Player #874 for Aston Villa, Scott Andrew Sinclair played as a winger for the club in Villa’s 2014-15 and 2015-16 Premier League campaigns, with the latter ending in Villa’s first relegation from the top tier in nearly 30 years. Sinclair made 45 appearances and scored nine goals.

Sinclair was born in Bath on 26 March 1989 and was signed under Paul Lambert in January 2015 on loan for the remainder of the season from Manchester City.

Try before you buy is normally a sure-fire way to ensure you don’t make expensive mistakes, but Villa of the period just didn’t heed or understand the warning signs and were seduced by a couple of good performances into making Sinclair’s loan move permanent for €3.50m ahead of a disastrous 2015-16 season.

Sinclair’s Villa career started inauspiciously, making two substitute appearances and one start under Lambert before the latter was sacked with Villa losing all three games by an aggregate of nine goals to one.

Sinclair scored his first goal for Villa under the caretaker management team of Scott Marshall and Andy Marshall, hitting an 89’ winner in the FA Cup 5th Round tie with Leicester City.

Under Lambert’s successor, Tim Sherwood, Sinclair was handed five starts in six games, scoring once again before succumbing to injury.

On his return from injury, Sinclair made three substitute appearances in the final seven games of the season before sitting out the 2015 FA Cup Final on the substitutes’ bench.

Sinclair hadn’t contributed a single assist in 2014-15 and had scored just one Premier League goal, with most observers expecting his underwhelming short-term loan to be the end of his time with Villa.

His permanent transfer, therefore, came as a real surprise.

Sinclair’s acquisition for €3.50m was one of a series of controversial signings undertaken ostensibly under the leadership of Tim Sherwood but in truth driven by the sheer idiocy of Sporting Director Hendrik Almstadt and Director of Scouting and Recruitment Paddy Riley. Two names that would be painted into Villa folklore for their footballing illiteracy and ultimate responsibility for Villa’s first relegation in three decades.

Indeed, his permanent transfer was one of several sub-standard Villa signings that marred the club throughout the 2015-16 campaign and contributed to Villa’s first relegation in nearly 30 years. Players such as Sinclair, as well as Jordan Ayew, Jordan Veretout, Adama Traoré, Rudy Gestede, Joleon Lescott and José Ángel Crespo were brought to the club despite being nowhere near the standard required for a top-flight player either on or off the pitch.

Sherwood, despite having restricted Sinclair to the bench towards the end of his loan in 2014-15, named Sinclair in eleven squads, handing him nine starts.

Again, Sinclair failed to make a single assist but did score a brace in the home draw with Sunderland and a hat-trick in the League Cup against the Football League’s basement club and soon-to-be non-League Notts County.

That, in reality, though, was small beer, and for most observers it was clear that Sinclair was simply not good enough for the Premier League.

With Sherwood sacked, his successor Rémi Garde retained Sinclair and named him in every one of his twenty-three squads, but yet again, Sinclair failed to contribute a single assist or score.

Caretaker Eric Black was the latest to try and get something out of Sinclair, but despite handing him five starts in Villa’s final six Premier League games, Sinclair again drew a blank.

Indeed, across 36 League games, Sinclair scored three goals and did not create a single assist for his teammates.

Sinclair made his final appearance for Villa on Sunday, 15 May 2016, in the 0-4 defeat at Arsenal, aged 27, with Villa already long since relegated.

Villa would, however, pull off a masterstroke at the last, selling Sinclair for €4.10m to Celtic 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 in August 2015.

Sinclair had played under Paul Lambert, Tim Sherwood and Eric Black.