Aston Villa fear Arsenal, Saliba repeat as Premier League title challenge takes major hit | OneFootball

Ollie Watkins limped off for Aston Villa in a Europa League match he really did not need to start. Unai Emery has shot himself in the foot.

With a spot in the Europa League last 16 secured last week, Aston Villa, who are third in the Premier League, level with Manchester City and four behind Arsenal, could afford to rest their best players against Red Bull Salzburg on Sunday. Yet, Watkins started.

It was a risk not worth taking.

Villa supporters will argue that if Watkins didn’t play, who could come in for him? Literally anyone, lads. Wrap him up in cotton wool and let a kid play. Or Harvey Elliott as a false-nine. It simply was not worth it. Not in any way.

Even if he didn’t get injured, you would still question why he wasn’t given a rest, especially with a lack of depth behind him following the departure or Donyell Malen and impending departure of Evann Guessand.

Tammy Abraham has joined, which is lovely, but he’s only just through the door and might not be enough, especially if Watkins is out for a while. If you weren’t aware, Abraham was ineligible for the Europa League league phase.

And if you want to argue that feeling forced to start Watkins wasn’t Emery shooting himself in the foot, he – or the club – is the reason there was no choice having sanctioned the Malen and Guessand transfers.

The bigger picture is that the outlook of Aston Villa’s season is a lot different than before kick off.

Winning the Europa League is more realistic than the Premier League and an injury to Watkins shouldn’t derail their progression in that competition, but it threatens to damage their title challenge.

It’s worth saying that we have no idea how significant his injury is. Nobody does at this stage. He mouthed ‘hamstring’ when he limped off in the first half, and that doesn’t bode well.

It shouldn’t be months, but weeks is still pretty rubbish, innit? If it does have a negative effect on Villa’s push for the Premier League title, it will be reminiscent of the injury Arsenal’s William Saliba picked up in the Europa League in 2022/23.

Arsenal would go on an awful run and ultimately bottle winning the title after leading for the entirety of the campaign with Saliba and Gabriel Magalhaes at centre-back, and the January signing of Jakub Kiwior couldn’t fill the void.

At least Abraham is an experienced and Premier League-proven option in comparison to young centre-back Kiwior who Mikel Arteta didn’t want to throw into the deep end, prefering Rob Holding. That aged well.

Saliba playing against Sporting in the Europa League wasn’t worth it with so much on the line in the league. Watkins starting against Salzburg was even more pointless, thus an even bigger risk.

His replacement being Morgan Rogers was wild. Thankfully for Emery and Villa, he came through the Salzburg match unscathed and influenced a brilliant comeback victory.

Watkins was replaced in the 35th minute, two minutes after the Austrian side took the lead through Karim Konate.

It was a Konate goal, but it was all down to Tyrone Mings, whose brainfart in his own box presented the ball to Edmund Baidoo to square it for the easiest of finishes.

Mings would make amends with a goal in the second half but Villa made it very difficult for themselves by going two down despite the unnecessary strength of their starting XI.

Rogers’ 64th-minute strike got the comeback underway, and fittingly, it was two youngsters given a rare chance who won the game for Aston Villa after Mings’ equaliser.

Substitutes Kadan Young and Jamaldeen Jimoh-Aloba combined with three minutes remaining to earn Villa a win that doesn’t mean too much in the grand scheme of things, but means the world to those two young men.

It was an unforgettable moment for Jimoh-Aloba and a very tidy finish to boot.

That will be the story of the night for so many Villa fans and undoubtedly the biggest positive, but the glass-half-empty in us can’t deviate from the Watkins situation and how Emery’s crazy risk could cost the Villans in the long run.