Aston Villa boss Unai Emery, speaking to Sky Sports: “I’m very happy. Our supporters should be proud of everything we are doing together because the energy is very important. How they transmit the energy, how they are helping us here to feel Villa Park is out fortress.
“It’s really fantastic. And then compete, compete. Sometimes we can’t dominate, sometimes we must defend. We must be resilient which we need today well. But being resilient, taking our time, with our qualities, overall we must be proud of everything we are doing. But first have issues and of course be realistic.
“After those three points of course we are taking advantage but still a lot of work to do. We are building the team in different ways. Of course the mentality is very important. This is through our mentality. We must understand how much team we are facing and how we can compete, stopping them. Our capacity too, tactically. We need our structure defensively and offensively to get good positions. Then our qualities. With our supporters helping us. The energy was important as well. “
Emery, speaking to BBC Match Of The Day: “It was a very hard win but a fantastic win. Of course, Villa Park is our fortress. We need the supporters here and how they transmit energy, and support. And how we are being resilient and competing in the difficult moments like we did today. But as well showing our capacity to react, showing our capacity to use our compete individually through different players. Overall we did a fantastic job to try to get our structure tactically.”
On Rogers calling him a genius: “He’s a fantastic guy. A fantastic player. Because he loves football. He loves work. He’s a hard worker and he’s increasing his level professionally to a high level. Of course we are proud of everything and I am happy with him.
“Now we have the next match and the next challenge and it is Chelsea, and a difficult match away. How we are responding and feeling good, this is the way we are building. Every player is helping us with their qualities, their commitment and their attitude is very important. For the rest of the season to keep this consistency we need a lot of players to be how they are. We can rest now and enjoy time with family, but we also think about Chelsea.”
Emery to Sky Sports on what is realistic for Villa this season: “The realistic is the capacity and potential and we have played a lot of team like Arsenal and Manchester City. Of course we beat them here, but they have massive things tactically with players on a high level. And we have as well but to be a contender in front of them is our reality where is not.
“We are not contender. We are here because we are competing fantastic. The players are really focusing each match with what we are trying to set and being consistent. But we are not contender to be there.
“Of course we are being consistent in more or less three years, and getting into European positions, but we must continue to be humble. And understanding how we can get points like we did. We want to keep the same level by being intelligent, competitive, consistent and demanding. Through it we are here.”
On Morgan Rogers and his team’s second-half performance: “He was not performing very well in the first half! He scored a good goal but he was not performing very well. We spoke about individually increasing our focus to get better and in the second half we did much better. At half-time I was not happy [with him] because I am ambitious myself. I share my ambitions with them and my demand.
“Of course the players were performing but we weren’t focused enough. We weren’t facing them, or getting duels like we planned and needed. The second half we were better. Today was a matter of playing forward because they wanted us to pass back so they could press us and create difficulties.”
Manchester United boss Ruben Amorim speaking to Sky Sports: “I think we were the better team today. We were unlucky, even with the injury of Bruno, but during the game even without him we were the better team. We blocked the transitions quite well and they did really well. We did a very good job that no one is going to remember tomorrow because what matters is the result.
“We already knew that Aston Villa play with everybody inside and we needed to overload that situation. We have been training like that. We did different options, we can use different starting elevens depending on the game, so we are improving. Again I think we deserved so much more today but the better team did not win.”
On Fernandes’ injury: “It is really strange. During this year, especially at this time, we have so many problems, but we have to cope with that. I think Fletcher did his first game, so that is good news, Lacey the same, so we will try to find solutions and go for the next game.
“I am a manager for six years and even Sporting is all about the academy, so it’s about the history. Every manager wants to bring players through from the academy and not spend money because this gives value to the manager. I just want to win and want to be certain that the players that come in from the academy are not going to suffer too much. I’m just trying to help the club, it doesn’t matter if it’s from the academy or abroad.
“I think it’s soft tissue [Fernandes injury] so it’s going to be a while. We’ll see.”
