Even though Aston Villa beat Lille 2-1 in last night’s first leg of the Conference League quarter-finals, the French side don’t see that as a very bad result.
They now sound confident that they can overcome Unai Emery’s side next week, and Nabil Bentaleb has something to say about that.
The midfielder was interviewed by RMC Sport after the match, and in quotes brought by Le Petit Lillois, he insists they’ll be ready to beat Aston Villa in France.
“We knew they were dangerous from set-pieces and they showed that tonight. We’ve given ourselves a good opportunity to do something next Thursday. We knew they were going to set the pace for this match. They got into the game well, we didn’t get into it as well. But we still controlled the match,” said Bentaleb.
Lille and Aston Villa will face each other at the Pierre-Mauroy stadium next Thursday, and we’ll see if the French side will be able to back up the talk and get qualification for the semifinals.
Even though Unai Emery’s side certainly want to make a big campaign in the Conference League, we can’t forget the fact that they’re now 5th in the Premier League and fighting for a place in the Champions League next season.
So they’ll be fully focused on the match they have against Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium on Sunday, and only then turn their focus back to Lille.
