Overview
Coach Unai Emery hopes the Europa League will bring a familiar comfort to Aston Villa. The Villa Park team is having trouble before hosting Bologna in the opening match of the Europa League.
The 1-1 draw with Sunderland at least helped Villa score the first goal of this year's Premier League season. However, they have not won any and only have 3 points in hand.
The 2025-2026 season is only the fourth time in history that Villa have launched a campaign without winning a single match in their first five games.
Matty Cash's goal against Sunderland was only Villa's second goal in all competitions this season, despite them having taken a total of 64 shots. Their conversion rate is only 3.1% - the lowest among the 20 Premier League clubs this season.
Emery hopes the Europa League will bring comfort to Aston Villa. The Spaniard holds the record with four championships (3 with Sevilla, 1 with Villarreal) and 56 wins, the most in the competition's history. He is also the coach with the most captains in the Europa League with 93 matches, and has reached the finals in all 5 of the most complete campaigns.
However, Aston Villa do not often feature in this competition. Last season, a controversial defeat to Manchester United in the final round cost them a place in the Champions League to Newcastle due to a poor goal difference.
In that match, Emiliano Martinez was sent off in the first half, while Morgan Rogers' opening goal was disallowed after a controversial collision with goalkeeper Altay Bayindir.
Emery was extremely angry at Villa's loss of a chance to return to the Champions League. However, they still reached the quarter-finals of the Champions League last season and only stopped because champions Paris St-Germain with a dramatic total score of 4-5.
Villa have scored 23 goals in the league, their best in a single European campaign. And Emery hopes to revive this form when he joins Bologna at Villa Park.
On the other side, Bologna also participated in the Champions League last season but stopped right from the group stage, winning only 1/8 matches and ranking 28th out of 36 teams. The Coppa Italia championship - their first major trophy since 1974 - has helped them qualify for this season's Europa League. This is also the first time Bologna have participated in the European Cup in two consecutive seasons since 1998-1999 and 1999-20 in the UEFA Cup.
Hero Dan Ndoye, who scored the decisive goal in the Coppa Italia final against Milan, has parted ways with Bologna to move to Nottingham Forest. Jonathan Rowe was brought in from Marseille as a replacement, but Bologna's attack is still questioned about its effectiveness.
Last weekend, coach Vincenzo Italiano's team defeated Genoa 2-1 in Serie A, thanks to a penalty in the 99th minute by Riccardo Orsolini.
Vincenzo Italiano hopes the recent victory will give Bologna more confidence, especially when his team has just had 2 consecutive wins at home in Serie A. This is the first time they have done so since a series of 6 consecutive wins from January to March.
In the match against Genoa, Bologna were without Nicolo Casale, Tommaso Pobega, Ibrahim Sulemana and Ciro Immobile. This quartet will likely not be able to return for the encounter with Villa.
On the Aston Villa side, Emery will not have the services of Youri Tielemans and Amadou Onana, while Victor Lindelof could return.
Head-to-head record
This will be the second consecutive season that Aston Villa have faced Bologna in the European arena. In the most recent meeting, in the Champions League group stage last season, Emery's team won 2-0 at Villa Park.
John McGinn and Jhon Duran scored in the victory last October, thereby extending Bologna's streak of 4 consecutive away losses in European cups. This is the first time in history that they have suffered such a series of bad results.
The Serie A side have also failed to win in their last five European games against English opposition (D1 L4) since a 1-0 win over Leeds United in March 1967, a year in a draw with United.
Predicted result: Aston Villa 2-1 Bologna
The match between Aston Villa and Bologna takes place at 2:00 am on September 26 (Vietnam time).
