"When he picked the ball up and was brushing people away, it was like watching Jonah Lomu in his prime..."
Sky Sports' Jamie Redknapp
"He is now ready to play in the England first team."
Unai Emery, Aston Villa manager
"He was different to the players in the Man City academy system."
Brian Barry-Murphy, former Man City Elite Development Squad manager
Words and Interviews by Sam Blitz | Top image by Ben Scott
A previous version of this article was published in October 2024, which can be read here.
Exactly a year ago this week, Morgan Rogers made a short cameo off the bench as Middlesbrough were beaten at Bristol City.
Fast forward 12 months, the forward has now had one of the weeks of his life. an England debut in a brilliant win away at Greece, followed by a new contract at Aston Villa.
It is capping off a brilliant 2024 for the 22-year-old, who has started every single Premier League and Champions League game for Unai Emery's Villa this season. And looking at his style of play, you can see why.
His sheer strength and drive in terms of running ability has gained plenty of plaudits this season. The Villa forward ranks highly among Premier League players when it comes to carrying the ball great distances, taking Emery’s Villa higher up the pitch and into more dangerous areas.
When Rogers put in an impressive display against Arsenal in the second game of this season, footage showed the normally defensively resolute Thomas Partey and Declan Rice falling at the feet of the Villa forward. “The way he was brushing people away, it was like watching Jonah Lomu,” said Jamie Redknapp that day.
These skills are nothing new to those who have followed Rogers’ career for years.
“He’s always been an attacking midfield player who is 6ft 2in, is really quick, highly skilful and his technique is of the highest quality. He’s always set himself apart with those characteristics,” says Brian Barry-Murphy, Rogers’ former academy coach at Manchester City.
“He’s definitely different because he can get the ball and run really quickly, directly and carry the ball big distances.
“Morgan has the ability to receive, turn and run with the ball and really affect opponents. How he moves is really efficient and his size is under-estimated.
“He’s always been big for his age, but now among senior professionals he looks big. That ability to create and score goals with those attributes was always a standout.”
But it has not been plain sailing for Rogers and he has not always stood out. This is the story of a player who has suffered setbacks down the divisions of English football and has since bounced back to the top of the game.
For Villa and now for England, Morgan Rogers is Next Up…
When a four-year-old tore bigger boys to shreds
The irony of Rogers’ career is the now-Villa star’s career began at the hands of a former player and boyhood fan of Birmingham City.
A four-year-old Rogers was taken along to a local Midlands football session in the town of Halesowen ran by Paul Tait, who played 140 league games for the Blues. during his own playing career. Around 150 kids attended the session, but the toddler stood out.
“As soon as I saw him, you just know that this particular child has just got something different,” Tait tells Sky Sports.
“He was just different from the rest, a fantastic little player, way beyond his years from a very, very young age.
“He was playing in his own age group to start with, but it was ridiculous, he was getting nothing from it. We would play small-sided games to get the kids to score goals – and you just couldn’t get the ball off him.
“I started to move him up to play against the bigger children above his years – so when he was five or six, I was playing him against ten-or 11-year-olds. It sounds like a dumb thing, but I wanted to see how he’d get on. And he tore them to shreds.”
When Rogers was aged eight, he was ready for academy football. The only question was which Midlands club he would end up at. With Tait incredibly loyal to Birmingham – he now works for the club’s academy as a Player Development Mentor – Rogers could have been set for the blue half of the city.
But the Rogers family are all die-hard West Brom fans. Tait knows the power of playing for his boyhood club, so despite his own loyalties, he would not take that away from a talented child.
“I could have offered him to Birmingham, but I played my hometown club, the team I supported,” adds Tait. “What better opportunity for Morgan and his family for him to play for West Brom? I like things like that.
“I offered him to West Brom, they had one look at him and couldn’t believe how good he was. They were going: ‘Oh my God, how do we stop him going to Villa?’ They seem to snap up everyone in this area.’
“But he stuck with it, he stuck with the belief that West Brom would be best for his development in his early future in football.”
Life at Man City
Rogers rose through the ranks at West Brom, eventually making his professional debut for the club in a FA Cup fifth round replay against Brighton in February 2019 – while he was still at school. “He excelled in that game,” remembers Tait.
But it was during the Baggies’ run to the FA Youth Cup semi-finals in the same year that got Rogers his next big break. The forward appeared in the last four clash away at Manchester City, who were so impressed they signed the forward in the following summer transfer window.
“I didn’t want him to go to Man City. I thought he should have stayed at West Brom and learnt his trade a bit,” adds Tait.
“When you join a club the size of Man City, or Man Utd and Liverpool, players can get swallowed up when there are so many other fantastic players already. And then what is the pathway for the youngsters at these clubs? Is there even a pathway?”
Well, that pathway looked like two years in the City academy teams before undergoing a ‘loan map’ in the EFL. His first move was a very successful one in League with Lincoln City, where he worked under Michael Appleton. From the first minute, he showed no fear.
