Former Aston Villa director of football Monchi has admitted he didn’t have the “strength” to carry on the project at the club.
El Desmarque have comments from the director of football today after he sat down for a big interview with them this week.
He’s been talking about his exit from Aston Villa for most of this month. He left his role at Villa Park on September 23rd in surprising circumstances.
He’d been with the club since 2023, moving from Sevilla to reunite with Unai Emery after their previous successes together. He was tasked with working alongside his fellow Spaniard to keep Aston Villa on an upward trajectory. They’re targeting a regular place in the Champions League.
Last season proved to be a difficult one, though, in which they missed out on that aim. An even more difficult summer followed thanks to PSR and FFP rules limited Aston Villa’s ability to strengthen.
Questions were asked about Monchi as a result. He also had split loyalties after saving his boyhood club CD San Fernando from oblivion. Indeed, he is now solely focused on them as their president.
Now he admits that there was a feeling at Aston Villa that he didn’t have the strength to carry the project forwards.
“It’s been a complicated summer. A difficult summer, where we’ve had to be very imaginative when planning due to many circumstances,” he said.
“After two very successful years, both financially and sportingly, I think all parties saw, visualized, that the next steps perhaps needed a little more strength. I was already a little short.
“We had a very friendly conversation with two people who had known each other many years ago, both Unai and I. And then with the ownership, we felt it was time.”
