After Aston Villa's play-off final heartbreak against Fulham at Wembley at the end of last season, hopes were high that the club could go one step further this time around. 

Manager Steve Bruce was given the backing of the club's new owners in the summer and he set about adding to his squad in a way that would see them push for promotion.

John McGinn, Anwar El Ghazi, Axel Tuanzebe, Yannick Bolasie and Tammy Abraham were amongst the personnel to arrive at Villa Park and confidence was beginning to build among the fans.

But with Sam Johnstone opting to join local rivals West Brom, Bruce needed to bring in a first choice shot-stopper.

Here for FLW Rewind where we take a look back at when Bruce opted to splash £2.7million on a relatively unknown Norwegian shot-stopper called Orjan Nyland, bringing him over from Ingolstadt in the second tier of German football.

Many fans were happy with the acquisition as well, not trusting their young Atletico Madrid loanee Andre Moreira to be up to the task yet:

But it is fair to say that Nyland has had an incredibly rocky start to his time at Aston Villa.

The shot-stopper has been personally liable for many goals already and was dropped for what was Steve Bruce's final game in charge against Preston.

The defence in front has done him absolutely no favours either with the frequented partnership of James Chester and midfielder Mile Jedinak used at the heart of the defence.

But there have been many occasions when Nyland has been poor himself, proving to be weak at dealing with crosses and flimsy when making basic saves.

With Bruce now sacked it remains to be seen what the future holds for him at the club.