"We were not the biggest team and I remember there were a couple of games where we were thinking about the opposition and who to pick up,” Appleton tells Sky Sports.
“And he just said, 'Put me on their biggest player. I will do the job.' He genuinely meant it. He had so much belief."
Rogers played as a winger or No 10, with Brennan Johnson, on loan from Nottingham Forest at the time, on the other wing. Word got round in the third tier about Lincoln’s dynamic duo that were firing the club towards the top of the table.
When Barry-Murphy took his Rochdale team to Lincoln in March 2021, he had to come up with a plan to keep Rogers and Johnson.
“The two of them in League One were causing a lot of problems because of how direct and skilful they were in wide areas,” Barry-Murphy tells Sky Sports. “It wouldn’t have been the norm to come up against two young talents of that calibre.
“Essentially, our strategy on the day – and I remember it well – was to take them back towards their own goal as much as possible because every game that we had watched, they showed they were pretty lethal even at that age.”
It almost worked. Rochdale managed to beat Lincoln that day 2-1 – but only after Rogers levelled the game at 1-1 in the second half, beating three players by driving at the Dale penalty area before rifling a shot into the top corner.
It was one of six goals Rogers scored for the League One outfit that season, firing Lincoln to the play-off final in the process. But he and Lincoln ended up losing to Blackpool at Wembley – and that disappointment would be the start of a couple of challenging years on the pitch.
Loneliness on loan
His next loan move was to Championship title contenders Bournemouth under Scott Parker for the 2021-22 season, but he struggled for minutes in the next chapter of his development.
In a recent interview, Rogers admitted to experiencing loneliness – which is unlike him as coaches describe him as an “outgoing character” while at the south coast club and his season-long loan move was cut short half way through.
By the time he came back, Barry-Murphy had moved from Rochdale to City to become the club’s Elite Development Squad manager, also known as the Premier League champions’ ‘B team’.
“When Morgan went to Bournemouth, it was presumed he would be playing for a Championship side under Scott Parker going for promotion, but he played a very small amount of games,” Barry-Murphy explains.
“All of a sudden when you’re not playing and not making squads, and you’re expected to be one of the best players there based on your outside support system, that can make it very different for a player to navigate.
“There was a player there who had a setback and was always working hard in his game to make him feel prepared for his next loan move."
Rogers spent the rest of 2022 back at the City academy – and his time there nearly got him a look-in at Pep Guardiola’s first team.
With City playing a mid-season friendly against Girona during the 2022 World Cup break, thereby missing a lot of their top stars, Rogers was named in a strong starting frontline alongside Erling Haaland, Kevin de Bruyne and Riyad Mahrez.
When City’s World Cup stars returned to the first-team, the door was slammed back shut for Rogers. He then had another go at the Championship with Blackpool on loan to reunite with Appleton, who was sacked two weeks after the forward’s loan move was completed.
It was clear a fresh start was needed. “He was really clear and convinced in his mind that he would have to go elsewhere and was really determined in what he did – and he made it elsewhere because of that,” says Barry-Murphy.
Finding his feet at Villa - and what's next?
Rogers eventually left City to join Middlesbrough just over a year ago and six months into his spell in the North East, he was impressing enough to earn a move to Villa, where he has since shone.
“The projected of career path for all these players is different,” says Barry-Murphy. “Anybody who says to you now that they would have seen Morgan doing what he’s doing, it’s hard to believe it.
“I always thought he would do really well, but he really struggled at Bournemouth, really struggled at Blackpool and at Middlesbrough he did ok.
“But there was always this feeling of: ‘he’s a lot better than what he’s showing’. Now you’re actually seeing that potential, so it shows you have to be patient.”
What is impressive about Rogers is how he has the physicality of a winger – but is impressing for Villa in an attacking midfield role, just behind clinical striker Ollie Watkins. It would have been easy to play Rogers as a winger, but those who have coached him before have spotted how effective he can be in central areas.
“He actually likes the contact,” says Appleton. “He enjoys people being really tight to him and he can then use his physical frame to roll them on the inside or the outside.
“Because I knew Morgan liked contact, I knew I could play him inside as a 10.”
With an in-form Rogers now settled in a Villa team and set for an international bow this month, where can the 22-year-old improve his game?
“I believe he has this unique ability to arrive into the final situation more than any other player based on what he could do physically – but I felt his finishing was inconsistent, like any young player,” says Barry-Murphy.
“He can score some amazing goals and be spectacular, but consistency in those finishing actions isn’t at the same level as his build-up work.
“And I hope and imagine the same things now will be in his mind: that he’s creating all these assists for other players and he’s arriving in situations where he can score goals, but working on that finishing action will start to add another dimension in his game.”
With three goals and two assists in his last seven Premier League games, finding that consistency is Rogers’ next aim – and now he has an international stage to boost his confidence in front of goal.
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