Aston Villa manager Unai Emery will have high hopes for his side in the Europa League this season.placeholder image
Aston Villa manager Unai Emery will have high hopes for his side in the Europa League this season. | Getty Images
Aston Villa are one of the favourites to win this season’s Europa League trophy
Aston Villa have made a slow start to the new Premier League season, but their Europa League form has been exemplary. Unai Emery’s side have won two from two in the competition without conceding a goal, to sit joint-top of the new-look league table.
The Villans beat Bologna 1-0 at Villa Park on their opening European night of the season, John McGinn scoring the decisive goal to secure a first victory in any competition of the campaign at the time. The Scotsman was on the scoresheet once again as Villa won 2-0 at Feyenoord in Rotterdam.
Upcoming Europa League fixtures for Villa include a trip to Go Ahead Eagles up next, with clashes against Maccabi Tel Aviv, Young Boys and Basel on the horizon. They end their group phase campaign against Fenerbahce and RB Salzburg in January, and will hope to finish in the top eight to qualify directly for the knock-out stages. From there, Emery will hope to go all the way - as he has done on four occasions as manager of Sevilla and Villarreal.
How Aston Villa’s £476m squad value compares to Europa League rivals
The Villans’ squad is worth a massive €547m (£476m) according to Transfermarkt, placing the Birmingham outfit amongst some of the most valuable squads in the competition. As is often to be expected, Premier League sides dominate on the European stage from a financial perspective and will hope to live up to this on the field.
Villa’s star-studded squad is led by the likes of Morgan Rogers (£47.8m), Amadou Onana (£43.5m) and Ollie Watkins (£34.8m). With one of the older average squad ages in the competition, being 27.8, Emery’s squad boasts a host of players right in their prime and ready to challenge to go all the way and get their hands on European silverware for the first time in a generation.
Though it is in fact Nottingham Forest’s squad which is the most valuable overall - an overall value of £492.3m. Ange Postecoglou’s squad has five more bodies than that of Villa, who have the smallest squad in the competition, just 23 players, according to the statistic. The Villans’ squad is, therefore, the most valuable per player, worth £20.7m per player compared to £17.6m in the case of Forest.
Other high-value squads in the competition include Roma (£353m), Porto (£340.7m) and Stuttgart (£295.2m). Scottish giants Celtic (£115.4m) and Rangers (£90.8m) find themselves in the middle of the pack, with the lowest-value squad in the competition worth £23.2m.
Europa League squad value rankings
Nottingham Forest - £492.3m
Aston Villa - £476m
Roma - £353m
Porto - £340.7m
Stuttgart - £295.2m
Fenerbahce - £253.8m
Bologna - £237.3m
Feyenoord - £203.4m
Lille - £187.5m
Real Betis - £187.4m
Olympique Lyon - £155m
Nice - £154.5m
Freiburg - £141.5m
Genk - £126m
Celta Vigo - £123m
Braga - £117.4m
Celtic - £115.4m
RB Salzburg - £113.1m
Rangers - £90.8m
PAOK - £81m
Panathinaikos - £80.1m
Red Star Belgrade - £74.2m
Basel - £69.1m
Midtjylland - £68.1m
Utrecht - £65.4m
Young Boys - £63.1m
Dinamo Zagreb - £58.5m
Sturm Graz - £46.2m
Viktoria Plzen - £45.4m
Ludogorets - £42.3m
FCSB - £42.1m
Ferencváros TC - £40m
Malmo - £31.7m
Go Ahead Eagles - £27m
SK Brann - £26.96m
Maccabi Tel Aviv - £23.2m
Continue Reading