Words by Tom Longmore | Published 31.03.2026All football fans will have witnessed their team win, lose or draw. Some lucky ones will have seen their captain hoist aloft a trophy at Wembley, feel the euphoria that promotion brings or the abject failure of relegation. Been there during the lows of near bankruptcy, scandals or away trips where the home crowds really are only one man and his dog. It is the lot of a football fan.
Sometimes things will be bad, the fall seeming much harder than the rise. Apocalyptically bad in some cases. Other times, maybe only fleeting, things will be good. Ecstatically good. Immense pleasure lifting you to a place that is euphoric and wonderful and to be cherished, because once it’s gone, it’s gone, and for how long, no supporter will ever know.
There comes a time in every supporter’s life, though, when everything clicks into place. Sometimes it is defined by success with cup runs or league titles or furores into Europe. Other times it is defined by watching those players that make you rise up, leaving behind the snapback of the plastic seats as the stadium is lifted towards the skies.
These times only happen at that moment when all the planets and stars, creating unbridled joy that is immeasurable at the time and yearned for after it has gone. It can be brief, seeming to last only a moment, disappearing from your memory as quickly as it came. A more sustained form of this joy is when a manager walks into your club, and maybe not instantly, but eventually, they find a way to win and drag you, and everyone at the club, along with them.
Sir Alex Ferguson took a little bit of time, but his success at United will probably never be repeated. Brian Clough at Nottingham Forest. Arsene Wenger at Arsenal. Jose Mourinho at Chelsea. In fact, he could be seen to have done it a few times. Pep at Manchester City. Same as Jose. These guys walked into a club and lifted them to such a height that the whole place became a beacon of light. The city, and town, exploded.
There must be scientific studies somewhere that quantify the effect of a successful football team on a place and I’m sure if you stuck the data into a spreadsheet and asked it to spit out charts and graphs then all of them would be off the scale. Wrexham is a great example. Hollywood takeover. Money poured in. Promotion, after promotion, after promotion.
The town is lifted to such a state of disbelief and joy that only football can bring. Money brought into the town. People coming to visit. Wrexham became a worldwide phenomenon from the depths of obscurity where fans used to turn up and watch part time players, to now seeing a multitude of stars grace their famous ground. But most of all, the resounding feeling of the residents is one of pride and passion and joy.
For me, an Aston Villa fan since 1992, I’ve seen rare glimpses of this. Ron Atkinson’s first season in the Premier League finishing agonisingly close to rewriting history but falling short to Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United. John Gregory sitting top of the table in December only to fall away like an avalanche in the new year. Brian Little winning the Worthington Cup. Martin O’Neill threatening the status quo of the top four.
But none of them were sustainable. None of them really felt like good times, or overachieving, or that they were not tinged with this emotion that eventually they would stop. And stop they did. While all those managers found a formula to win, none of them found a formula that would last.
Martin O'Neill managed Aston Villa from 2006 to 2010.
Photo Credit: BBC SportDon’t get me wrong, I’ve tasted success sat at the old Wembley in uncomfortable wooden seats, cheering on two League Cup wins. I’ve seen us win the lottery of the play-offs coined by some as the richest game in football. But take those out of the equation, I’ve seen far more mediocre football in my lifetime. Mediocre football that saw us drop out of the Premier League after years of struggle and poor management.
Think Joleon Lescott and his ‘pocket’ car tweet. Think Steve Bruce stood outside Ross McCormack’s house banging on his gates to get to training. And think Alec McCleish arriving from Birmingham City with every fan saying this is a bad idea for a whole host of reasons. But then, when everyone thought it was lost, Unai Emery walked through the door, and everything felt just that little bit lighter.
When you think of the Basque Country in Spain you think of food, culture and a place of fierce independence. Often overlooked is that it is a hot bed for football management talent. Look around; Mikel Arteta, Andoni Iraola, Xabi Alonso and four times Europa League winner Unai Emery. There is something in the tapas there driving a passionate enthusiasm for winning, and that enthusiasm is conquering top football leagues around Europe.
