Aston Villa face Feyenoord in the Europa League this week, and Unai Emery has provided our latest team news ahead of the encounter.
After back-to-back wins against Bologna and Fulham respectively over the past week, Villa will hope to build on the foundation we’re setting to get our season on track after a dismal start, but it certainly promises to be a difficult challenge against our upcoming Eredivisie opponents.
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Naturally, returning to Rotterdam brings back fond memories after our European Cup success at De Kuip in 1982, and Emery will be hoping to deliver another positive result in our latest bid for European success.
He’ll have to do so with key absentees in his squad though, as the Villa boss spoke to the media at his pre-match press conference on Wednesday, and confirmed that Amadou Onana, Youri Tielemans, Jadon Sancho, Andres Garcia and Tyrone Mings all miss out.
“[Jadon] Sancho is still being sick,” he told reporters, as per VillaTV. “He trained this morning, but he is not in the group. [Amadou] Onana, [Youri] Tielemans, Andres [Garcia] & [Ross] Barkley are not here. Tyrone [Mings] is also out.”
Ross Barkley will play no part given he wasn’t included in our Europa League squad, and so we’ll continue to be limited in terms of options available to play in our deeper midfield pivot. Tielemans and Onana have been sidelined for weeks now, while Mings picked up a setback in our win over Fulham, thus joining them on the sidelines.
It’s hoped that we can recover some of those key players named above for the visit of Burnley on Sunday as we look to finish on a positive note ahead of the upcoming international break, but the full focus will be on getting the desired result in the Netherlands in midweek to continue building an improved run of form.
Despite being short of a full-strength squad, we still have plenty of depth to cope while certain individuals will have to carry a heavier burden, but it’s hoped that whoever gets the nod can set us on our way to all three points to take another important step towards direct qualification for the knockout stage of the competition.
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