Unai Emery outlines Rashford and Watkins plan and urges Aston Villa supporters to help his team ‘create history’ against PSG | OneFootball

Aston Villa boss Unai Emery says he would like to play with a strike partnership of Ollie Watkins and Marcus Rashford this season.

Villa host PSG in the second leg of their Champions League quarter final on Tuesday, trailing 3-1 on aggregate following their first-leg defeat.

Rashford, on loan at Villa until the end of the season from Manchester United, has been preferred to Watkins in the starting striker role in the last two games – including the first-leg against PSG.

But Watkins came off the bench to score for Villa in their 3-0 win over Southampton on Saturday and Emery says he envisages pairing the two together as a strike partnership.

Rashford and Watkins have played together in seven different games for Villa, but largely with Rashford as a winger and Watkins as the striker.

“He (Watkins) showed us he is feeling fantastic,” Emery said. “He is scoring goals. He played 30 minutes performing really well [against Southampton].

“This is the variety we have with our players. We have to try to use their quality to help the team – be it 30 minutes, 10 minutes or five minutes. That is the mentality we need

“The next step, if I have time, is to play them together.

“We did with Rashford playing left side but now we are choosing more with both playing as strikers. That’s the next step. I want to practice, I want to test but not now, with enough time.”

Villa face an enormous task to overturn a 3-1 deficit but Emery is optimistic of his side’s chances and urged the fans to help his team “create history”.

“We played how we wanted to at Paris St-Germain but the result obviously wasn’t what we hoped for,” he said.

“Our objective is to play with one strong plan in our tactical way tomorrow and try to be consistent and try to understand how the match is going in 90 minutes.

“When we were winning at Club Brugge also, we were ready to play extra time. Our plan is the same that if we are getting extra time, that’s good and if we are getting a penalty shootout, that’s fantastic as well.

“I have experiences of comebacks. Both positive and negative.

“But now, it’s something different. We want to write the history of Aston Villa. Last year in the Conference League, this year in the Champions League and hopefully for years to come in Europe.

“we will be connecting with our supporters and transmitting the energy. More or less, if we do, tactically and individually, good things on the field, the supporters are going to up our energy and help us a lot.

“They are going to transmit that energy always for our players.”