Fearless Aston Villa will attack Unai Emery’s Champions League ‘dream’

Few managers – if any – in world football could have replicated the job Unai Emery has performed at Aston Villa over the past 21 months.

He returned to the Premier League in November 2022 with a point to prove and he has done just that, averaging nearly two points per game in the 63 league matches he has taken charge of at Villa. Emery’s win ratio of 54 per cent is the highest of any manager in Villa’s history.

Winning 15 of 25 league matches in 2022/23 propelled the club back into Europe and laid the foundations to then qualify for Champions League football last season. Only Liverpool, Manchester City and Arsenal have claimed more points than Villa since Emery’s first game in charge in 2022, showing the level of consistency Villa have found.

Until late January, Villa hadn’t lost at home in the league in nearly 12 months after going 17 matches unbeaten at Villa Park under Emery, winning 16 of them. The most impressive of those victories came in the space of days as Villa beat Man City and Arsenal by a goal to nil inside 72 hours.

The win over City was probably the best performance I’ve seen from Villa live, and make no mistake, they made the Premier League and then European champions look very ordinary at Villa Park. So much so, Pep Guardiola admitted Villa were genuine title contenders at that point in the season.

Rico Lewis had nowhere to hide from John McGinn, Phil Foden no chance of beating Ezri Konsa and Erling Haaland was in Diego Carlos’ shadow. In fact, after the Norwegian called Emi Martinez into action in the 11th minute of the game, City recorded an expected goals value of zero.

The 1-0 scoreline flattered City, who faced 22 shots from Villa in total. Only one went in, but they deserved that slice of fortune when Leon Bailey’s effort took a deflection off Ruben Dias. City made two chances all game, which came seconds apart; the fewest ever by a Pep Guardiola team in a game within Europe’s big-five leagues, with that game being his 535th. The 22 shots from Villa was the joint-most faced by a Guardiola side in the same period, while Villa won possession in the final third 13 times, which is the most ever by an opposition team against City in a Premier League game under the Spaniard.

Emery’s Villa completely dominated City across the pitch, but had to show a different side to their game to go again three days later to set a new club record of 15 successive home league wins by beating
the Gunners.

Only in 1980-81, when they last won the title, had Villa ever had more than their tally of 35 points after 16 top-flight games in a season. Villa were running on empty in the final months of the season with some players playing through pain and others sidelined through injuries they had to nurse, meaning they fell away from Man City, Arsenal and Liverpool at the top of the table.

It was Villa’s second win over Arsenal in what was Emery’s first league game at the Emirates since he left the Gunners which all but sealed his side’s place in the Champions League. It was Arsenal’s first Premier League defeat since New Year’s Eve against Fulham after they had won 10 of their last 11 Premier League games, scoring at least twice in each victory, going into their clash with Villa.

Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal had also conceded just four goals across those 11 games, taking 31 points out of a possible 33 and only dropping points in a 0-0 draw at Manchester City back in March. They had also kept 14 Premier League clean sheets this season, at least five more than any other club. It was a monumental victory.

Emery’s players aren’t fazed by any opponent and no doubt feel fearless after a couple of hours in the meeting room, where he gives his players all the tools and information they need to get a result if they can carry out his game plan.

It puts Villa in a strong position to attack the Champions League next season and thrive on their underdogs tag, like they did in Emery’s first season to finish in a European position and when they saw off competition for fourth spot even though the view from the outside was that they’d succumb to the pressure of holding on.

Emery’s dreams have no limit and he knows he has everything he needs to succeed at Villa.

“It is a dream,” he said when asked if his team can actually win the Champions League next season. “It is very difficult. When we were at the beginning of the season playing two matches against City and Arsenal, we won both matches. We were there.

“Those teams are amazing with consistency. Always I want to get better and I have my dreams. And I believe in my dreams. Of course my objective is to win the Premier League or the Champions League. We are not contenders, but it is our dream to get something like that in the league in the Champions League.”

Emery, of course, is well-versed in what it takes to emerge triumphant from competitions; he’s lifted the Europa League three times with Sevilla and once with Villarreal and completed a domestic treble while in charge of Paris Saint-Germain in 2018. He works now from his Bodymoor Heath base plotting more silverware, with the intention of not allowing his decorated managerial career, littered with trophies, to dry up.

“The time is passing so quickly, but it’s been fantastic,” he told beIN Sports Asia. “We are progressively getting better and developing everything like we wanted to, when I decided to come here and take this challenge with Nassef, Wes Edens and Aston Villa. My target was, and is still, to be in Europe – to be in the Conference League, Europa League, Champions League. In the end, my target is to be with Aston Villa in the Champions League.

“Then, try to be contenders for a trophy – we are now, in Europe with the Conference League, but also in England. I want the hardest challenges I can face, and to get trophies and dream, maybe, of even the most important trophies for us, to win the Premier League, to win the Europa League or to win the Champions League. We have to be demanding, but we have to be realistic.