At A Glance
Aston Villa’s Europa Conference League group stage campaign begins against Legia Warszawa in Poland on Thursday night.
After seeing off Hibernian in the play-off round, the Villans will look to make a strong start in Group E, which also includes AZ Alkmaar and Zrinjski Mostar.
Unai Emery’s team head into the game on the back of a rousing comeback against Crystal Palace at Villa Park on Saturday, fighting back to claim a 3-1 win in the Premier League.
Legia came through three rounds of qualifiers to reach the group stage, overcoming Ordabasy, Austria Vienna and FC Midtjylland.
Their European progress has gone hand-in-hand with a strong start to their league campaign, where they’re unbeaten after six Ekstraklasa matches.
Legia sit third in the standings after winning four and drawing two of their matches, including a 1-1 draw against Piast Gliwice on Saturday.
European Pedigree
Legia have been regulars in various competitions since their first appearance in the European Cup in 1956.
Their best performance remains reaching the semi-finals of the European Cup in 1970, while more recently they got to the quarter-finals of the Champions League in 1996.
Legia came up against Leicester City on their last appearance in Europe in 2021/22 when they were drawn alongside the Foxes in the Europa League group stage.
Ron Saunders guided Aston Villa into Europe for the first time in 1975 and the club have appeared in European competitions during 17 seasons.
Saunders led Villa to the quarter-final of the European Cup in 1981/82 before leaving the club mid-season. Tony Barton took over and guided the team to the final, where they overcame Bayern Munich 1-0 on a famous night in Rotterdam. They also collected the European Super Cup a few months later.
Appearances in the UEFA Cup, Intertoto Cup and Europa League have followed, but this is the club’s first foray into Europe since 2010.
Legia’s Last Outing
Legia fought back to draw 1-1 against Piast Gliwice in the Ekstraklasa on Saturday.
Warszawa went down to ten men when captain Josue was shown a second yellow card in the final minutes of a goalless first half.
And things got worse when Sergei Krykun gave the hosts the lead shortly after the restart.
But Legia salvaged a point thanks to Muci’s equaliser on 69 minutes.
Team News
Jacob Ramsey and Alex Moreno have both travelled with the squad to Poland, but Emery was non-committal over whether the pair will feature.
Tyrone Mings, Emi Buendia, Tim Iroegbunam, Bertrand Traore and Diego Carlos remain sidelined.
For Legia, Bartosz Kapustka, Filip Rejczyk and Rafał Augustyniak have been ruled out.
The Bosses
“To be in Europe, with some of the titles I’ve won, is important for me, but football is about now. It’s not about the past – the past is only to take experiences and use those experiences to be help me to do something again. I respect a lot every team and every coach. Legia Warszawa are playing very well and they have a very good defensive structure. They’re going to be very, very excited and are going to play to their best football capacity. We have to be ready for it.”
Unai Emery
“We all like watching the Premier League. It's the equivalent of the NBA in basketball. Unai Emery is an amazing coach. When I started my coaching career 18 years ago, one of my first internships was at Aston Villa. Now I have the opportunity to play against this team. This makes me extremely proud. Coach Unai Emery has experience in European competitions. Just look at the value of the England team. Our rivals have amazing players and a coach with a great past on the bench. Tomorrow we will have a kind of duel between David and Goliath. I'm very excited and can't wait.”
Kosta Runjaić
