Unai Emery has an impossible choice to make between Ollie Watkins and Jhon Duran, writes TOM COLLOMOSSE – as Aston Villa prepare to bolster their Champions League credentials versus Club Brugge
Unai Emery has stressed all season that the Premier League is Aston Villa’s priority and beating Club Brugge on Wednesday would allow them to focus on it completely.
Villa suffered a mini-wobble by losing to Crystal Palace in the Carabao Cup and then suffering a 4-1 hammering at Tottenham in the league four days later. Extra scrutiny and criticism must be welcomed: if Villa want to reach the elite, they must accept the higher standards that will be expected of them externally.
Another slip-up in Belgium would start to raise real concerns for the first time this season, especially with a trip to Liverpool on the horizon.
Yet Villa’s perfect record in the Champions League so far affords them breathing space and three more points against Brugge would virtually guarantee them a spot in the knockout stages.
In the competition’s new format, nobody can be quite sure of the total needed to progress, yet there is a growing consensus that 15 or 16 points would secure a place in the top eight and an automatic spot in the last 16. By that measure, victory over Brugge would leave Villa needing just three or four more from their final four fixtures.
Liverpool will have an extra day to recover for the clash at Anfield on November 9 and that will surely persuade Emery to tweak his line-up on Wednesday. It is perhaps still too early for Boubacar Kamara or Tyrone Mings to start a top-level match yet both may be granted more minutes from the bench, while – depending on the fitness of Morgan Rogers after the attacker picked up a knock at Spurs – Jhon Duran could replace Ollie Watkins.
Duran was named in the starting XI for Villa’s last European fixture, at home to Bologna last month, and he responded with a goal before throwing a tantrum when he was taken off soon afterwards. The volatile Colombian has eight goals this term and is starting to make an unanswerable case for selection.
Indeed, the time is approaching when Emery will have to choose between Duran and Watkins for the longer term.
The Basque has talked often about finding a way to play them together but has yet to do so. Rogers has been Villa’s most effective forward player this term and moving him from the centre to the wing would weaken the starting line-up.
Both Watkins and Duran are tied to long-term contracts yet both are good enough to be the main man. Though Watkins, 28, is more experienced and has proven himself at Premier League level over four years, Duran is eight years younger and probably has a higher ceiling.
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