James Milner: A Rising Star For Aston Villa and England

He is Aston Villa's record signing at £12 million and he is also the England U-21's most capped player, having earned 46 caps for his country.

But if you look at the performance of 23-year-old winger James Milner, it's hard to think that those are his only major achievements to date.

Aston Villa and England may already have quality wingers in the shape of Ashley Young and Stewart Downing, but so far this season there has been only one standout performer down the flanks for England and the Villans.

It appears that at the start of the 2009-2010 season, James Milner has really come of age.

He has been crucial in Aston Villa's flying start to the season, with the young but seasoned professional scoring the occasional goal and, more importantly, getting a number of vital assists.

While Young has found varying levels of success on one side of the pitch for Aston Villa this season, on the other Milner's fantastic ability to create goalscoring opportunities has been vital to the goal tallies of strikers Gabriel Agbonlahor, John Carew and Emile Heskey.

And this ability to create such good scoring chances for the strikers stems largely from Milner's improved crosses this season.

Much was made in the past about Milner's ability to put in a decent cross, with many journalists and commentators putting that down as the reason why Milner had been unable to break into the England senior team and was stuck in the U-21s.

But as was proved only yesterday with Heskey's equalising header at 86 minutes in Villa's 1-1 draw at Burnley, Milner's crossing ability has improved greatly, with the winger consistently providing dangerous, swerving and incredibly accurate balls into the penalty area.

Milner has not only established himself as a definite first-team regular at Aston Villa (an achievement in itself), but has also finally forced his way into the England senior team, having impressed the notoriously hard-to-please Fabio Capello (with Michael Owen providing evidence of that).

Having made an incredible 46 caps for the England U-21s, history was not on Milner's side to make a smooth transition onto the senior team. Historically, players with several U-21 appearances usually don't progress into full internationals.

However, the ability to effortlessly take the ball past defenders and make very accurate passes and crosses has made Milner something of a regular now on the England senior squad.

The ex-Newcastle United winger has made six appearances on Capello's team and already has assists to his name despite only receiving limited playing time in all six matches.

If James Milner can keep his form going for Aston Villa and England, then not only will he continue to force out either Stewart Downing or Ashley Young from the Villa starting 11, he will be a no-brainer when it comes to squad selection time for the 2010 World Cup.