Why Bologna manager is 'not happy' before Aston Villa as huge Champions League opportunity knocks

Aston Villa take on Bologna on Tuesday night for their third Champions League league phase clash

Aston Villa have the chance to take a big step towards qualifying for the Champions League knockouts when they host Bologna at Villa Park on Tuesday night (8pm kick-off).

Having beaten BSC Young Boys and Bayern Munich, Villa are targeting their third successive victory in the competition against a Serie A side who have struggled for form this term. In fact, Bologna have only won one of their first 10 games in all competitions, which came at early strugglers Monza last month.

However, they are also unbeaten in eight of those matches, only tasting defeat in away games at Napoli and Liverpool. Despite that, Villa have been installed as firm favourites against the Rossoblu, who have failed to beat the likes of Udinese, Empoli, Como, Parma and Genoa in the opening two months of their season after losing their manager and key players in the summer.

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Thiago Motta joined Juventus as their new boss following the sacking of Massimiliano Allegri, while Bologna also sold Riccardo Calafiori to Arsenal, Joshua Zirkzee to Manchester United and Marko Arnautovic to Inter.

New manager Vincenzo Italiano left Fiorentina in the summer after becoming the first manager in their history to reach back-to-back European finals. They lost to West Ham in the Europa Conference League in 2023 and then to Olympiacos - who knocked Villa out in the semi-final stage - last season.

Bologna have a few injury concerns heading into the game with Villa as Martin Erlic, Michel Aebischer, Lewis Ferguson and Oussama El Azzouzi all missed the 2-2 draw with Genoa on Saturday. Forwards Dan Ndoye and Villa loanee Samuel Iling-Junior also missed their last match, but returned to training at Casteldebole on Sunday.

"Aebischer has an adductor problem, Ndoye is tired, Erlic has an injury, Iling has a condition with his collateral ligament, these are discomforts that will take time to go away," Italiano said before their clash against Genoa. "We need to start drawing energy and performance from some guys who have given less and had little space, we needed to wait for them.

"I knew and I know that there can be difficulties on this journey, you've seen what happens, you're missing important players, you think something and are proven wrong by something that happens. I'm just sorry for this situation. We have a lot of commitments over 20 days - and I’m not happy about it."

He added: "I hope to recover someone like Ndoye [to face Villa], but let's focus on the league and tomorrow's match."

Bologna were on track to claim only their second win of the season against Genoa as they were leading by two goals at the break, but blew their advantage after conceding in the 73rd and 85th minute.

"Two incidents condemn us," Italiano said after full-time. "It’s a shame because at 2-0 we can’t throw ourselves away like that, we would really need a win but I want to try to focus above all on the many positive things seen today.

"We worked very hard in the first half, without conceding anything; then I’m particularly sorry for that mistake by Casale who had played a great match up until that point. An intense period awaits us, in which we always play on Saturday and Tuesday, we wanted to start with the three points but it wasn’t possible."

If Villa can maintain their 100 per cent in the Champions League this week, they will be mighty close to at least securing a place in the knockout play-offs. Opta analysis found that 10 points will as good as guarantee a place in the top 24, with 99 per cent of 50,000 simulations conducted seeing teams on 10 points make it into the play-off round.

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