Unai Emery hails ‘perfect’ outcome as Aston Villa win Conference League group.

Unai Emery hails ‘perfect’ outcome as Aston Villa win Conference League group.

Unai Emery hails ‘perfect’ outcome as Aston Villa win Conference League group.

After eliminating Zrinjski Mostar 1–1 on the road to earn first place in their Europa Conference

League group and a berth in the round of 16, Aston Villa manager Unai Emery

believed his drastically altered team had created a perfect night.

With goalie Filip Marschall making his debut and Jacob Ramsey making his first start in five months,

Emery made eight changes from the victory over Arsenal on Saturday.

Villa took the lead just after the hour, thanks to Nicolo Zaniolo, a midfielder on loan from Galatasaray.

Although Matija Malekinusic fired a spectacular equaliser for the hosts in the closing stages,

the result was enough to see Villa finish top of Group E ahead of Legia Warsaw.

Villa now avoid two play-off matches and so progress straight into the knockout stages.

“We are pleased because we achieved our goal of leading the group with this result,” Emery remarked.

We also attempted to play with Leander Dendoncker, Filip Marschall, Tommi O’Reilly, and those players who aren’t playing as much this season due to injury, such as Alex Moreno and Jacob Ramsey.

“It’s important for them to get confidence and minutes. Tonight was perfect with the draw

and result and perfect to give some of the players chances.”

Emery added in quotes on the Aston Villa website: “We wanted to win, but our first objective is completely done:

to be first in the group.

“We want to have fun in this competition because it’s crucial to recall how we got to be in Europe last year

and how we’re attempting to win a trophy this time around.

“Some of our supporters were present today, and we want to share it with them.

It is crucial that they spend time together and relish this in Europe.

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