Player #871 for Aston Villa, Thomas William Cleverley known as Tom Cleverley played as a midfielder for the club in Villa’s 2014-15 Premier League season and run to the 2015 FA Cup Final making 38 appearances and scoring 3 goals.

Tom was born in Basingstoke on 12 August 1989.

Paul Lambert signed Tom from Manchester United on loan in September 2014 until the end of the 2014-15 season and he proved to be one of the better signings under Lambert’s three season reign in an admittedly uncrowded field.

Cleverley made his debut in Villa’s 1-0 win at Liverpool on Saturday, 13 September 2014 as to the surprise of many Lambert’s team made the best start to a campaign since John Gregory’s in 1998-99. The addition of Cleverley was very much seen as the point at which two season of pain under Lambert’s stewardship would unexpectedly come good.

That however was a false dawn with Lambert losing the next six games on an aggregate score of 1-15.

Cleverley was an ever present under Lambert until ironically he was relegation to the bench and an unused substitute in the 0-2 defeat to Hull City on Tuesday, 10 February 2015 which proved to be Lambert’s last game in charge of Villa after a torrid two and half year spell.

Lambert’s replacement Tim Sherwood immediately recalled Cleverley to the starting line up and the midfielder was revitalised with a more attacking, free for all, confidence boosting philosophy that Sherwood brought to the club.

Under Sherwood, Villa and Cleverley qualified for the FA Cup Final and staved off almost certain relegation under Lambert with Cleverley scoring in three consecutive games from Saturday, 25 April 2015 to Saturday, 9 May 2015.

Cleverley made his final appearance for Villa on Saturday, 30 May 2015 in the FA Cup Final at Wembley aged 25 before returning to Manchester United in May 2015.

Cleverley had played under Paul Lambert and Tim Sherwood.