Unai Emery believes that Marco Asensio and Marcus Rashford can be decisive as Aston Villa bid for a deep run in the Champions League.
Villa stimulated their attack with the loan signals from Asensio and Rashford, from Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester United, respectively, late in the winter window.
The couple has concluded a promising partnership, with Rashford Asensio already helping three times.
Asensio has scored four goals, while of all Premier League players, Rashford leads the road for great opportunities created (six) in all competitions since the beginning of February.
Villa takes on Tuesday in the first stage of their last part of their last-16-drawing game in the Champions League and Emery has supported Rashford and Asensio to have a big impact.
“We have added players with experience in Europe and in this competition. Usually they are players who play at the highest level that can help us a lot,” said Emery.
“The process they do, gradually adapt to us, goes well.
“We are not only going to get our goal through individual players. We are going to get the collective and build our structure as strongly as possible.
“As soon as we have our structure, individual players can exploit their skills. This is the challenge we have.”
On the next round! @AVFCofficial pic.twitter.com/T6M2QRX8JP
– Marco Asensio (@Marcoasensio10) March 1, 2025
Emery had to make the difficult decision to leave January supplements Andres Garcia and Donyell Malen from his Champions League team, although he can welcome defender Pau Torres of injury back.
Torres suffered a middle section at the end of December with an incorrect break during a Premier League 2-2 draw with Brighton.
But the middle behind is just in time back in the fold for Emery to call him in Belgium.
Colleague defenders Tyrone Mings and Matty Cash are also fit after missing the 2-0 FA Cup victory of Villa on Cardiff City on Friday, alongside midfielder Boubacar Kamara, who sustained a thigh injury last month.
“Torres, Mings and Matty Cash are in the team,” Emery told reporters on Monday.
“Kamara was in the team on Friday and tomorrow he could start playing minutes.”
Villa lost to Bruges earlier this season, but Emery expects his team to deliver much better performance this time.
“We played here in November and we are now in March. Hopefully we can do it better now,” he said.
“When we played here, we did not compete as I want to do. The players know and we have analyzed why we have not experienced at that time as we can hopefully do tomorrow.
“The next step is tomorrow, trying to be best motivated, to be excited, to get emotional balance and play good football.”
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