Morgan Rogers lifts lid on Unai Emery meeting and makes bold Aston Villa claim ahead of PSG clash
Aston Villa have a deficit to make up against Paris Saint-Germain on Tuesday night (8pm kick-off)
Morgan Rogers believes that if any team can overturn a two-goal deficit against Paris Saint-Germain, it’s Aston Villa.
Confidence is high at Bodymoor Heath ahead of the Champions League quarter-final second leg against the French champions.
Rogers gave Villa an unexpected lead at the Parc des Princes last week, before Désiré Doué equalised just before half-time.
Khvicha Kvaratskhelia then turned the game around, scoring PSG’s second of the night shortly after the restart, before Nuno Mendes made it 3-1 in second-half stoppage time.
“There’s massive belief,” Rogers claimed. “Most people wrote us off before the tie. The first leg I think we gave a pretty good account of ourselves.
“Of course there are details and areas we want to improve and learn from but ultimately we know what they’re like now we’ve played them and we’re more comfortable in that sense of having already played them.
“We know there’s a task at hand. But we’re excited, under the lights at home, playing in the quarter-finals of this competition. There are not many places better to be. If anyone’s going to turn it around, it’s going to be us. We’re excited for the challenge."
He added: “In the position we’re in, the second leg being at home is massive for us. We can create our own atmosphere. We have done it this season in the big games, not just in the Champions League but in our big league games as well.
“They’re a massive push and boost for us. That energy, that feeling, that vibe is sometimes bigger than the actual game. That’s what drives you on … you can forget about all the tactics or the intricate stuff we’re going to work on, sometimes it’s just about that sheer energy and heart and determination within the stadium.
“Sometimes that can be just enough to pull you through tough moments and get you to where you need to go. We need every bit of support and we’ll feed off that 100 per cent."
Villa’s defeat at PSG ended a seven-match winning run in all competitions, before they then won 3-0 at Southampton to boost their hopes of finishing in the top five this season.
“We had a meeting when all the new players came in and we knew that was the squad for the rest of the season,” Rogers said about Villa's strong recent form. “The manager just said listen, no matter what happened before, we are here. In each competition he told us where we were and who we were playing.
“He told us this was the most important bit of the season. We still had a chance to turn things around. We knew we had to go on the run, we knew we had to start winning games pretty quickly and catch up to certain teams that we wanted to.
“It was just a conversation in that sense that we knew we had the next few tough months coming ahead, the games were coming thick and fast and they're going to be massive games with a lot on the line.
“I think the way the squad has come together, you could not have imagined how quickly it's all gelled together and how players off the bench are making an impact as well as starting because it's difficult.
“We've got a competitive squad that can compete on all fronts and you don't know who's going to play. We all come into training the day before the game and sometimes the day of the game and we don't know who's playing. It could be anyone, a flip of a coin at this moment in time, but that's the ability of the squad that we probably haven't had in the last year or so that we've finally got now.
“That's why I think the performances are so strong, just because we've got so many options. People can stay a bit more fresh and we're all competing but we all want to win and we all want to get to the same goal.
“That's massive and I think the manager bringing us in together, getting us aligned on the same path and knowing that if you're not starting, we've not got time to care about it, in the sense of we've got places we want to get to and we've got ambition. There's no time for it.
“To be fair the boys have been excellent, even if they've been playing or not playing, they've been disappointed, been out a few games, they've come in and done what they need to do and done their jobs and that's massive.”
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