Unai Emery spoke to reporters at Bodymoor Heath on Thursday afternoon to preview Aston Villa's fifth round FA Cup tie against Cardiff City.
The club's manager referenced the prestige of the competition and the squad's focus on achieving their objectives as he spoke ahead of the game.
Here's what he had to say...
On the importance of the FA Cup...
“It’s a way for a trophy and it’s a way for Europe. The winner is playing next year in the Europa League.
“We have three ways [to get into Europe]: Premier League, Champions League and FA Cup. We are not contenders in FA Cup to win this trophy.
“To try to compete in this competition and to have a way for a trophy is very important. And then prestige. Every player, the club, the coaches – everybody would like one way trying to get prestige as well.”
On Villa’s run in the competition…
“We are being consistent in this competition this year. At home against West Ham and Tottenham we played a great two matches and we won.
“Tomorrow is another opportunity to keep being consistent. Our demands are in different ways, individually and collectively, to get confidence, get comfortable, try to transmit to our supporters our wishes in this competition.
“We are not contenders, but in case we can continue in this competition we are going to be closer to competing for something important.”
On his side’s busy schedule…
“We’re focusing on every competition, focusing on each match and how the players are recovering after playing a lot of minutes. We’re looking at how we can adapt the new players in our structure.
“Our focus every day is to prepare each match and how we can create and build again our structure tactically, trying to get comfortable with the players in their position in our structure.
“This is the task we have now. We’re playing matches, but hopefully we can play a lot of matches this season and next year as well.”
On Cardiff City…
“Firstly, we have respect for the competition. Secondly, we respect every team that is competing in this round.
“Of course, Cardiff is a Championship team, but we have our own experiences two years ago with Stevenage for example. We weren’t being successful last year and two years ago.
“We are playing at home in Villa Park and we have to feel strong. To be consistent is our challenge.
“Through the respect of the competition and the opposing teams, we will start being consistent and then building our team again with our new players and some tactical changes to help our players feel comfortable in our structure – that’s the first objective I have.
“Through it, we can play better and be consistent. Tomorrow, this is our challenge, individually and collectively, in this competition, the FA Cup, respecting the opponent and trying to build our structure as strong as possible with the opportunity we have tomorrow.”
