It was the 57th minute when Unai Emery made a series of small circles with his hands as the pulses of everyone else in this stadium began to race that little bit quicker. Emery tapped his temples, reminding hisAston Villaplayers to stay focused, but, really, who was he kidding? Ezri Konsa had just side-footed a shot in off a post to earn Villa the lead on the night and, with the help of a tail wind from the Holte End, this stadium felt liftoff. And not for the first time. The noise was so loud and the atmosphere so fervent that it seemed worth checking on the foundations of this grand old ground.
Villa won the match and, though they lost the tie, this was a night they will always remember. It is also an evening when, once they have fully digested the drama of rousing from 5-1 down on aggregate, they will surely reflect on the strides they have made, particularly under Emery. Villa inadvertently did so with an amusing faux pas in the moments before kick-off: someone presumably pressed the wrong button as the Europa and Conference League walk-on music boomed instead of the operaticChampions Leagueanthem as the players lined up on the pitch.
That was so last year. Villa’s progress has been startling under Emery, who has assembled a band of diverse talents, a kind of School of Rock: from Marcus Rashford and Morgan Rogers to the bustling John McGinn, an inspirational captain, and the class of Youri Tielemans and Konsa, so often an understated key pillar. Six years ago this week Villa were coming off back-to-back wins in the Championship against Rotherham and Bristol City, preparing for a Good Friday trip to Bolton. Here they pushed PSG, according to Emery favourites for the competition, all the way, making light of the visitors’ advantage.
When Konsa scored, Villa had 33‑plus minutes to find another goal. Ron Saunders’s old line, those immortal words in 1981, came to mind: “Do you want to bet against us?” Gianluigi Donnarumma made a superb right-hand save to prevent a slow‑motion Tielemans header looping in and then Marco Asensio – on as a substitute, following a return to warm-up mode after being primed to come on until McGinn struck – also had a shot saved.
There was a glorious to-ing and fro-ing in an absorbing contest. Emery flung himself to the floor of his technical area, enveloped by his black hood, after Konsa went agonisingly close to meeting Rashford’s free-kick from the right. For practically the entire second half it felt entirely feasible that Villa might score with every attack.
After the first leg at the Parc des Princes, Emery was asked what Villa would do differently in the second. “We will see, we will see,” he said. He was adamant that the tie was not dead. The only notable change was Amadou Onana replacing Jacob Ramsey, a midfield presence to stop PSG’s stream of passing triangles. Few envisaged Konsa securing the lead for Villa and afterwards going so close to another, especially after Nuno Mendes and Achraf Hakimi extended PSG’s buffer inside 27 minutes. And, despite their favourites tag, nothing is certain from here.
As Emery had said, PSG have been pressing hard for 15 years to give them a shot at a trophy of such universal prestige. The next line, however, was probably the most telling. Emery spoke of PSG’s evolution into “a top team with a top coach and, in addition, a team spirit that fits the style of their manager”. He would know, having spent two years in the Paris goldfish bowl before departing, haunted bytheir collapse against Luis Enrique’s Barcelona.
Villa were a midtable Premier League side at best until Emery took the reins almost two and a half years ago. At the end here Rogers lay on the turf and Emi Martínez, sitting on the edge of his 18-yard box, surveyed the scene for a while. But now Villa, who host Newcastle on Saturday, must recover and attack their remaining six league matches, fuelled by the carrot of returning to this stage.
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PSG were confident on arrival and will depart with a bounce, despite the late scare. Those who travelled across the channel in crammed camper vans made sure to pack crates of fireworks. Luis Enrique, in a bomber jacket, was uber‑relaxed on the eve of this match but by the end he was on the pitch feeding Ousmane Dembélé instructions to box off the tie.
There was still time for Ian Maatsen to send a volley spinning towards the bottom corner of the PSG goal with 28 seconds of stoppage time to play, only for Willian Pacho to prevent the ball advancing. PSG simply did not expect a night quite like this. Villa, whose journey to this point began in earnest withthat boisterous win against Bayern Munich, hope there is a few more of these to come next season.