Maybe it’s just a coincidence, or maybe that fierce independence drives a passion for winning. Whatever it is, I’m thankful for whatever they did to Unai to make him the way he is.
And the way he is was not from a playing career that saw hundreds of appearances, and goals and trophies. He was one of the ones who got injured a lot. Didn’t play a lot. Never set the world on fire but instead stood in the pecking order behind players with far greater skillsets. And I think this has driven most managers in his situation to where they are now. The need to look at what happens after your career before your career even got started. Look at the legends of the game.
Wayne Rooney, Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard, Frank De Boer, Alan Shearer. I could go on and name footballers who were superstars, never able to turn that into sustained success in management. Their careers never looked like coming to an end, so they never had to plan for what was next. Players like Unai had to look closer at the detail. Work out routes and strategies that would get him to where he wanted to be. Get him to be successful on a football pitch in one way or another. Rooney, Lampard and Gerrard never had to fight at the details, they were the details. Unai had to fight at everything.
Now, I’m sure you will have noticed that Unai hasn’t won anything. Villa aren’t smashing through cups and league titles and European finals. But take a look at where we came from and you’ll see the difference Unai has made. Steven Gerrard’s stock was falling drastically, and form wise we would have been in a relegation battle at the very least, if not relegated.
With the same set of players Unai lifted us to a respectable seventh placed finish. He lost only 6 out of 25 games, compared to Gerrard’s 6 out of 11. Qualification for the Europa Conference league was secured, when relegation was almost certain months before.
Unai Emery started his career as a manager with Lorca Deportiva, who ceased to exist in 2012.
Photo Credit: La Vozde GaliciaIn his first full season, we finished 4th. Champions League qualification this time, when we weren’t even considered in the conversation for the ‘Big 6’. 6th in the next campaign, only on goal difference, with some very dodgy refereeing at Old Trafford keeping us out of consecutive seasons at the top table in Europe. A season that saw us play 57 competitive games, missing out on an FA Cup final and best summed up by a Champions League quarter final against eventual winners Paris Saint Germain. Down 3-1 from the first leg, Villa Park went even quieter when PSG grabbed two early goals.
We needed four to draw level. Villa grabbed three goals and almost a fourth that would have given them extra time. Thought Unai’s eternal philosophy was under pressure, the players turned up for him. They never gave up; a value he has instilled into them from day one. I have no doubt that if we had grabbed another, PSG would have been so shellshocked, we would have gone on to win that game. Highs and lows.
And as I write this, we sit fourth, after a disastrous start to the season where we didn’t score until the fifth game. Still in the Europa League and a glorious chance to compete in next seasons Champions League for the second time in three seasons when the last time we competed in it was back in 1982. Form has dropped off thanks to injuries to our midfield engine room but even through that we are still in with a chance to do something special.
Putting all these results into perspective is something I can hear people shouting as they read this but really if you do, you see the genius of the man. The highest win percentage of any Villa manager. Most consecutive home wins. First win over Manchester United at home in 27 years. Fastest Villa manager to 200 points. First Villa boss in the Premier League era to reach 300+ goals. Qualification for European competition in every season he’s finished at the club. Most home points in the Premier League era. Most points in a Premier League season. Most wins in a calendar year. Fastest Villa manager to a century of wins. And there are more.
But the most important for my argument is the win percentage. This club is over 150 years old so to hold that record, even through Aston Villa’s massively successful start in life, is phenomenal. And it isn’t just the way we are winning games. It isn’t the fact that Unai has spent very little money compared to teams around him. And it isn’t the case that winning in the Premier League now has become so difficult because of the quality of even the worst team in the league. It’s the manner of how he and his team go about it.
Unai has total control. He has been given free reign to do what he thinks is best for the football club. Players who had been brought in who don’t make the grade are cut. Àlex Moreno, Donyell Malen, Jhon Duran. They didn’t fit in with what Unai wanted and so they were shown the door. His work ethic for himself and the team are key to what he wants to achiev; key in the way that he knows that the value of his resources are much lower than most other clubs and yet he knows that if he extracts the most from everyone, including himself, he can upset the order. He demands it.
