Glenn Whelan is one of the eight players released this afternoon by Aston Villa.

The 35-year-old Republic of Ireland midfielder played a key role in Villa's return to the Premier League and was a regular under manager Dean Smith.

The Dubliner played 35 times in the SkyBet Championship this season, including all of their matches in a 10 game winning run, but didn't start Monday's Playoff final win over Derby County.

Whelan is part of the Ireland squad for the upcoming Euro 2020 qualifiers against Gibraltar and Denmark and manager Mick McCarthy feels he can still be a valuable player for his country.

“When I came they told me he’d retired, obviously, he hadn’t and he told me he had been retired. He was brilliant, it was an outstanding performance against Georgia and he’s been really good this season.

“Look if he keeps playing like that (he’ll keep playing). I have to say, when he trained with us, we were having a pretty good session and then we were just stretching off and he said, ‘I actually want to do a bit more’ and he went and put a bit more work in himself. I thought ‘yeah, that’s why you’ve played until 35, you train hard, look after yourself.’

“He’s in great shape so if he keeps playing like that, he can play as long as he wants.”

Mile Jedinak, Alan Hutton, Tommy Elphick, Albert Adomah, Ritchie De Laet, Mark Bunn and Micah Richards will also leave Villa Park as the club look to slash their wage bill.

Villa released a short statement after announcing the players wouldn't be offered new contracts: “We’d like to thank all of them for their contributions and wish them the best of luck for the future.”

We can this afternoon confirm the release of eight players. Thank you all, for everything. Best of luck. 💜https://t.co/2cHnkCyrdl#AVFC pic.twitter.com/9We4EHO50x

— Aston Villa (@AVFCOfficial) June 1, 2019