Aston Villa boss Unai Emery describe their 4-2 home loss against Olympiacos in the first leg of Europa Conference League semi-final as ‘unusual’ and ‘unexpected.
Villa came back from a 2-0 deficit to draw level at 2-2 before the Greek side regained their advantage with Ayoub El Kaabi‘s penalty completing his hat-trick, followed by Santiago Hezze‘s deflected effort finding the back of the net.
The result means Villa now have a mountain to climb if they are to reach a first major European final since 1982.
They are also the last English team in with a chance of lifting silverware in Europe but Emery insists they will have to be better at the Georgios Karaiskakis Stadium.
Specifically, the Spaniard wants to see his side play with the “personality” that has put them on the verge of securing a spot in next season’s UEFA Champions League.
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He said:
“We are motivated even losing the first leg,”
“We didn’t play well but we have to try and understand overall the season how we were performing with our style with the players we have.
“Now we are at the end of the season and we are preparing everything trying to do our best tomorrow and changing.
“Before the first leg we were speaking about our possibilities to get to the final and now it’s clear after the first leg they are the favourites, and we accept now tomorrow is going to be very difficult here away.
“But of course we are ready to play tomorrow and to give our best performance.
“Everything starts in your mind and then with our capacity on the pitch.
We have to respect them, but we’ve lost a little bit the respect of them because they won the first leg clearly.
“But tomorrow we’ll play with our personality and try to be stronger overall tactically in defence and in attack.”
