Unai Emery delighted with Aston Villa mentality
Unai Emery saluted Villa’s mentality after they thrashed Hibernian to virtually confirm their place in the Europa Conference League group stages.
Villa announced their return to European competition after a 13-year absence with a 5-0 play-off round first leg win at Easter Road.
Ollie Watkins scored a hat-trick, while Leon Bailey and Douglas Luiz were also on the mark as Villa ensured next Thursday’s second leg should be a formality.
Emery was rewarded for naming a strong team in Scotland and said: “It is important for us to be in Europe and of course the plan is to take it seriously. You have to respect the competition and the mentality I want is what I got here.
“Football is very difficult and we are going to face difficult moments in this season, particularly in the Premier League.
“I want to do something and Europe is always special. Hopefully we can compete for a trophy, 42 years ago they won what was the Champions League.
“Now this is the third competition in Europe but there are a lot of very good teams and doing something is very important for us.
"The end result - five goals - is maybe not deserved, but we deserved to win, and our respect of them is playing how we played."
Villa captain John McGinn played a role in two of Villa’s three first half goals on his return to Hibernian five years after moving to the Midlands.
He said: "It's the most nervous I've been for a game in a long time. I had butterflies today.
"It was really strange being in the away changing room. I had a special three years here, it's great to be back but it's a good result for us. I told the boys 'don't disrespect Hibs'. I told them they'd be surprised and they were surprised first 15 minutes.”
Emery, meanwhile, confirmed striker Cameron Archer is close to joining Sheffield United in a deal worth around £18.5million.
