Aston Villa boss Unai Emery wants his side to “write the history” by producing an epic comeback against Paris St Germain to reach the Champions League semi-finals.
Villa have a mountain to climb in Tuesday’s quarter-final second leg at Villa Park as they trail 3-1 from last Wednesday’s first match in France.
They looked like returning to home soil with just a one-goal deficit but Nuno Mendes’ stoppage-time effort proved damaging.
The odds are against Emery’s men on their debut season in the Champions League but the Spaniard knows all about European comebacks, famously being the PSG manager when they squandered a 4-0 first-leg lead to lose to Barcelona in 2017.
“Our objective is to try to play with one strong plan in our tactical way tomorrow and then try to be consistent.” #UCL pic.twitter.com/MEBJeWaNS5
— Aston Villa (@AVFCOfficial) April 14, 2025
And he wants his side to create their own story.
“I have experiences of coming back, positively and negatively,” he said.
“But now it’s something different. We want to write the history with Aston Villa. Last year in the Conference League and this year in the Champions League and hopefully for a long time in Europe.
“Because my experiences before were different, sometimes losing away and winning at home, sometimes losing at home and winning away.
“But I’m not going to remind the players of those experiences because my idea and my every word with the players is sending the message how we are doing this way and how we are getting experiences together here with Aston Villa.
“With the players we are, with the experiences we are adding in our back last year and this year.
“As well with the combination we have with our players mentally and as well tactically to play, being so demanding in our process to get opportunities and believing to beat tomorrow PSG.”
Emery said that Mendes’ late goal at the Parc des Princes did not fundamentally change Villa’s outlook on the tie and that they have to win the game regardless.
He said: “Ok, 2-1, 3-1 it changes something. A lot, no. Why? We have to win. We have to win with 2-1 and 3-1 and now we have to win by one more goal.
“We competed there like we planned, the result we achieved was not really a bad result. We were in good balance for the second leg. The objective is to win.”
Morgan Rogers, who put Villa 1-0 up in Paris last week, says his side believe they can produce the comeback.
“There’s massive belief. Most people wrote us off before the tie,” he said.
“We know the task at hand. We know what we need to do but we’re excited under the lights at home playing this competition in the quarter-final.
“There’s not many places better to be, and if anyone’s going to turn it around, it’s going to be us.
“It’s down to us, and I think we’re excited for that challenge, looking forward, but we know it’s going to be difficult.
“We’re not saying we’re going to do it by any stretch of the imagination, but we will definitely give it a go and go out to win 100 per cent.”
