Former Valencia defender Ivan Helguera has revealed his awful relationship with Unai Emery at the club, questioning the Aston Villa manager’s personal skills.
[Super Deporte have an interview](https://www.superdeporte.es/valencia-cf/2025/06/04/ivan-helguera-etapa-valencia-hizo-118222170.html) with the defender today after he worked with Emery during a difficult spell at Valencia.
He had previously enjoyed success at Real Madrid before moving Valencia in 2007, where Emery would arrive as manager a year later. His time at the club would last four years before he headed to Spartak Moscow in 2012.
It was not a trophy laden spell for him at the club, indeed there were no trophies, with Valencia instead finishing sixth and then third in three consecutive seasons under his leadership.
Helguera would only spend one season under him before bringing his career to an end and only managed six appearances under the Aston Villa man in that year, totalling 509 minutes.
That was disappointing for him in his final season as a player and has left him with a negative opinion of the Aston Villa manager, who has since gone on to become a dominant name in European football in a trophy laden career.
_“The next year Emery arrived,”_ he said after discussing his initial struggles.
_“It was horrible with Emery, it was horrible, we got on terribly. I have a lot of very bad anecdotes. He’s a great coach but managing teams and as a person it’s pretty complicated._
_“We clashed very soon and between things and some other things it became fatal to me at Valencia.”_