Aston Villa boss Unai Emery hopeful of Emi Martinez return after stomach bug
Villa boss Unai Emery is hopeful Emi Martinez will return for Tuesday’s visit of Fulham after the goalkeeper was forced out of Saturday’s 1-1 draw at Brentford with a stomach bug.
Martinez played the first half at the GTech Stadium, making an impressive save to deny Ivan Toney, before being replaced by Robin Olsen at half-time.
Emery explained how the World Cup winner had been feeling unwell prior to kick-off.
The Villa boss said: "He (Martinez) has a stomach virus. He was feeling bad before the match. We tried to support him.
“After the first half he was feeling worse and could not continue. It is something with his stomach. He was not feeling good."
“"We have players here, waiting for their opportunity. We have to support them when something has happened so we turn to Olsen.
“We have another game on Tuesday so we will wait and hopefully it's not something that will rule him (Martinez) out.”
Villa struggled initially in Martinez’s absence, falling behind when Toney opened the scoring for the hosts with 25 minutes remaining.
But they rallied impressively in the closing stages and bagged a point courtesy of Douglas Luiz’s 87th minute leveller, extending their unbeaten run to nine matches.
Emery said: "Our reaction in the last 15 minutes was very good. We have to try to recover on Tuesday.
"Brentford made it difficult. We are very demanding but we have to understand the matches being difficult. I told the players I'm so happy with this draw because it was difficult.”
