In The Times today
‘ Departure of Emery's transfer guru deepens Villa's identity crisis
After transfer window that 'killed' the club, Unai Emery's side have shown little of the fight and organisation that once defined them. Now the head coach has lost a key ally
Charlotte Duncker
The tone for Aston Villa's season was seemingly set before the previous campaign had ended. The club's director of football operations, Damian Vidagany, addressed Villa's end-of-season awards dinner and warned it would be a “difficult” summer — and that was even before they had lost to Manchester United on the final day to miss out on Champions League football.
Unai Emery's trusted aide did not need a crystal ball to foresee the problems that were awaiting the club in the transfer window — a situation that took a turn on Monday night with news that Monchi, another Emery favourite and president of football operations, would be leaving the club. The 57-year-old has been a vital part of Emery's team since arriving at Villa in 2023, forming a power triangle along with Vidagany which made all the key decisions, including on transfers.
It is hard to question the ambition of Villa's owners, who have invested heavily in the squad to take the club from the Championship to the Champions League, but that previous spending has caught up with them.
Senior figures knew they were in trouble with regards to Uefa's squad cost ratio rules (the percentage of a club's income spent on the first-team squad) and had already, in April, started negotiating an agreement that would end with a £9.5million fine in July, plus an acknowledgment that they would need to reduce their wage bill to avoid further fines, and even possible expulsion from European competitions.
That meant the summer transfer window was always going to be challenging for Villa, with a focus on recouping money rather than investing and, most importantly, reducing the wage bill, which had risen above £250million, according to the football finance expert Swiss Ramble, at a wages-to-revenue ratio of 91 per cent.
Marcus Rashford and Marco Asensio, high-profile loan signings last season, left after their deals expired. Jacob Ramsey, the dressing-room favourite and boyhood Villa fan, was sold to Newcastle United for an initial £39million and despite public statements that certain players were not for sale as rivals circled — aware of Villa's vulnerability — there was a possibility that nearly anybody could have been sold if the right offer came in.
It created an air of uncertainty at the club — right up to the last few hours of deadline day. That evening, on September 1, Emiliano Martínez was waiting at Villa's Bodymoor Heath training ground for an offer from Manchester United that never came. The Argentina goalkeeper has since been reintegrated into the squad.
One source described the club as being “trapped” during that transfer window and those private concerns were being made public, with the hierarchy and players speaking openly about financial constraints. Ezri Konsa, the defender, said the window had “killed” Villa.
Whatever the issues, it felt against type for a club led by a head coach who operates a “no excuses” policy to be seemingly getting their excuses in before a ball had even been kicked.
The anxiety off the pitch has translated into poor performances on it in the opening weeks of the season. In the near three years Emery has been at Villa Park, his side have been fiercely competitive, solid and hard to beat. That identity has, for the time being at least, disappeared.
Emery's decision to head down the tunnel before the final whistle in Sunday's 1-1 draw away to Sunderland invited scrutiny, but it was not the failure to defeat a side who played much of the game with ten men that irked him the most — rather, the fact his team were not playing in the manner he demands.
There was at least one positive: Villa are no longer the only team among the 92 without a league goal after Matty Cash ended their drought 67 minutes into game five of the top-flight season, but that was no consolation for Emery, who described Villa's display as “lazy”. He used that word five times in his post-match press conference, to hammer home his point. There is a suggestion that the Spaniard actually meant to say they were slow and that his meaning was lost in translation, but there was still no disguising the head coach's anger.
Having overseen an instant improvement after succeeding Steven Gerrard in October 2022, Emery has guided Villa to fourth and sixth-place finishes in his two full terms in charge, plus run eventual winners Paris Saint-Germain close in last season's Champions League quarter-final. Yet the stats show a marked decline in the early stages of this campaign.
This time last season Villa had scored ten goals, while their shot conversion rate is down to 1.9 per cent from 16.1 per cent after five games in 2024-25. They have had half as many shots on target.
It would be unfair to blame the decline on one player, though Morgan Rogers, the Professional Footballers' Association Young Player of the Year, is struggling to hit the heights of last season, while Ollie Watkins is yet to score. Rather, there are issues all over the pitch. Villa are second-bottom in the Premier League for duels won and 18th for tackles won; there seems to be a lack of fight and stagnation appears to have crept in.
Nine of the starting XI at the Stadium of Light on Sunday were at the club before Emery arrived nearly three years ago. In the draw with Everton a couple of weeks ago, Villa fielded the same back line that Gerrard deployed against Manchester United in January 2022.
Harvey Elliott and Jadon Sancho, both of whom arrived on loan on deadline day, should help to solve those problems in attack, and it takes time to bed into Emery's system. Elliott, for example, who joined from Liverpool, has already come under fire for releasing the ball too quickly.
It is up to Emery to find a solution to this lack of firepower and identity to prevent questions being asked of the 53-year-old. He has done a remarkable job and it is understood that, within the club, there are no doubts about his ability to turn things around.
Emery has been in this position before, albeit not with Villa. In 2015-16, at Sevilla, he failed to win any of his first five league games, losing three and drawing two, but went on to lift the Europa League trophy.
In some ways, the first match of their Europa League campaign, at home to Bologna on Thursday, could not come at a more perfect time. It is a chance for Emery — a three-times winner of that competition — to remind everyone what his team are capable of and quell the sense of unease at Villa Park.
