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Just a few months before Unai Emery arrived for his first stint in English football, his famous predecessor gave a comment that now feels so striking. It was October 2017 and Arsene Wenger was speaking at another angry Arsenal AGM, as the criticisms that would ultimately lead to his replacement by Emery escalated. The French great attempted to explain the lack of recent success by pointing to the modern economic infrastructure of the sport.
“If I ask today, could Aston Villa win the European Cup, you’d say, ‘you’re joking’.”
Some at the AGM quipped that at least Aston Villa had actually won one, in 1982, when Wenger's Arsenal hadn’t. That was part of his point, though. The game was becoming dominated by the super clubs, with the economic threshold to compete raised by oligarchs and state ownership.
That’s also precisely why Emery’s feat in returning Villa to this stage, for the first time since they were European champions, requires more recognition now that they're actually prepare for a first match away to Young Boys of Berne. It wasn’t just winning the trophy again that would have been considered a joke, after all. So was the very idea of Villa qualifying. It would have been preposterous.
It isn’t the first time they’ve faced that sort of attitude, of course. Back before that 1982 final against Bayern Munich, the great German club that Villa symbolically face in this group stage, opposition defender Wolfgang Dremmler came out with the following.
“The cup is ours. Anything else is too fantastic to believe.”
Villa won 1-0. Now, there’s no joking, as Emery has the club believing. And dreaming? Is this possible? Can they be this season’s great Champions League story?
Any optimism about potentially going the distance again is grounded in some reality. Much of Emery’s respected reputation has been because of his record in European knock-out ties. It is among the best in the game, albeit mostly in the continent’s secondary competition, the Europa League. The Basque proved himself a specialist in those kinds of gameplans, becoming the manager that has won more Europa League titles than anyone else with four. While his consistency at that level did not translate to the top level for a long time, the 2021-22 semi-final with Villarreal marked a wider shift. It preceded a notable tactical evolution, where his teams played with the high lines of the higher level.
Now, Villa have even reunited him with recruitment supremo Monchi, whose work at Sevilla was the foundation of three of Emery’s Europa Leagues. There is a lot to respect here. Villa are going to be one of those teams no one wants to face. The new format and open league means Emery’s side have also escaped the issue that made it more challenging for Newcastle United last season, since they aren’t in a group of death. No club has pot protection anymore.
Any discussion of recruitment and modern structures must raise the fact that this story isn’t completely one of Emery defying expectations with canny management, or even romance.
The wider club has adapted to new realities, too. Egyptian billionaire Nassef Sawiris is part of a more ambitious ownership group, and is politically aligned to Manchester City’s Abu Dhabi owners in the Premier League. He has been willing to back them on certain points in the competition’s meetings. The new ambition has naturally run alongside far greater expenditure, and other clubs would enviously point to the fact that Villa’s wage bill has quickly become one of the highest in the Premier League.
The owners and fans might say this is the club rising to its natural place as one of England’s biggest, with a lot of untapped commercial potential. That’s actually almost exactly the argument they used in trying to justify a drastic increase in ticket prices for these Champions League games. The spending on players such as Youri Tielemans brought them to the brink of Profit and Sustainability Rule limits.
Damian Vidagany, the director of football operations, even revealed last week that “there was a bomb with the countdown” and he and Monchi “were there to cut the cable”. That eventually involved the sale of Douglas Luiz to Juventus, who Emery's team also meet in another glamour tie at Villa Park.
The sad question is how many fans who have waited decades for this will be able to afford to go. The prices for such games have shot up to £97, with even season ticket-holders expected to pay between £70 and £82. That is way above regular Champions League qualifiers like Liverpool. The club have been criticised by groups like the Aston Villa Supporters’ Trust as “extremely disappointing” and “out of touch”. They responded by stating that “achieving our sporting ambitions while complying with financial stability regulations requires difficult decisions”, and pointing to how their “priority” will “always” be to match their “collective ambition”.
The problem with all that, as ever, is that ticket price increases bring negligible income compared to European prize money, broadcast revenue and the actual cost of modern Champions League squads. The difference would barely afford a substitute goalkeeper.
The pity is that it adds a sour note to what should be an uplifting first Champions League home game against Bayern Munich on 2 October. It’s all the worse since the inevitable call-backs to 1982 will feature footage of a raucous Villa Park crowd. The reporting at the time made such a point of mentioning how they were a powerful feature in that run.
Other elements would be impossible to recreate. Villa won that European Cup without a single regular international in the squad, which would be simply inconceivable now. Captain Dennis Mortimer spoke of how they “went from a team of nobodies to somebodies”. More famously, title-winning manager Ron Saunders was replaced mid-season by someone who was almost unknown. Tony Barton, who had barely been seen on the training ground before that, was hands-off manager. It led to the club lifting the greatest club trophy of all.
Emery is much more immersed in everything his teams do. He’s all about the coaching and the tactics, which is why he relishes European occasions. These are moments to figure out the opposition, to come up with something that can shift an entire tie.
It’s just going to be a while until anyone gets to see that, due to the extended nature of this group stage. It is another pity that Villa actually don’t get to experience the Champions League in its more classic form. The offset is that they have a huge chance of getting into the knock-out stages.
That, very suddenly, isn’t something that’s hard to imagine.
