Unai Emery admitted that Aston Villa is willing to expect everything, despite taking a 3-1 lead in their Champions League round of 16 first leg with Club Brugge.
Emery looked at the early strike of Leon Bailey, was canceled by the well -approached finish of Maxim de Cuyper, with the loot that is shared until the final phase.
Brandon Mechele turned into his own just in the 82nd minute before Marco Asensio sealed the victory of the penalty spot shortly thereafter to give Villa control over the draw.
Villa indeed scored more goals against Bruges (three) than in their previous five meetings with Belgian parties in all combined competitions (two).
But sometimes during the game, Emery cut a frustrated figure on the sidelines, where his emotion saw him receive a yellow card for his problems.
And despite their advantage with two goals in the draw, the Spaniard insisted that his team should not think that they have already reached the phases of the competition of the quarterfinals.
“Very important. A very heavy match. The idea was to compete how much the players showed,” Emery said.
“Of course we can play better, but sometimes competing can get your goal, and today we showed it.
“We sometimes struggled defensively, we needed the keeper and needed the last action with Tyrone Mings. Of course it is a good result, but we also get balance.
“Individual skills and individual versions are very important for the team. Leon Bailey Scoring today is fantastic.
“We played 90 minutes today, we know that we still have to play for 90 minutes, continue with the game plan that we had today.
“We have to be ready to get extra time and the penalty shootout because we have to expect everything.”
Yes, this felt good pic.twitter.com/baylthrnds
– Aston Villa (@AVFCofficial) 4 March 2025
Emery also praised Tyrone Mings for his performance on Wednesday and earned a sort of redemption after his display against Bruges in the competition phase of the competition.
Only 118 days after Mings inexplicably picked up a target kick in the penalty area to send Villa to beat in November, he reduced himself with a sensational target -saving approval of the header of Hans Vanaken who waved the balance of the game.
“It is very important to get experiences. The first experience he had here was not good, but today he responded fantastic, played in a targeted manner, seriously, saved one action. That was a goal,” Emery added.
“We demand everyone inside. I demand with the players and they have to demand themselves.
“Of course I know the difficulties in football and how we can (have) experiences and how we can get better and analyze everything deeply and try to correct it. That is my only target with the players.
“We have corrected something from the game that we played here. Of course we have to correct something that we have not done well here today for the following week against Bruges.”
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