On 6 November 2022 a packed house at Villa Park exploded with joy as Aston Villa beat Manchester United on home soil for the first time since 1995.
A dream debut for new head coach Unai Emery, less than a week after the work permit hurdles that delayed his appointment had finally been cleared.
There had been fleeting moments of joy in the past but, for many years, never anything like this. It felt like that the club had finally broken through into the light after years of gloom.
In the dressing room after the match the mood was electric with handshakes, hugs, singing, dancing and the feeling that something new had begun – that the sleeping giant that is Aston Villa had finally been roused from its slumber.
But, amidst the hysteria and the celebrations, Emery and his team were more measured, and Unai’s objective analysis of the triumph was clear.
And he was not happy. Villa had won, but on the players’ terms. It had been an end-to-end affair, chaotic and uncontrolled. This wasn’t the football that Unai had envisioned.
In that one moment he knew that the non-stop, frantic, 100mph football that the fans demanded was the polar opposite of the controlled, patient, measured, deliberate, dominating game that he wanted to put in place at the club.
All Unai and his team had to do was persuade everyone at the club – players, owners, directors, fans – that his was the road the club had to take. And if they did not want it, he would move on. Three years on, he is still there.
