On January 31st, Jhon Durán left Aston Villa and completed a permanent transfer to Al-Nassr.
Aston Villa director Monchi has stated it was difficult for the Villans to refuse the offer as the overall fee could rise close to €85m.
The 21-year-old has been subjected to criticism for leaving Aston Villa for the Middle East at an early stage of his career.
Durán’s former manager, Alberto Suárez, has come out to defend him and sent a message to his critics. The 63-year-old coach managed the Colombia international for a short spell at Envigado FC.
Suárez spoke to journalist Mariano Olsen, who took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to share the manager’s comments.
He arrived at Envigado in May 2021 and managed Durán until he left them for Chicago Fire in January 2022. The frontman managed six goals and three assists from 13 games under Suárez’s orders. The latter was at Envigado until July 2023.
“It is stupid to criticise Jhon Durán, nobody gives up €100m. I don’t think that in his first days of training in Envigado they talked to him about glory, they talked to him about money. For young people, glory is solving their economic problem,” he said.
Durán arrived at Villa Park from Chicago Fire in January 2023 and was mainly used as a substitute by Unai Emery at Aston Villa.
He clocked in 2,272 minutes from 70 matches for the Premier League club, managing 20 goals in the process, of which 12 were from this season.
The South American made his debut for his new club in their 4-0 win over Al-Wasl on Monday.