{"id":463489,"date":"2011-07-18T19:59:05","date_gmt":"2011-07-18T19:59:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/07\/18\/aston-villa-complete-given-deal\/"},"modified":"2011-07-18T19:59:05","modified_gmt":"2011-07-18T19:59:05","slug":"aston-villa-complete-given-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/07\/18\/aston-villa-complete-given-deal\/","title":{"rendered":"Aston Villa complete Given deal"},"content":{"rendered":"<div readability=\"60.9615139949\">\n<div readability=\"53.8399168399\"><span><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/news.bbcimg.co.uk\/media\/images\/54120000\/jpg\/_54120418_shay_given.jpg\" width=\"226\" height=\"170\" alt=\"Shay Given playing for Manchester City\" \/> Shay Given played second fiddle to Joe Hart for Man City last season<\/span> <\/p>\n<p>Aston Villa have completed the signing of Republic of Ireland goalkeeper Shay Given from Manchester City.<\/p>\n<p>The 35-year-old has signed a five-year contract at Villa Park after the clubs agreed an undisclosed fee.<\/p>\n<p>New Villa boss Alex McLeish targeted the former Newcastle man after <a href=\"http:\/\/news.bbc.co.uk\/sport1\/hi\/football\/13639513.stm\">Brad Friedel moved to Tottenham<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Given told <a href=\"http:\/\/www.avfc.co.uk\/page\/NewsDetail\/0,,10265~2395397,00.html\">the club&#8217;s website<\/a>: &#8220;Aston Villa is a huge club and I&#8217;m really excited to be joining. It&#8217;s a new challenge and I&#8217;m eager to embrace it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Given had been on the margins at Eastlands after City manager Roberto Mancini made England international Joe Hart his first choice.<\/p>\n<div>\n<h2>Shay Given&#8217;s career<\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/news.bbc.co.uk\/sport2\/hi\/football\/14194921.stm#skip_feature_02\">Continue reading the main story<\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Republic of Ireland&#8217;s most capped player with 113 appearances<\/li>\n<li>Was on the bench for Manchester City&#8217;s FA Cup win over Stoke in May &#8211; his only honour<\/li>\n<li>Has made over 400 Premier League starts<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p>The Irish international will make his Villa debut in a friendly against Walsall on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>He is McLeish&#8217;s first signing since taking over at Villa Park and the former Birmingham manager believes Given will have a major impact at the club.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Shay has come here with something of a point to prove and that won&#8217;t do him any harm at all,&#8221; McLeish said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Everybody who has watched him perform over many years in the Premier League will know his pedigree so we believe we have secured the services of one of the best goalkeepers in the business.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Read this article:<br \/>\n<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/news.bbc.co.uk\/go\/rss\/-\/sport1\/hi\/football\/14194921.stm\" title=\"Aston Villa complete Given deal\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aston Villa complete Given deal<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> Shay Given played second fiddle to Joe Hart for Man City last season Aston Villa have completed the signing of Republic of Ireland goalkeeper Shay Given from Manchester City. The 35-year-old has signed a five-year contract at Villa Park after the clubs agreed an undisclosed fee. New Villa boss Alex McLeish targeted the former Newcastle man after Brad Friedel moved to Tottenham . <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-463489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Aston Villa complete Given deal - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/07\/18\/aston-villa-complete-given-deal\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Aston Villa complete Given deal - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Shay Given played second fiddle to Joe Hart for Man City last season Aston Villa have completed the signing of Republic of Ireland goalkeeper Shay Given from Manchester City. The 35-year-old has signed a five-year contract at Villa Park after the clubs agreed an undisclosed fee. 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