Shan on Youth League outlook

Jimmy Shan feels Aston Villa have “a lot to do” to reach the knockout stages of the UEFA Youth League but insists qualification remains in our hands.

The Young Lions suffered a frustrating 1-0 defeat against Viking at Bodymoor Heath on Wednesday afternoon.

The reverse leaves Villa on three points at the halfway stage of the league phase, with a further three matches remaining against Barcelona, Galatasaray and Paris Saint-Germain.

Shan’s side currently occupy 26^th place in the standings, with the top 22 sides progressing to the next phase of the prestigious youth competition.

“In terms of where we are now, we've got a lot to do,” he said.

“We looked at the league table and what we thought we could qualify with in terms of the number of points at the start of the competition.

“We've now got a lot to do, so we've got to try and generate, we believe, possibly a minimum of six points, five might do it from these three games remaining.

“We've got a lot to do, but obviously, the beauty is we still have three games.

“We’ve still got a fighting chance and the ball's going to be in our court to make sure we get points on the board and we qualify into the knockout stages.”

Shan was disappointed to see his side fall to defeat against the Norwegian visitors.

Kelvin Frimpong’s neat finish four minutes into the second half did the damage against Villa’s Under-19s, who proved unable to make it back-to-back European victories following last week’s success over Fenerbahçe.

The Young Lions pushed hard for an equaliser in the closing stages after Jonathan Debes’ dismissal for Viking with over half an hour to play, but the Scandinavian side defended strongly to repel Villa’s advances and seal the spoils.

Reflecting on the encounter, Shan said: “We knew it was going to be a difficult game.

“We watched three or four of their matches, including the one against Bayern where they were very good.

“They're a very well organised team, a very well coached team out of possession, and caused a big threat on the turnover on counter-attack.

“We envisaged we’d be dominant, would have lots of control in the game, and we’d find it difficult against them in the defending third to beat the block and break them down.

“We spoke about having control in and around the final third. But also having moments where we asked a question.

“Once we knew they had their shape fixed to defend low and we had our offensive shape, sometimes we're going to have to ask a question and that might be shots through bodies, around bodies, might have to be crosses into the box and maybe not score the perfect goal, but get the ball around that territory.

“Striking that balance between risking and retaining against a low block. It's what we spoke heavily about.

“I thought we probably had neither, really. We didn't ask enough questions when we delivered crosses, didn't have enough volume into the box and of quality with the type of cross that we put into the box.

“And then weren't patient enough also just to keep them camped in and wait for a moment, for a gap to open, or wait for the moment for the timing of the movement to penetrate.

“The game probably panned out and played exactly as we had planned. We’re just disappointed with lots of our aspects of executing that gameplan.”