Aston Villa face Club Brugge in the second leg of our round-of-16 Champions League tie on Wednesday night, and Unai Emery has named his starting line-up.
Villa hold a commanding 3-1 lead from the first leg in Belgium last week, but having already suffered defeat to our opponents in the league phase and been reminded of the threat that they pose in the first meeting of this tie, we’ll have to produce our best to ensure we advance to the quarter-finals.
READ MORE: Crucial triple boost for Villa ahead of Club Brugge clash
The winner will progress to the next round to face Paris Saint-Germain after they saw off Liverpool on Tuesday night, but that won’t be on the minds of Emery or his players at this stage, as we remain focused on our upcoming opponents and getting the job done in midweek.
There was positive news from the pre-match press conference as the Villa boss confirmed that Emiliano Martinez, Amadou Onana and Marco Asensio were all set to be included in the matchday squad having recovered from injury, and so combined with the recent returns of Matty Cash, Pau Torres and Boubacar Kamara, the Villa squad is certainly growing stronger as the weeks go on.
As per the club’s post, Villa have made five changes to the side that beat Brentford, with Martinez, Cash, Ian Maatsen, Kamara and Marcus Rashford coming in to replace Robin Olsen, Axel Disasi, Lucas Digne, Leon Bailey and Jacob Ramsey.
While it’s a huge boost to have Martinez back in between the posts, there’s also good news on the bench as both Onana and Asensio are back in the squad having also recovered from injury.
It will hopefully give all concerned an important lift not only for this game, but with so many key clashes coming up across Europe, the Premier League and FA Cup, Emery will be delighted to continue to get key figures back at his disposal.
Not only does that give him the luxury of rotating and resting players, but we have multiple tactical solutions available depending on the opposition, hopefully giving us a better chance of getting the desired results.
