Nathan Delfouneso: Blackburn Rovers are perfect club to get my career back on track

The 24-year-old attacker was regarded as one of the brightest young talents in English football after breaking through into Aston Villa’s first team at the age of 17.

He became Villa’s youngest player to represent the club in Europe and was a regular for England U21s, playing alongside his new Rovers team-mates Jason Lowe, Jason Steele and Ben Marshall.

But, after leaving crisis-hit Blackpool in May, he found himself without a club.

He was delighted, then, when he received a call from Rovers boss Gary Bowyer asking him to come for what would turn out to be a successful trial.

“I was over the moon, really excited and buzzing like crazy,” remembers Delfouneso, who has put pen to paper on a one-year deal at Ewood Park.

“Funnily enough I was at my mum and dad’s house with my brother, who I’d been doing some training with, when I got the call.

“I went back into the room and said, ‘Blackburn want me to come in’, and everyone was like, ‘Blackburn, great!’

“I literally can’t wait to go now everything is rubber stamped. I’m really excited for the start of the season and to have some success and score some goals.”

Delfouneso notched nine goals in 50 appearances for Villa, including two against Rovers.

But he was unable to fulfil his early promise and he went on loan to Burnley, Leicester City, Blackpool and Coventry City.

Delfouneso is hopeful Rovers boss Gary Bowyer can get him back to his best.

He said: “You’ve seen what the manager has done with the players here.

“You look at Rudy Gestede, who was at Cardiff City, and people would say he wasn’t doing much until he came here, and now he’s just signed for a massive Premier League club, in my old club Aston Villa.

“You see the opportunities this club gives to players, and young players in particular. They believe in you and they have faith in you.

“I have everything at my disposal – training facilities, pitch, great stadium, players to work with, staff to work with. We’ve got a member of staff for every last bit of detail.

“I’ve got to use that and improve, develop and keep progressing. Hopefully I can do that and we can have some success and we will move forward together.”

But Delfouneso regretfully admits there was little chance of that happening at Blackpool, who were relegated from the Championship last season against a backdrop of chaos.

 “They’ve got really good fans there and I can understand why they are very frustrated at the minute,” said Delfouneso, who signed a permanent one-year contract with the Seasiders after his release from Villa last summer.

“I wish them all the best and I just hope they can pull themselves out because there is a good club in there. It’s going through a little bit of a rough time but I hope they can get themselves back on track. 

“It was an experience, probably an experience no player would want to go through, but you learn from it and you move on from it and Blackburn’s the present and the future.

“I know a few players have come out and said this and that about the club but I’m not going to do it because I have got feelings for the club because the club was good to me and I wouldn’t want to say a bad word about it. 

“But I think it was well documented how it was last year. There were issues, and while I would say that was football, you probably wouldn’t expect what happened last year to happen in football.”

Delfouneso has no such concerns at Rovers.

He said: “To have the opportunity to come to such a massive club like this is a real honour.

“The facilities that we’ve got here, the stadium, the fan base, the history that the club has, only a handful of teams have won the Premier League and Blackburn is one of them so it shows how big the club is.

“So I can’t wait to get started and work with the players and the staff and hopefully I can bring some joy and success for the team and the fans.”

Delfouneso is in line to make his competitive Rovers debut in tomorrow’s Championship opener at home to Wolves.

And he said:  “Wolves are a good team and it will be a very difficult game but we have got to go in there confident.

“We are looking forward to it, there’s the excitement because it is the first game of the season.

“I am delighted to be here and I can’t wait to get started on Saturday.”