He will take nothing less in his search for success. One foot in the wrong place and he’s at you like a jack-in-the-box, pacing the technical area waiting to pounce at any moment. Words of encouragement when you compete even if it doesn’t work out. Screaming and flailing arm movements if you don’t. Unai gives everything. He expects the same in return.
Emery is known for how animated he can be on the touchline.
Photo Credit: Radio News HubChanging a relegation-threatened team into a European qualifier has taken some adjustments. A backline that works itself high, forming a diamond with a ball player at all points, one of the number 6’s dropping to allow the full backs space to become wingers. Allowing Morgan Rogers the room to play outside or inside.
Cutting through the lines with the other number 6 playing key forward passes. Triangles all over the pitch. And just think about who he has worked with at Villa. John McGinn, Ezri Konsa, Ollie Watkins, Emi Martinez, Matty Cash, Boubacar Kamara and Douglas Luiz. All of these players were at the club before Unai and all of them are excelling now more than ever.
You know your team is low on confidence when you notice that players are too scared to have the ball. Too scared to play risky passes in case they lose it and incur the wrath of an impatient fanbase. They hide. They give the ball to someone else like it’s a hot potato. Trust me, I’ve seen it many times. When your team is playing well, everyone on the pitch wants the ball.
They want to play those killer passes because they don’t care if it goes wrong. When a Villa player has the ball, when we’re playing well, two men break away from their markers and beg to receive it. A pass and two more players go to whoever’s got the ball next. Then again, and again. Triangles all over the pitch. Unai brought this to Villa. Simple, but effective.
You could say Unai’s time in England has been mixed. His stint at Arsenal is seen as a failure by most but look at it without bias and you see a different picture. He took over from Arsene Wenger, hardly an act you want to follow. Then he took Arsenal to a Europa League final and won 11 games in a row, the best run they’d had since 2007.
He spent some money but how much of it was on his say and not on the hierarchy of sporting directors? His time at Arsenal may be viewed by many there as a failure but even if it was, it was a blot on a copybook that otherwise showed an extensive history of great work.
Promotion with Lorca to the Segunda División in Spain, for the first time in their history. Another promotion at Almeria. Tasked by Valencia to secure Champions League qualification in the midst of a financial crisis at the club to ease their burden. Unai duly delivered, finishing third behind Real Madrid and Barcelona three years in a row. A brief affair at Spartak Moscow where neither side really got engaged. Then three Europa League titles at Sevilla before a domestic quadruple at Paris Saint German.
It was that ill-fated spell at Arsenal next that could have derailed Unai’s career only for him to lift another Europa League with Villareal, getting them into the Champion’s League and then taking on the project at Villa Park. I’ve heard a lot of Arsenal fans scoff at Unai. Ridicule his time at the Emirates and claim Arteta is a better manager. My argument to them is that you can’t even mention them in the same sentence. Unai has won promotions, European trophies, a league title in France.
He’s taken teams that have spent very little and delivered instant success, almost everywhere he’s ever gone. I’m not saying Arteta doesn’t have the makings of being a great manager, but he has returned an FA Cup after spending £1billion. If you were looking for value for money, I’d be pouring mine into Unai.
Emery celebrates with the Europa League trophy as manager of Villareal.
Photo Credit: EuroSportWhat does the future hold for Unai and for Villa? I’m sure he knows what his ceiling is, having seen how detailed he is. I’m sure he will have a thought as to how far he can take Aston Villa and that won’t be an issue on his part, it will be the fact that the club simply can’t reach the success that he has set himself. I am dreading that day. The day he decides that the project just won’t reach his dreams.
I’m pretty sure that if you take him out of Aston Villa, you will see a return to the mediocre football which has blighted Villa through the years. Until that day, I’ll be savouring and enjoying every minute, every second, every win, every goal. Success isn’t only defined by winning trophies or leagues. It can be defined by that feeling you get when you know something special is happening. Something special brought on by a manager who lifts you, lifts the players. Extracts more than what’s there. Something special is happening at Villa Park and for me, the ride needs to be savoured because you never know when it could come to an end.
Cherish these moments, they might not come around again, not in our lifetime anyway.