Aston Villa have been resurgent in recent weeks since Dean Smith’s arrival, and he has been naming a consistent team that have started to pick up points and put on impressive performances.

The Championship side are unbeaten in their last five matches, winning four and have moved up from the lower reaches of the second tier to just three points off an improbable playoff place with the halfway mark in the season approaching.

For every player excelling under Smith, the other end of the scale is less than exotic with players rarely featuring or able to get into the first-team deemed outcasts. 

Players whose futures are uncertain after the initial transition from one manager to another.

And they will be secretly wishing time away to make it to January where they can discuss the possibility of moving on to pastures new to play regular football.

For all glitz and the glamour that a new manager brings when things are going well, the other end of the scale is a different tale.

Players who are desperate to play are not being afforded the change to show what they can do on a matchday other than just trying to impress during inter-squad training sessions.

With that said, here are three Aston Villa players who need to find a route out of Villa Park next month.

Despite being injured, he made his first appearance of the season in the win over Birmingham but was taken off ten minutes after coming on as a substitute.

When your luck is out, it’s out, and Henri Lansbury might see that as a sign as it being time to depart Villa Park in favour of a new challenge in new surroundings to re-ignite his career that has taken somewhat of a nosedive in recent times.

Aston Villa were in desperate need of defensive cover and with that, they loaned out Tommy Elphick to the side who they beat on the opening day and whom the defender scored against, too.

Hull City have been aided by Elphick’s arrival as he has performed well consistently despite their relegation fears.

When a team needs defenders and you are shipped out too, you know your luck is out, and there is no way back to the first-team.

Next month the 31-year-old should cut his ties entirely and leave Villa Park for good.

The Steve Bruce defensive experiment looks to have been the nail in the coffin of his Aston Villa career.

Mile Jedinak had been involved a fair amount under Bruce but since the arrival of Dean Smith, playing time has been near enough non-existent.

That should be all the motivation he needs to look for an escape route out of Villa Park to prolong his career and play as much as he can for as long as he can.