How much pressure do Aston Villa want to put on one 90 minutes in Istanbul?
For all the celebrations in the past week – no celebration police here – after reaching a first European final since 1982, here was a timely reminder that Aston Villa haven’t secured Champions League football for next season yet.
They should finish in the top five, sure. They should beat Freiburg, seventh in the Bundesliga, in the Europa League final in nine days’ time, too. Either cashes in UEFA’s golden ticket for entry.
But they also might not. That’s a reality Aston Villa need to be conscious of. As Unai Emery sprinted up and down his technical area here, incandescent at what he was seeing in front of him, it wasn’t lost on the Villa boss what an opportunity missed this was.
After all, if you’ve got a Premier League problem and need a helping hand, come and pay a visit to Doctor Burnley.
Unai Emery left Turf Moor with more questions than answers after another tough away trip
Burnley made sluggish Villa pay the price and they were good value for their point in this draw
That’s a Burnley side with the worst home record in the league, having scored a league fewest 15 goals on their own turf, with just two wins all season long at Turf Moor. The last of those came 205 days ago against Leeds United when talk was just getting started about Halloween costumes.
And yet here was Villa, a side that looked like they’d have blown any team in the world away on Thursday night, labouring to a point that massively lets Liverpool, crawling over the Champions League line themselves, off the hook.
This was supposed to be the banker for Villa, who made only three alterations from the semi-final win over Forest and stuck with the big guns of Ollie Watkins, John McGinn and Morgan Rogers.
By contrast, Burnley interim boss Mike Jackson made six alterations from the team that got handsomely turned over by Leeds, one of which saw 21-year-old goalkeeper Max Weiss handed his Premier League debut.
So, worst team at home in the league, who rarely score goals, with a rookie goalkeeper in between the sticks. This should have been as safe as collecting £200 when passing go in a game of Monopoly.
Four points would mathematically seal a top five spot and with it Champions League football. The idea they could sleepwalk into three of those points here blew up in their face inside the opening 10 minutes.
Backing off Lesley Ugochukwu, Villa only had themselves to blame when Emi Martinez parried the shot straight to Jaidon Anthony, who duly converted from a few yards out.
Martinez is a top goalkeeper, no one would deny that, but he’s picked up an odd habit of this exact thing this season, parrying right back into the danger area. By his standards, this was a costly mistake.
But for as bad as this was for large spells, Emery’s face a picture of anger and disbelief, Villa looked to have salvaged the most precious of wins.
Villa dominated at the end of the first half and deservedly got themselves level when Ross Barkley delicately flicked on McGinn’s corner to the far post.
Then came the goal to put them ahead. Straight out of the route one playbook.
Emi Martinez’s error allowed Jaidon Anthony to open the scoring for Burnley nine minutes in
Ollie Watkins had one goal chalked off by VAR but his second saw Villa go into a 2-1 lead
Martinez, under no pressure, drilled a long kick 70 yards and Watkins raced between Maxime Esteve and Axel Tuanzebe to toe-poke in. Turnaround complete.
So, of course, they switched off again assuming the job was done and Burnley, inspired by the brilliant Hannibal Mejbri, punished them to leave Champions League hopes hinging in the balance.
This was a goal that is everything Burnley haven’t been this season. Inventive, incisive, sharp. Ugochukwu hustled to win the ball back wide on the left and picked out Mejbri in the box, who had the wherewithal to backheel a flick to Zian Flemming, who had missed two huge chances earlier in this affair.
And so Emery threw his arms around, knowing full well that Champions League football is not the foregone conclusion many may say it is.
It’s on to Liverpool on Friday night, days out from their first European final in 43 years, when rotation feels inevitable. Lose that and turn that pressure dial up to the max for Istanbul.
Talk about making life hard for yourselves.
