Europa League round of 16: Lille v Aston Villa match preview and team news

Villa's Europa League round of 16 tie gets underway with a first leg away at Lille

Aston Villa aren’t shying away from their ambitions this season. They want to return to the Champions League and they want to win a trophy. That’s what I want too so I guess it’s fair enough as a set of objectives.

Villa have slumped in the Premier League, though, and that doubles the pressure on their Europa League campaign, er, twice. I’m not great at maths. Let’s just say it’s very important that Villa stay in Europe.

The nature of the Europa League knock-out rounds means the pressure’s on. With this competition forming such a large part of the club’s goal for 2025/26, it doesn’t bear thinking about that it could be all over in the space of 180 minutes over eight days.

As such, it’s getting close to shit-or-bust time for Unai Emery and his team. If they can come away from Lille with an advantage, they’ll have a great chance of moving into the quarter-finals after next week’s second leg at Villa Park.