Aston Villa Roma Walsall Unai Emery
(Credit: Imago)
Max Wilkins
Wed 6 August 2025 21:43, UK
Aston Villa and Roma saw their pre-season clash delayed on Wednesday night.
The Villans were scheduled to face the Serie A side at 7:30pm on 6 August, but instead kicked off 15 minutes later at the Pallet Track Bescot Stadium.
It was clear that this delay didn’t impact Unai Emery’s side as they burst out of the traps to take a 3-0 lead before the half-time break, before finishing as 4-0 winners.
This didn’t stop questions over the moved kick-off time, with police seemingly involved in the situation before the eventual delay in Walsall.
Aston Villa boss Unai Emery
Unai Emery watched on as Aston Villa secured a pre-season win against Roma (Credit: Imago)
This article contains exclusive comments from Keith Hackett for Villa News.
Aston Villa v Roma delay questioned at Walsall
It is always a strange situation to see the claret and blue outfit pitching up in WS1 to face off against a side that isn’t the Saddlers.
Villa fell to defeat against Walsall earlier in pre-season, but returned to their stadium to face off against Italian outfit Roma nonetheless.
Aston Villa pre-season schedule
Aston Villa pre-season schedule
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This comes as work continues on Villa Park to change the pitch and change seats in the upper section of the Trinity Road Stand in B6.
With that in mind, it wasn’t a good look to see the clash away from home to be delayed by 15 minutes without any true explanation from Villa themselves.
This was likely down to traffic around the Pallet Track Bescot Stadium.
Former PGMOL chief Hackett believes that conversations with police and the Ground Safety Controller will have occurred before agreeing to a delayed start in Walsall.
Speaking exclusively to Villa News, Hackett said: “The delay of the kick-off will have involved the police and the Ground Safety Controller.
“That delay may well be down to traffic, Parking and the late arrival of fans to the turnstiles.
“*The Referee and both Managers will be in constant contact with the Ground Controller.*“
Aston Villa uneffected by delays in Walsall
This sort of issue doesn’t reflect well on the B6 club as they continue to persist with their policy of playing home pre-season games at the Bescot.
Regardless, the players in claret and blue didn’t allow this to affect them as the likes of Emi Martinez, Ezri Konsa, Buendia, and Watkins put in some top performances.
It will certainly be interesting to learn exactly why a delay was green-lit, but fans won’t care about this on the back of a hugely impressive pre-season win.
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