Aston Villa manager Paul Lambert has claimed that no club has shown an interest in striker Darren Bent and that the pair have not had a falling out.

Bent has been left out of the past few Villa starting line ups and his future has been widely speculated this week with the January transfer window around the corner.

After a big money move from Sunderland in 2011, Bent has failed to really set Villa Park alight and Lambert has favoured youngster Andreas Weimann and new signing Christian Benteke to lead the line with Gabby Agbonlahor also in front of Bent in the pecking order.

A player of Bent’s goalscoring record may attract plenty of attention if he becomes available in the transfer window and while Lambert claims that he has not had an argument with the player, it is clear that the England striker is not in his plans at the moment.

"Darren was on the bench last week. We've not had a cross word at all," Lambert told Sky Sports.

"Has there been any interest in Bent? None.

"Are you adamant you want to sell? Listen. My job is to pick a group of lads I think will win the game and that's my main focus, not any other deviation of anything else."