Soccer
Matty Cash: Aston Villa boss Unai Emery is definitely king of the Europa League
Aston Villa defender Matty Cash hailed manager Unai Emery as “the king” after he guided the club to Europa League glory with a 3-0 victory over Freiburg in Istanbul.
Emery delivered Villa’s first piece of silverware for 30 years after superb first-half strikes from Youri Tielemans and Emiliano Buendia were added to by Morgan Rogers’ close-range finish after the break.
The Spaniard wrote his name in Villa folklore after securing the club a first European title since 1982, and the win means he has now won the Europa League five times – three with Sevilla and one with Villarreal before this latest success.
All of the pre-match build-up centred around whether Emery thought he was ‘king’ of the competition.
The Villa boss was coy in admitting the title, but Cash definitely thinks he is, saying: “The king set the game plan out for us. He clearly is because he’s won it five times.
“He’s so demanding and passionate. We had a meeting today and he told us exactly how the game was going to go, and what they were like.
“He does that much work on the opposition, we knew what positions we were going to get into. The reason why we play like that is because we know what we are doing on the pitch. I’m going to enjoy this tonight.”
Villa have been knocking on the door in Europe over the past couple of seasons after reaching the Conference League semi-finals in 2024 and last eight of the Champions League in 2025.
Cash feels the experience gained from that hurt was important in their victory.
He added: “It’s a big moment for the club. We’ve made history after a long time. The last few years we’ve nearly got there but here we executed the game plan well and looked like we’d played these games before – so happy.
“When you experience these moments as a team it makes you stronger, definitely.
“To get to this point, last year we got beat in the quarter-finals, the year before in the semis. But I think we gained experience from it as a team.”
Aston Villa fans seemingly outnumbered the Freiburg contingent inside Besiktas Park and Cash heaped praise on the support.
“It actually felt like we were playing at home to be honest,” he said. “Incredible. When we were on the way to the stadium, we actually went past loads of Villa fans and that’s when it hit.
“Europa League champions, all the hard work we’ve done to get to this point and the conversations as to how we’d think it would go. The game plan was good, we executed it well and the fans were unbelievable.
“The fans deserve it so much. What Ginny (John McGinn) said, they’ve been to Wigan away, Rotherham away at the lows and have now seen the club at a high.”
Rogers meanwhile was named as the competition’s best player by organisers UEFA on Thursday. The 23-year-old’s display in the final capped a memorable campaign in which he scored two other goals and registered five assists.
Villa were continuing the celebrations on Thursday, returning to Birmingham to parade the trophy around the city.
