by Pau Torres takes possession in front of the Holte End, where in 2016 a banner was displayed reading: “No fight, no pride, no effort, no hope”. He takes the ball across the halfway line, where Tony Xia was once the new chairman of Aston Villa and promised to build a theme park. In the dugout, Unai Emery leans forward expectantly, just meters from where – six years ago to the day – a disgruntled fan threw a cabbage at Steve Bruce.
And as Jhon Durán’s speculative shot skimmed the back of the net, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up and the crowd surged and swelled, was it worth it in the end? Is he worth the indignities, is he worth the futility, is he worth 11,000 against Middlesbrough in the League Cup, is he worth losing at home to Stevenage, is he worth Remi Garde and Roberto Di Matteo?
Related: Jhon Durán’s daring lob for Aston Villa surprises Neuer and Bayern
A draw against Bayern Munich. History doesn’t repeat itself, but sometimes it rhymes. And Gary Shaw is no longer there, but Dennis Mortimer and Peter Withe are hugging each other tightly, and there are grown men in the crowd with tears in their eyes, and Durán just smiles and nods. as if to say: “I said. you are like this.”
It’s a place that has spent the last few decades trying, unsuccessfully, to escape its ghosts. The past is everywhere you look here. It lives in the weathered murals, grainy photos, and Brian Moore’s famous commentary plastered across the Doug Ellis booth, and even in the red brick structure itself, which basically looks like a Victorian sherbet factory, the kind of building that will almost surprise you. to find still open.
So it was perhaps natural that Villa Park’s first steps in the Champions League would be marked by a certain sense of history. And not just the obvious parallels with 1982, but also the more recent past, the long and often ignominious journey that Aston Villa undertook to get here. Relegations and promotions, five managers in 20 months, refused by Rickie Lambert. A night to feel a little dizzy and overwhelmed by the breakneck pace of progress, the decades of despair swept away in one fell swoop.
But of course there is always danger here too. The danger is that you play the opportunity rather than the adversary, the specter on the flesh. Is second place in the Bundesliga last season really a marked improvement on fourth place in the Premier League? Is Kim Min-jae really better than Pau Torres, is Manuel Neuer really a huge improvement over Emi Martínez, is Harry Kane really in a different class from Ollie Watkins? In simpler terms: are you playing like a team fulfilling a long-held dream? Or the team that actually belongs at this level?
Twenty minutes into this match, it felt like we had our answer. Bayern had 73% possession and all the territory. Villa was vigilant, disciplined, well spaced, far too respectful. But Torres’ early strike – although disallowed for offside – seemed to set something up.
Shortly after, Morgan Rogers broke into rhythm. Amadou Onana had a chance. Jaden Philogene mowed down Alphonso Davies, after maintaining a deferential distance during the first quarter of the match. Youri Tielemans rolled Joshua Kimmich like he was disappearing through a backdoor. Suddenly Villa seemed to remember that this was the team that blew up the Bundesliga last season, led by the guy who lost here with Burnley last season.
And for Rogers and Philogene, and for Jacob Ramsey before he got hurt, that’s the kind of story that matters. Unlike the thousands of people present in the stands, Villa’s young English guard are not marked by the past, nor naturally suspicious or fatalistic. Does Philogene even record 1982 as a year that happened? Not on this evidence, a whirlwind Champions League debut that belies the 43 minutes of football he has played this season and the fact he was playing for Hull City a few months ago.
Rogers was rather unplayable, a spinning machete of a player, flying through clouds of Bayern jerseys and somehow emerging with the ball still at his feet.
In the meantime, there were still long periods of Bayern possession, a lot of pressure, a few half-chances, but until the last minutes nothing really scary. Kane came and went, omnipresent and yet completely ephemeral, like the plot of a Claire Denis film. Villa managed to break away from pace and numbers. Eventually, an exhausted Watkins gave way to Durán, and everyone knows what happens when that happens.
It’s time for a new page. It’s a club with a rich and beautiful history, but at the moment the history is not by far the most interesting thing. It was perhaps fitting that this was a victory largely built on by the new generation, the players who can show this club where it is going, the young men who can shape its future. One night when Villa was celebrating their past, they ended up moving the clock forward.
