Aston Villa boss Unai Emery has backed Ollie Watkins to regain his place in the England squad after he scored in the 2-0 win over West Ham.
Watkins, who has been off colour this season, saw his World Cup dreams suffer a big blow on Friday when he was left out of Thomas Tuchel’s squad for this month’s friendlies with Uruguay and Japan.
But his second-half goal, which came after John McGinn opened the scoring, provided the perfect response on the eve of the international break.
“He’s a fighter. Three years ago, he was not involved in the national team, and he deserved to be there,” Emery said.
“Now again, he’s out, but he must recover his fight, like he did today, always doing his task.
“And when he’s doing his task, his numbers are coming like today.
“Today he fights with the centre-back, he was winning duels, he was holding up the ball and getting in the box and threatening them.
“He scored and he did a fantastic match.”
Watkins admits he expected to be dropped from Tuchel’s group after a disappointing run of form.
He said on Sky Sports: “Everyone wants to play for their country but I expected that because my form has not been that great.
“I know what I can do and when I put on an England shirt I feel like I have always performed well.”
After a run of one win in six Premier League games, this was a welcome return to form for Villa, who are now six points clear of sixth-placed Chelsea.
“We are delighted with how the players responded on the field,” Emery added. “When you are not wining everything looks more difficult and of course we needed to recover our way.
“Today we did it, the players were fantastic. When we were winning a lot of games in a row we played similarly to how we did today.”
West Ham boss Nuno Espirito Santo says he “expected much more” from his side as their Premier League survival hopes suffered a blow.
The Hammers had resuscitated their season in recent weeks, suffering just two defeats in their last nine games, but they flatlined at Villa Park.
Despite the defeat, they remain in touching distance of safety following Nottingham Forest’s crunch win at relegation rivals Tottenham, with all three sides – and Leeds – locked in a high-stakes battle.
“It was not a good performance,” Nuno said. “Not a good performance in the first half. We were never comfortable in the game, we lost duels, we arrived late to the press. We didn’t break them. We had possession, but side to side, not to break them.
“We slightly improved in the second half. There was a spell in the beginning of second half that we had half-chances but it was not enough to change the dynamic of the game.
“We lost a game against a good team, team that was better than us. So it’s a time to reflect and react. We expected much more from ourselves. Today was not good enough.”
