Aston Villa are reportedly eyeing up a move for a tried and tested Premier League manager who might not be a big improvement on the last regime…

What’s the latest?

That’s according to journalist Ben Jacobs, who spoke to the Off The Ball podcast about the potential candidates for the Villans vacancy.

He outlined plenty of big names but cited a former Burnley boss as someone likely to be mentioned as part of that list.

Jacobs said: “Sean Dyche will be linked as well.

“It's an open race at the moment but one thing I do know is that a lot of the legwork behind formulating a short list and touting candidates had been done a week ago, which means the Villa board are not starting from now in terms of their recruitment.”

He would be worse than Gerrard

Although Dyche does boast a fine record in the Premier League, it is not at the level that Villa will feel they require.

Dean Smith fell short of the task, and the most recent casualty is Steven Gerrard.

The latter had just a 25% win ratio at Villa Park, and his subsequent sacking seemed an inevitability by the end of his tenure.

However, another factor that the fans would likely have been frustrated with was the style of play.

He flitted between a 4-3-1-2 and 4-3-3, neither of which garnered much success.

Dyche does have a set play style and formation, but the somewhat boring nature of it could see the Villa fans turn once more as they did on the 42-year-old.

Journalist Joe Krishnan, when debating with another journalist about the former Burnley manager’s links to the England job, wrote: "That sort of negative football will only get you so far. Not suitable for a side who should be dominating games."

Certainly, fans of the Midlands club will expect their side to do this, and given their current position they still have time to get a more expansive manager who could not only move them away from the relegation zone but help progress them in the seasons to come.

Dyche’s style favoured long balls to hulking strikers, yet with Danny Ings and Ollie Watkins, he has two forwards who rank in the 37th percentile and the 71st percentile of strikers in the big five European Leagues respectively for aerials won.

It would undo any work Gerrard did to create a slightly more creative philosophy, and the 51-year-old could manage to be even worse than him.