How Unai Emery’s Aston Villa shocked Europe to go top of the Champions League

Aston Villa were not invited to join the European Super League. Which, as they were in the lower half of the Premier League when the botched attempt at a breakaway was revealed in April 2021, is not entirely surprising. And yet their league position was not the determining factor. After all, Manchester United, founder members of a competition that has never started, are 12th in the English top flight now.

Aston Villa are top of the Champions League, though. There is a suggestion it is a Super League by another name, with reasons to believe it is a step in that direction. But there is still a crucial difference, enough of a meritocracy to render unlikely feats possible. Unai Emery has taken Villa into the Champions League.

Now he has taken them to the top of it, a 2-0 win over Bologna giving them a two-point lead. If it is safe to say the early standings may not have permanence, Villa are a reminder European football should not be a closed shop; like West Ham winning the Conference League or Newcastle demolishing Paris Saint-Germain 4-1 last year, such feats mean more to those accustomed to watching on from the outside.

Premier League revenues have facilitated all; there may be less moneyed outfits elsewhere in Europe who struggle to see the romance in an English club topping the standings. They may find more to celebrate if, say, Brest were to displace Villa. That would be more of a triumph for the underdogs.

But Emery’s European trophies came with Sevilla and Villarreal, also not among the treacherous dozen who conspired to found the Super League. He has prevailed with outsiders before, even if it came with a calibre of player and a budget some others may envy. Emery has arguably provided more meaning to European football than anyone else over the last decade, a greater sense that it is not purely carved up by the superclubs to suit themselves.

Most of his achievements been in the Europa League but he steered Villarreal to a Champions League semi-final. Emery can specialise in smashing through glass ceilings for clubs. He is doing it again at Villa. “No matter what happens until now and whenever he leaves – we hope it’s never – he will certainly go down as one of our club’s greatest managers,” said the captain John McGinn. It is already only Ron Saunders, Tony Barton and Emery who have managed them in the European Cup or its successor.

When the reformatted Champions League began, it was with the probability that Villa would finish somewhere between ninth and 24th, sending them into the play-off round. Now a top-eight spot within the league stage looks within their grasp: three more wins should seal it, or two and two draws. “Of course we can change the objective,” said Emery. “I want to feel in a natural way we are doing it but not [that it is] a surprise.” McGinn added: “We are proud of where we are, top of the league table. It has put us in a great position to go and kick on.”

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Among teams who played their third game on Tuesday, Villa are already five points clear of Paris Saint-Germain, six ahead of AC Milan. They are upending the pecking order, the arriviste challengers to more established forces. Which, in a way, taps into one of the club’s traditions.

The team of 1982 were one of the most unlikely European champions. They were scarcely studded with superstars. Now Emery’s team have a captain who began at St Mirren, a goalkeeper who, while a World Cup winner, has played for Oxford and Rotherham, a No 10 who started last season in the Championship with Middlesbrough.

The players who took the field against Bologna have played for Charlton, Cardiff and Coventry, Blackpool and Burnley, Lincoln, Exeter, Doncaster, Hull and Stoke. That gives Villa an old-fashioned feel, a sense of social mobility, the idea that players with unglamorous beginnings can work their way up to eminence.

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When the Premier League seemed to have its glass ceiling, Villa weren’t in the big four; nor, the big six, all of whom were invited to the Super League. They nevertheless finished ahead of three of them last season. They may succeed where Newcastle failed last season, qualifying again for the Champions League while competing in it.

All of which makes Villa an advertisement for the principles of competition. Their improvement has been expensive at times, but also organic, underpinned by Emery’s ambition, aided by his coaching. The Super League was designed to exclude them, while the Champions League was certainly not revamped with them in mind. The same can be said of Bologna, who have found their return to the European elite altogether tougher.

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But in Villa, Bologna, Brest, Girona, Atalanta, in some of the sides who are not normally on this stage, some of the stories of the Champions League are to be found. Bologna’s may end after eight games. With Emery’s European pedigree and his improving team, Villa’s adventure could last rather longer. “For me, they will go very far,” said the Bologna manager Vincenzo Italiano. And if they do, it will be on merit.