HEROES AND VILLANS

A year ago to the day, Aston Villa’s 2024-25 Bigger Cup adventure – one that would take them to a mesmeric quarter-final with eventual winners PSG – started with a 3-0 victory over Young Boys, a performance with more fluidity than a Jamie Carragher drive-by and the Birmingham side’s first game back in Europe’s elite club competition in 41 years. In the next round of Bigger Cup fixtures, Bayern Munich were duly dispatched by Villa in a performance with more fluidity than a Bavarian title parade. Unai Emery could seemingly do no wrong and had everything from Jhon Durán’s left foot to John McGinn’s backside marching to the beat of his drum, with his team and tactics looking more fluid in the season’s early stages than Ozzy Osbourne’s long locks gently rocking in the soft Birmingham breeze (OK, that’s enough – Football Daily Ed).

Fast forward to September 2025 and while most of our attention on Tuesday night was on the bright lights of Bigger Cup, a few savvy onlookers may have noticed Villa scrapping at a bus stop in Hounslow, as Emery’s side continued their dreadful start to this season by going out of Fizzy Cup with a whimper after a penalty shootout defeat at Brentford. On the plus side, Villa did actually score a goal – which is more than can be said for the other four games this season – even if Harvey Elliott’s opener had less to do with dynamic, incisive play and more to do with a botched Brentford backpass and a goalkeeper howler. But after becoming the latest victims of the long throw’s renaissance, with Aaron Hickey bringing the Bees level in the second half, a strong Villa side that featured nearly all of their best players were left to lick their wounds, exiting a very winnable competition in the second round and leaving Emery in something of a pickle.

“I think we’re getting better – there’s still work to do and we’re going to practice,” roared Emery after the Brentford defeat, somewhat reassuringly. “We used in the starting XI some players who joined us in the last moments of the transfer window. They need minutes to get confidence and feel comfortable in our structure, trying to adapt as soon as possible. The press we did with McGinn was really fantastic, and then in 90 minutes we created three or four clear chances and even hit the post with Jadon Sancho.” Which is a very positive way of saying nine other outfield Villa players did not press and certainly a good way to put a shine on a Sancho miss that should have been a simple back-post tap-into an empty net rather than a careful sidefoot on to the outside of Brentford’s post.

Villa fans have not yet resorted to smuggling large arrows into the away end and pointing them at the opposition’s goal, but another blank at Sunderland on Sunday will certainly turn the pressure up on Emery. What a difference a year makes.

LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE

Join Simon Burnton at 8pm (all times BST) for Bigger Cup updates on Liverpool 3-1 Atlético Madrid, while Luke McLaughlin will be on hand at the same time for Bayern Munich 1-1 Chelsea.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

I don’t want to talk about a single player but of course if you sub somebody at half-time you are not pleased with his performance. I will talk to him in person and then it’s up to him to show improvement. That’s it” – Oliver Glasner, there, not wanting to single out Romain Esse for criticism yet somehow managing to magnify his ruthless half-time hooking of his new Crystal Palace midfielder in the Milk Cup win (on penalties) over Millwall.

Qarabag ‘whipping-boy chaff’ (yesterday’s Football Daily). Funny, Bruno Lage thought so too” – Richie Philpott.

Has it ever occurred to my learned friends at Football Daily (OK, our sarcasm antennae is really starting to twitch now – Football Daily Ed) that perhaps one of the reasons three dozen teams are playing a dozen-dozen games in Bigger Cup’s first stage and some people still turn up to watch, is because they actually like football. Whether a particular fixture confirms their own team as crowned champions of Europe is maybe for most fans not of great import. I presume most followers of the ‘whipping-boy chaff’ go for the love of their team and some maybe even for the love of the game. Whilst no doubt generating a fat load of dosh, Uefa’s ‘Swiss Model’ also allows fans to watch more football and see their team play more other teams. Is this such a bad thing? Even if this means enduring ‘meaningless’ fixtures such as last night’s mind-numbing dead-rubber between Juventus and Borussia Dortmund. I also presume that the legendary Algerian goalkeeper Albert Camus enjoyed playing in goal for Racing Universitaire d’Alger, even though he was convinced that life was entirely devoid of meaning” – John Waugh.

Kevin Mac Allister (aka Alexis Mac Allister’s brother) scoring the winner for Union Saint-Gilloise away at PSV gives me the excuse to bring out one of my favourite, pointless pieces of trivia. He is named after the Kevin McCallister character in Home Alone played by Macaulay Culkin but he wasn’t aware of it and used to joke about the coincidence whenever it was mentioned, until he found out from his parents when he was 18 that he actually was named after him. To quote the great Philip Larkin, ‘They mess* you up, your mum and dad.’ The language has been changed as the original is far too rude, but Larkin was bang on …” – Noble Francis.

Re: ‘There’s a tradition in the Mediterranean, especially in Greece and Cyprus, of doing some olive oil really early in the season. It’s not new. It’s thousands of years old’ (Tuesday’s breakout section – full email edition). That endless Peloponnesian war between Athens and Sparta was sparked by a disputed offside call, it turns out” – Mike Slattery

If you have any, please send letters to [email protected]. Today’s winner of our letter o’ the day is … Richie Philpott, who wins some Football Weekly merch. Terms and conditions for our competitions are here. 

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