Aston Villa have the answer to Gareth Southgate's biggest issue - and here's the proof

Ezri Konsa is the man Gareth Southgate must turn to after Harry Maguire was ruled out of EURO 2024 with a calf injury.

The Manchester United centre-back would have partnered John Stones for England's opening game against Serbia on June 16 and throughout the tournament, no doubt. But while Maguire has been unable to recover in time, it's Marc Guehi who has been tipped to play alongside Stones at the heart of defence.

The 23-year-old joined Crystal Palace from Chelsea in July 2021 and made his England debut in March 2022 against Switzerland. He won his 10th cap alongside Lewis Dunk in England's 3-0 win against Bosnia-Herzegovina on Monday at St James' Park.

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Konsa was playing at right-back against Bosnia in what was his third appearance for England and impressed as he occupied three different positions in the 90 minutes. He also played on the left and in midfield.

Since making his debut against Brazil in March, Konsa has flourished. There are few harder tasks as a defender than coming into a game against Vinicius Junior and Rodrygo, but Konsa locked down the right side after Kyle Walker came off injured during the friendly at Wembley.

He then put in another accomplished performance against Belgium from right-back, before demonstrating more of his versatility on Monday night in the Euro2024 warm-up game at St James' Park, Newcastle.

“We weren’t intending to move him quite as much,” Southgate said after the 3-0 win earlier this week. “We took Lewis [Dunk] off as a precaution and the best way was to put Ezri at centre-half, which I think is his strongest position anyway.

"That’s his third cap, he’s done very well in all three. That adaptability is helpful to us. He’s playing in a team that have had an extremely good season and he’s been a big part of that. He looks very confident in an England shirt.”

No player in Europe's top five leagues recorded a higher per cent of dribblers tackled value (85.2 per cent) than Konsa last season, which in the Premier League was five per cent better than the next best, Nottingham Forest's Moussa Niakhate.

Konsa also had the best ground duel success rate (77.84 per cent) of any player to contest at least 20 ground duels across Europe's top seven leagues last term. It was a huge 30 per cent higher than Brighton's Dunk and 10 per cent more than Palace's Guehi.

The Aston Villa defender contested 40 more duels than Dunk and over 70 more than Guehi last term, while also making nearly 30 more tackles (54) than those two England teammates.

Konsa also bettered Dunk and Guehi in aerial duel success, winning over 68 per cent of the aeril duels he contested. Another underrated element of Konsa's game is his ability to draw fouls and relieve pressure having been fouled 64 times which was more than any other Premier League defender last season.

Konsa made 50 appearances across all competitions for Villa last term, playing a crucial role in Villa's impressive campaign after the club finished in the top four to qualify for Champions League football and also reached the Europa Conference League semi-final. Villa boss Emery spoke about Konsa's development earlier this year.

"When I arrived at Aston Villa and I analysed all the players, Konsa was a player who is good, sometimes not good, now I can tell him that he is better than he believes," Emery told Sky Sports. "I believe in him more than he believes in him.

"Sometimes the problem is being focused 100 per cent and being concentrated more than he was doing. He can be ambitious himself to improve, develop but through every training session practising.

"Sometimes he was being comfortable playing better, playing worse, but when we were trying to explain to him the capacity to go up, he was progressively taking it. Now, still a lot of work to do to improve and this is my challenge of him, trying to get better. He is a better player than he is playing now and he is a better player than he thinks he is.

"He is still young, but now he is taking more experiences, for example in Europe, playing in the top ten, playing in the top five. Also playing for his national team now as well.

"This step ahead is perfect, but he must have another challenge again himself and I am going to try to push him to get it. It is to lead the team, speak more, practice every day trying to improve through each practice and then play wishing more than before but thinking overall for the team and for the club to increase the club. This is the mentality."

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