Aston Villa boss Unai Emery was disappointed with our 2-1 defeat at Man City, but insisted we have to focus on the next challenge quickly.
Villa looked set to secure a point at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday night, but the hosts struck deep into injury time to seal the win in what could be a decisive result in the Champions League qualification race.
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There’s no doubt that this is a major blow for Villa in our bid to close the gap on our rivals as we could slip further away from contention this weekend, and it also risks damaging our belief and momentum given the manner in which we were defeated.
Emery’s reaction on the touchline immediately after we conceded said it all as he looked devastated, but the Villa boss was keen to focus on the positives and get his mind set on the next task, which comes in the form of our FA Cup semi-final clash with Crystal Palace on Saturday.
“We can’t waste time, we lost in the last minute of this match, but we competed well – we were close to drawing,” he told Sky Sports in his post-match interview, as per BBC Sport. “We were trying to win the match as well with the subs, but they do the same and they score.
“Over 90 minutes they [Man City] dominated more, but we played a good competitive match.
“Take a lot of positive things and now is a moment to be positive. I’m going to analyse the match and try get a lot of information from it.
“We can’t waste time now, we have to keep going.
“We want to try keep the level that we’re achieving and try to be demanding in our way so we can build us stronger in everything.
“Tomorrow, rest. Thursday and Friday, positive and work hard to prepare for the game against Crystal Palace.”
Having played a game more, Villa now sit two points adrift of fifth place, and so it has become relatively clear in that we must now win our remaining four league games to have any hope of returning to the Champions League next season.
Emery will arguably feel as though he perhaps made some wrong decisions in this game after getting his rotation and changes spot on in recent weeks, with the Axel Disasi-Jeremy Doku match-up proving to be decisive in the final passage of play after seeming obvious it would be problematic for us.
Further, with City’s weaknesses exposed after just 18 seconds as Marcus Rashford hit the post, there was a sense that if we took the game to them, we could have caused them all sorts of problems, but instead we were set up to sit back and counter, which gave them most of the possession and control in the contest.
Nevertheless, the game is now done and we have to look forward, and hopefully we can recover quickly and get back to winning ways not only this weekend, but in the weeks that follow too.
