa. And I certainly don't fancy Garnacho as a Villa player.

"When a side's been playing as indifferent as what Villa have been playing and he still hasn't got in the team, then there's obviously something going on behind the scenes as far as I'm concerned.

"There was all smiles and handshakes when he signed, but it doesn't look as though there's all smiles and handshakes at the moment."

Garnacho's attitude a 'disgrace'

Garnacho's former teammates made their feelings clear when Luke Shaw posted a picture of himself pushing the Argentine down after Man United beat Chelsea, with Joshua Zirkzee and Bruno Fernandes laughing.

"The best thing for me that Manchester United did was sell him because, forget his ability, I don't think he's that great anyway," Nicky Butt told The Good, The Bad and The Football podcast earlier this year.

"However, his attitude for me was a disgrace when he was at United. That's why that happens when people post things like that. If you are in a changing room and you leave and completely disrespect your teammates and football club.

"He'd have been taken out every single day in training. He'd have been put in his place very quickly with the likes of the players we got brought up with. Swatted down, taken out.

"He would've been treated really badly if he behaved like that, but he'd have learnt from it and got better."