The Aston Villa ace is determined to take his form in the Champions League onto the international arena
06:00, 19 Mar 2025
John McGinn in action for Aston Villa against Celtic(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
A first taste of Champions League football this season has been the thing of John McGinn ’s dreams - apart from the bit where he got his ‘first Celtic assist’.
The Scotland and Aston Villa hero admits he could already see the headlines as he sat in the Villa Park dressing room at half-time in the Battle of Britain blockbuster against his boyhood heroes.
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How he climbed off the bench to turn the game by inadvertently diverting Greg Taylor’s cross into the path of Adam Idah for Celtic ’s first goal. How, within eight minutes of his entrance, Villa had thrown away a two-goal lead. And how half his Hoops-daft family were secretly loving it in the stands above him as he went through the wringer down in the bowels of the stadium.
In the end it all worked out perfectly as Unai Emery’s men romped to a 4-2 win after the break to seal a top eight spot and automatic qualification for the last 16 as both sides progressed from the league phase. Celtic may be out now. But Villa have blazed into the quarter finals where they will face French giants PSG as punters dare to dream of a repeat of their finest moment in 1982.
Skipper McGinn has scored two goals in eight appearances so far in European football’s premier competition. Now he hopes to take his performances from the top bracket of club football onto the international stage - and help Scotland save their status as a top level team in the Nations League by dumping Greece.
Back north of the border and speaking about that Celtic clash seven weeks ago for the first time, McGinn said: “I was gutted not to start after working so hard to get back fit. I was even more devastated at half-time when the aggregate score of me coming on was 2-0 Celtic.
“The story was written, the narrative was there, I could feel it. I got my first assist for Celtic, all those ones! It was strange but thankfully for us it was a massive night, a really important victory in the end. I think if Atalanta scored at the end they would have got into the top eight and they might still be in the competition. So the margins were fine but in the end it worked out all right for me. But there was a story certainly written at half-time which was challenging.
“My family? Some of them were probably celebrating it at the time to be honest, which made the night trickier! At half-time the manager was really good because he knew it was just one of those things.
Adam Idah bagged a brace at Villa Park
“Celtic scored two good goals but we'd started the game on fire. I wasn't supposed to play longer than what I did. I was supposed to, I think, only be 45 minutes max, but when Matty Cash went down, I had a few worries in my head about the hamstring.
“I thought, ‘oh no’ but adrenaline got me through and thankfully in the end we got a good result. One minute I'm sitting a couple of yards away from Tony Ralston. I said ‘I'm not getting on here’. Three minutes later, no real warm-up, I'm on the pitch and it's 2-2.
“Aye, I've had some brilliant experiences this year in the Champions League. That was another great night under a lot of pressure and hopefully I can use those experiences to deliver a performance for Scotland.”
McGinn admits the manner of the Hoops’ fight back in Birmingham proved they too are a proper Champions League outfit. Emery’s pre-match prep for the Scottish champions had told his team mates as much anyway.
He said: “100 per cent. If you lose two goals early at Villa Park.. we've got a brilliant record there this season. They had a choice to crumble, sit in, make it less painful or keep playing the way they did, and they did, in fairness. I thought Celtic were excellent on the night and a few of my team-mates and the staff were very impressed.
“But the manager showed them the utmost respect before the game. We watched a lot of their European games in detail and he was impressed. But thankfully on the night, we just managed to edge it.”
McGinn was one of five members of Steve Clarke’s squad in the Champions League this season. He and Kieran Tierney are the last men standing. But the vice-captain reckons that growing band of players at the top level that includes the Serie A quartet of Scott McTominay, Billy Gilmour, Che Adams and Lewis Ferguson can continue to see Scotland mingle with the big guns of international football.
Scott McTominay of SSC Napoli
Scott McTominay of SSC Napoli(Image: Getty Images)
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He said: “Hopefully, there's many of us can go and achieve something towards the end of the season. You've always got a spring in your step, a lot to look forward to but when we're here our full focus is on trying to get us to remain in Division A of the Nations League.
“The older you get you try and take each challenge one by one. Going to Greece, I've been there at club level. That stadium, unfortunately we lost the Conference League semi-final last season. It's a brilliant atmosphere, a very, very tough place to go. We know how good the division A nights have been at Hampden. Full houses, the knock-on effect to everything.
“We're aware of it, we know how much we want to be competing at that level. What we've shown towards the latter stages is that we can compete and we do deserve to be there. We've got an additional opportunity to stay there and we want to stay there as long as possible.”