Unai Emery raises the bar for Aston Villa following impressive Champions League debut

Unai Emery believes that Aston Villa can now set their sights on securing one of the coveted top eight spots in the Champions League group stage, following their impressive performance in the competition so far.

The Villains have won their first three games on their return to Europe’s top flight, sitting top of the new-look league phase and yet to concede a goal.

Tuesday night’s 2-0 win over Bologna came after an opening game victory over Young Boys and a famous 1-0 defeat of Bayern Munich, establishing Villa as a force in the competition.

The new Champions League format sees the top eight in the group phase go straight into the last 16, while teams placed 9-24 face a two-legged play-off to join them.

Of course the goal from the start was to progress to the knockout stages, but with Villa sitting pretty at the top of the league table, Emery says they can now think about a top eight spot.

‘We are going to focus on each match but how we are doing in this moment, we are arriving in a good position in the table,’ Emery told a post-match press conference after beating Bologna.

‘Of course, we won the first match away at Young Boys, we were thinking about the objective of the next round. Then in case of winning, we were speaking against Bayern Munich how we could get another objective in the top eight.

‘Today was a challenge again, the objective was to win and we were thinking about those three points. We are going to focus on the next match against Brugge but in the case we keep the same performances we are getting and getting points through it, of course we can change the objective to get in the top eight.

‘But I want to feel something like a natural way we are doing and not as a surprise because we are playing good performances. There are other teams contenders and favourites for the top eight, but we are of course feeling comfortable.’

Villa have stern tests to come, but they have arguably already dealt with their toughest challenge in Bayern Munich.

Their next Champions League outing is a trip to Club Brugge, followed by hosting Juventus. Then come away days at RB Leipzig and Monaco before welcoming Celtic to Villa Park on 29 January.

Next up for Emery is a home match against Bournemouth in the Premier League on Saturday and he has tasked his players with continuing to improve their impressive level of performance.

‘This is our challenge, my challenge, and I’m sending the message to the players: we have to keep the level increasing,’ he said.

‘This high level we are trying to keep is the most challenging we can have in Champions League, in the Premier League.

‘The players must be committed for this challenge like I think we need.’

Emery was happy to bask in the glory of the win on Tuesday, though, thrilled with how his team performed against the Serie A side.

‘I’m very happy,’ he said. ‘I’m delighted with the supporters helping us today and how they were transmitting their energy. I’m really happy because we responded on the field playing a really serious match in the 90 minutes.

‘We were playing being mature, trying to respect them and being ambitious to play to win. We tried to push in everything; without the ball we pressed well, with the ball we were breaking their man-to-man press.

‘I’m really happy because we won 2-0, we had chances, we controlled the game like we were planning before and now we keep going. We are happy and we have to be delighted with the way we are doing in the Champions League, but there are still a lot of matches to play and we have to keep our balance.’

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