Aston Villa are heading to the next fixtures in the Premier League against Spurs this weekend.
Aston Villa are travelling to North London with not so convincing form in the Premier League lately. They are still winless in the league. Villa also suffer a crisis at the backline, with Ian Maatsen and Pau Torres being sidelined at the end of the game in their last home outing against Nottingham Forest last weekend.
There has been rumor about The Lions being linked to sign the free agent players like Sergio Ramos. The veteran Spanish international has been touted to make a move to Villa Park. However, all that seems to be nothing but speculation.
Aston Villa boss, Unai Emery, believes that he would not need any additional names in the squad, especially with Taylor Harwood-Bellis ready to make an impact to the team after his debut with The Clarets and Blue in the Carabao Cup in the midweek. The Spaniard boss made a statement about it, as reported in Birmingham mail.
“We have enough players, and we are trying to compete in the same way even without important players.”
The ex-Villareal, PSG and Arsenal manager was tipped to rely on Pau Torres at the beginning of the season. Consequently, he was injured and likely to be sidelined for about three weeks. Yet, Emery refuses to agree on the idea of counting on his former player in Villareal too much.
“We’re here four years working and we have had a lot of press conferences here over that time. When Tyrone Mings is not here, you ask for Tyrone Mings, and when Pau Torres is not here, then you ask about Pau Torres.
“But we have still performed without Pau or Tyrone. The structure is the most important thing. Pau has some characteristics as a player that give us so, so much in build-up, but Tyrone is doing it as well. He can take the responsibility to do it in the way that we want.”
Regarding the absence of Torres or Mings, Emery has experienced it before and still manages to do well with the available players in the squad.
“In the first six months that I worked here, Mings was playing every match, and we achieved the Conference League. On average, in that season, we finished fourth in the Premier League. Lenglet also helped us the season after as Mings was injured for a long time.
“Last December, we had neither Torres nor Mings, and we had Lindelof with Konsa. We performed fantastically. This is a good example.”
At that time, in December 2025, Villa managed to pick up two important wins over Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea without Torres. Such is a solid proof that Emery knows how to handle the squad crisis.
This season, Villa still have Taylor Harwood-Bellis in the squad, who can fill the void left by Torres. His form in his debut in the Coventry win displayed his quality to develop as Pau Torres. The former Southampton man had 83 touches, made 71 passes, six long balls with two of them accurate, and even one shot on target in the match. The 24-year old defender is likely to be Villa’s first choice in the coming weeks.
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