Emery relishing Bayern Munich challenge

Unai Emery was in front of the cameras on Tuesday afternoon to preview Aston Villa v Bayern Munich.

The club’s manager spoke about his ambition to be competitive in the UEFA Champions League, his team news for the game, the threat posed by the German side and the coaching career of Vincent Kompany.

Here are the key lines from his press conference…

On his team news…

“The injured players, I know it’s the worst for them. Every player wants to play in the Champions League and matches like this. We have to accept it.

“I want the best players on the field tomorrow and I want to face their best players. I want to play with our best players, accepting that we have some players injured. We’re ready to compete.”

On Matty Cash, he added: “Matty’s started training with us but for tomorrow he’s not ready to even play one minute.

“He’s not going to be available for tomorrow. Boubacar Kamara and Tyrone Mings are training with us but they are not going to play tomorrow.

On his message to the players…

“Hopefully we can play more times in the Champions League, but it’s the first match after a long time. It’s a new competition for us because before it was the European Cup.

“We’re motivated and excited to play tomorrow with our supporters in Villa Park in this scenario, this match, remembering the final of the European Cup played against them 42 years ago.

“Now, in this moment in our process we have to try to play one match more. It’s against one of the best teams in the world and maybe they’re favourites with another three or four teams to win this competition.

“I want to play matches like this and I want to play consistently matches like this. In the Premier League we are facing teams like them, favourites – Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal – that can win this competition this year. They are favourites with other teams like Bayern Munich.

“Playing in Europe, we are very, very happy to face Bayern at home and hopefully we can enjoy tomorrow. Hopefully we can compete and show our best against them.”

On Vincent Kompany…

“I knew him last year here with Burnley, but his career is very recognised as a player, as a professional in football. As a coach, he started two or three years ago and he worked with Pep Guardiola in Manchester City.

“More or less, he’s been successful so quickly. With his experiences and the experience of working with Guardiola, everything I watch of him as a coach, in Burnley and now with Bayern Munich, is really huge work.

“I think he’s a coach that has a very good future and he started being successful with Burnley when he got promoted. Last year was difficult with Burnley at the beginning, favourites to get relegated. He didn’t achieve to keep them in the Premier League, but I always respect him a lot as a coach because the two matches we played were very difficult.

“With Bayern Munich and the players they have, I think it’s easier to get the level they will want to have in their league and in the Champions League. They have started winning matches with very good results, playing very well.

“Tomorrow, I know it’s a big challenge for us to try to stop them. We have to be competitive, adapt to their tactical idea and try to impose our game plan.”

On playing Bayern Munich…

“It’s a challenge for myself. I told the players yesterday after the match we played on Sunday that we’re playing in England against the best teams in the world. We are playing consistently and showing our capacity against them.

“Now we are going to face one of the best teams in Europe. At the beginning, we played Young Boys and we are playing Bayern Munich. We are going to play Bologna, Juventus – maybe Juventus and Bayern Munich are two teams on the same level as Manchester United, Tottenham or Liverpool.

“My expectation is to try to compete, facing them being competitive and getting our best performances with the possibility to get good results.”