Aston Villa has cut short Jamaican Reggae Boy Leon Bailey’s stint at Roma and ordered him back to England as they fight for the Premier League title.

Aston Villa are currently sitting in third place on 43 points, level with second-placed Manchester City and seven points behind leaders Arsenal.

Bailey made the loan move to Italian club Roma in August, but that has not gone well in what turned out to be an injury-plagued season for him.

The 28-year-old Bailey was only able to make 11 appearances for Roma in five months, and Aston Villa’s coach Unai Emery believes Bailey will be more useful to him in the Premier League.

Bailey had scored 24 goals for Aston Villa but had fallen out of favour and was relegated to the bench. A move to Roma was expected to give him more playing time, but he got injured on the very first day of training at Roma.

Bailey has a reported 24 goals from 144 games with Aston Villa, and with the club challenging for the Premier League title, sitting third on 43 points, just seven behind leaders Arsenal, coach Unai Emery is expected to increase his attacking options.

Bailey was signed by Aston Villa in 2021 for $28m from German club Bayer Leverkusen, where he scored 28 goals in 119 games.

He arrived in Europe at age 13 as part of Craig Butler’s Phoenix Academy and was snapped up by Belgian club Genk in 2015, where he was named Young Player of the Year. Two years later, he was signed by Leverkusen for approximately $18m in 2017.

He has represented Jamaica 39 times, scoring seven goals and could be back in action as the Reggae Boyz push for a World Cup spot via the FIFA Confederation Playoffs in March.