‘How it got out’ – Aston Villa’s John McGinn opens up about spat with Sean Dyche

John McGinn has opened up about his light-hearted exchange with former Burnley manager Sean Dyche.

The pair memorably clashed as Villa fell to a disappointing defeat at Turf Moor in January 2021. Dyche was claimed to have told McGinn: “So you’ve been in the Premier League for one season and you think you’re proper big time, telling me to ‘shut up?’.

With the Villa midfielder said to have replied: “You’ve been in the Premier League for six seasons and you’re still wearing the same **** coat, you big *****!”. However, the 27-year-old insists that the humorous back-and-forth was brushed aside by both men – but McGinn did apologise to one Premier League boss.

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“I argue with everybody. I just get angry sometimes,” McGinn told Sky Sports . “I feel quite bad, I need to apologise to Scott Parker. I shouted at him one time and he looks like a good guy and a good manager so sorry Scott.”

Though the Scotland international admitted he felt uneasy about how his conversation with Dyche was portrayed at the time. “The Sean Dyche one – there’s parts of it that are true but I don’t know how it got out,” he said. “It was just an argument in football.

“It was (true) but it’s not fair because he got a good comment in before, so it was one each. That was fine.

“I don’t think it was fair to portray it as one-sided as it was. I don’t know who it was in the media but next time I saw him we just laughed it off and that was it. It was one of my better comments, it was quite quick, but to be fair he’s quite quick as well.”

Recalling an earlier question in the interview, McGinn joked: “Speaking about fights, I wouldn’t like to mess with him!” But the then-Burnley boss appeared to take the conversation in the right spirit, even suggesting he would prefer if more players took McGinn’s approach to the game.

When asked about the situation in February 2021, Dyche was seemingly baffled by the press coverage that their exchange received: “It was just a bit of light-hearted fun in a serious moment,” he said . “But I’ve got no problem with that. It would actually be quite pleasant if there’s more of that.”

Dyche added: “And by the way, if he did allegedly say that – I’m not going to say whether he did or didn’t – it’s a very nice coat I’ll have him know! And I haven’t had it for six years, I’ve had it for about two.”

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