Aston Villa made their return to European football this season as Unai Emery's side qualified for the group stages of the Europa Conference League.
The Villans are competing in Europe after solidifying their status in the Premier League following their promotion back to the top-flight in 2019.
Former Villa boss Dean Smith deserves a lot of credit for the part he played in the club's route back to the big time as the ex-Brentford boss led the team to promotion during the 2018/19 campaign and then achieved survival in the 2019/20 season.
Emi Buendia
£33m
Ollie Watkins
£29m
Leon Bailey
£27.5m
Danny Ings
£25m
Wesley
£21.5m
The English head coach, as shown in the table above, was backed in the transfer market by NSWE throughout his time at Villa Park, as he was able to splash the cash on a number of attackers to bolster his squad at the top level.
There is one player, however, that Smith may look back on and be thankful that he did not spend big money on to bring to the club as they have since gone on to flop in England – Milot Rashica.
Were Aston Villa interested in Rashica?
Deich Stube reported, via Sport Witness, that Aston Villa were prepared to meet Werder Bremen's €25m (£21m) asking price for the Kosovo international in the summer of 2020.
The outlet, however, claimed that the player was not convinced that a move to Villa Park was the right one for his career as he wanted to play Champions League football, rather than compete in a relegation battle for Smith's side.
Rashica ended up staying with Bremen and did not complete a transfer to the Premier League that summer, with Deich Stube's report suggesting that the reason may have been down to the player's reticence to fight relegation.
Villa's interest in the exciting winger came after his impressive performances for the German side in the Bundesliga throughout the 2019/20 campaign.
He averaged a Sofascore rating of 7.08 across 28 top-flight outings and contributed with eight goals and five assists from a wide position. That came after his return of nine goals and five assists in 26 Bundesliga appearances during the 2018/19 season for Bremen.
Rashica had proven himself to be a reliable provider of goals and assists in a major European league, without playing for one of the biggest German clubs, and that left Villa and Smith willing to pay around £21m for his services.
Who signed Rashica from Bremen?
The Kosovo star stayed with the Bundesliga outfit for another season before he finally completed a move to the Premier League to join newly-promoted Norwich City in 2021.
Daniel Farke's side reportedly spent £9.4m to sign the winger after Bremen were relegated from the top-flight of German football at the end of the 2020/21 campaign.
This, immediately, showed that Villa had a lucky escape as his value plummeted by £11.6m within the space of a year, thanks to his team's relegation and his poor performances on the pitch.
Rashica scored three goals and provided one assist in 24 Bundesliga matches throughout the 2020/21 season after Villa's initial interest in him.
This led to a move to Carrow Road to join Norwich, who had just been promoted from the Championship, and his performances for the Yellows left a lot to be desired.
How many goals did Rashica score for Norwich?
Rashica went on to score two goals in 40 appearances for the Canaries in all competitions before his eventual exit from England earlier this year.
The 27-year-old whiz's crack at Premier League football did not go to plan as he faced back-to-back relegations, with Bremen and then Norwich, after seemingly turning down a move to Villa in fear of a possible relegation battle before those two seasons.
Ironically, he did end up working with Smith as the ex-Villans boss replaced Daniel Farke in November 2021, which meant that the ex-Bundesliga star endured a fight against the drop in England with the former Bees boss as his manager, one year after he turned the prospect of that exact scenario down.
Rashica played in 31 of Norwich's 38 Premier League matches as they were demoted to the Championship and failed to prove himself to be a consistent performer at the top end of the pitch at that level with one goal and two assists in total.
How much is Rashica worth now?
Besiktas swooped to sign the Kosovo international from the Canaries for a fee of €5.25m (£4.5m) during the recent summer transfer window.
This means that he is currently worth around £16.5m less than the initial £21m that Villa were prepared to spend on his signature three years ago under Smith.
His value dropped after a dismal season of Premier League football with Norwich and then a year on loan with Turkish giants Galatasaray.
Rashica scored four goals and assisted six in 26 league matches throughout the 2022/23 campaign with the Super Lig side but that was not enough to convince in any teams from a major European division to snap him up.
Norwich lost £4.9m on the £9.4m they spent to sign him from Bremen in 2021 and had a big howler with the former Vitesse star as his performances on the pitch were not good enough to keep them in the Premier League and they lost out on millions overall.
Therefore, Smith, who could not avoid Rashica with the Yellows, managed to dodge what would have been a big blunder for the Villans by failing to convince the forward to join his team in 2020.
The 27-year-old dud flopped in England and his displays for Norwich suggest that he would have struggled on the pitch for Villa if they had managed to sign him for £21m, which would have made him a terrible signing for the club.
Smith also went on to sign Bertrand Traore from Lyon to bolster his wide options for the 2020/21 campaign and the Burkina Faso international produced seven goals and seven assists in 36 league outings for the Villans.
This suggests that the club ended up with a superior option on the flanks as the ex-Chelsea man contributed to far more goals than Rashica did in his season in the top-flight with Norwich.