Mona High and Phoenix Academy central defender Donhue Mitchell is scheduled to leave the island on March 20 for a three-week trial with English Premier League outfit Aston Villa of England, the Jamaica Observer was told.

Mitchell, 19, had a great season with the Mona last year, where he netted 20 goals while helping his team to reach the semi-finals of the Manning Cup competition.

Craig Butler, founder and president of Phoenix, said he is delighted that Mitchell has been offered this opportunity to go on trial at Villa.

“I think it is a wonderful opportunity for the player and I think it is also a testament of the quality that comes out of the Phoenix Academy, and also the fact that he should have been that central defender in the Under-20 team that they excluded him,” said Butler.

“He has shown his qualities in the Manning Cup and he was the second leading goalscorer with 20 goals and for central defender, I think that is even bigger than Whisper’s [Dujuan Richards] achievements because Whisper is a striker.

“So to score 20 goals as a central defender that really takes a lot of work and so I am truly proud of him and I am truly grateful to God for providing this opportunity and for Aston Villa for actually looking at our players and taking them on,” he added.

Aston Villa, who are currently in the 11th in the English Premier League standing on 34 points, is the club of Phoenix Academy graduate and now Villa star Leon Bailey.

The outspoken Butler pointed out that Aston Villa was impressed with Mitchell’s performance after Phoenix Academy defeated their Under-19s 7-4 in a friendly match in England in 2021.

“They saw him when we played against them, when we beat their Under-19s by 7-4, which had a lot of their top players, so they realised that against quality oppositions Phoenix was still able to beat them [and] he [Mitchell] was central defender in that team,” he said.

“They also saw profiles that we had put together of his performance in the Manning Cup and from tours in other countries, so they really love the player. It is a rare find when you have a central defender that has the knock of going forward scoring goals and resilience of getting back and defending at the same time,” Butler added.

The Phoenix boss shared that Mitchell is very grateful for this opportunity and is determined to go there and to give his best.

“He is looking forward to it because all the footballers from Phoenix have developed with two things, love of country and to become a professional footballer at the highest level,” Butler said.

“With the English Premier League, you don’t get much higher than that and for him to be able to represent us at the highest level means a great deal to us and it says a lot about the academy and a lot about the players,” he continued.