Mat Sadler: Tyreik Wright on the right path at Walsall

The Villa loanee had been an unused substitute for two games after signing for Walsall until the end of the season, until the Saddlers travelled to Port Vale.

The 19-year-old, on his first loan away from his parent club, started at Vale Park on Saturday.

After a fairly quiet first half, the winger delivered a superb cross for Elijah Adebayo’s second goal after 55 minutes and enjoyed a lively spell in the second half.

“Sometimes football’s not complicated, he wanted to run forward,” Sadler said.

“He wanted to run forward against a full-back who’s not as quick as him and not as athletic as him and we’ve got a few that when they run forward and they run forward fast, people can’t live with them.

“Factor into that Tyreik’s obvious quality, his set pieces were good and his quality with the delivery of the football, he could be a good acquisition for us so I was pleased for him.

“I spoke to a couple of people at the Villa this week and gave them the heads up that it might be today so hopefully they were watching and saw the fantastic performance the lad put in and doing things that we saw and that’s why we wanted to bring him to the club.

“Tyreik’s played under-23s football and international football for the Republic of Ireland, it’s different. The pleasing thing from Ty’s performance was in the first half when he didn’t quite have the opportunity to open his legs a little bit, when the opportunity presented itself, he took it with open arms and that’s learning on the job which is what these young lads need to do.”

Assistant manager Brian Dutton echoed Sadler’s comments, insisting Wright should be ‘proud’ of his display.

“We’re really pleased with Ty,” Dutton said.

“That’s his first game in men’s football, his first loan. It’s very difficult for first time loans to shine because they have to get accustomed to League Two football.

“I thought Ty acquitted himself fantastic. He’s done himself, his family and Aston Villa very proud.”

The win at Vale was Walsall’s first in six games, after three consecutive losses and two draws in the last week.

Sadler is now pleased with the quality throughout the squad, following the loan captures of Frank Vincent and Jayden Reid, but insists they will not get ‘carried away’ with the victory.

“We brought a bit of steel when Sinco (Stuart Sinclair) came on which is another positive sign that we have a bit of strength in depth in there,” Sadler added.

“Add to that a few injuries that we’ve got to come back whenever they come back so it was a positive win, without getting too carried away. We’ve got a free week now and things that we’d like to look at and work on to hopefully beat Mansfield next week. We watched them a couple of weeks ago and they’re a strong and positive team and their manager has got them playing so a tough game to go ahead.”