Former Aston Villa manager speaks out on Champions League ticket price hike
Former Aston Villa manager Tim Sherwood admits he was surprised by his old club's decision to raise prices so substantially for their forthcoming Champions League campaign. Villa will compete in UEFA's premier competition for the first time in more than 40 years and kick things off at Young Boys in Switzerland this coming week.
When Bayern Munich, Juventus, Bologna and Celtic visit Villa Park in the coming months, though, Lions fans will be having to part with eye-watering amounts in order to attend; depending on whether you have a season ticket or not, and depending on which zone of the ground you sit in, adults can pay up towards £100 for a single ticket.
The first game against Bayern has sold out already, the club have confirmed, but supporters have been left angered by the pricing and protests have been planned for today's game against Everton (5:30pm KO). Sherwood agrees, and believes the club will need every supporter onside on those Champions League nights on home soil.
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"Seeing Aston Villa’s ticket prices, it’s a shame really. I’m not sure how much difference it makes to finances as well, very little," Sherwood told OLBG. "It’s unnecessary publicity for me. I think if they're going to challenge or go far in the Champions League, they need their fans fully behind them.
"That is one of the best supported clubs and when that place is rocking, I've been there first-hand, the place bounces and they're going to need that. They’re going to need all the help they're going to get when they step up playing at a higher level in the Champions League. They’ll want it to be full and I still hope it will be, but I was surprised that Villa chose to go down that route of hiking prices."
Sherwood only sees Real Madrid and Manchester City as the viable candidates to win the newly formatted Champions League - the two most recent winners - but he considers the way in which the competition is set up might suit Villa, who can ruffle the feathers of some European heavyweights.
"Aston Villa should target progression to the next phase in the Champions League. That’s what they will be looking for. It will be more difficult with more games and there is going to have to be lots of analysis on different teams, but I think that can suit them," he continued. "In Unai Emery, they’ve certainly got the best manager to cope with European football. He's a prolific winner in the Europa League and he’s had a taste of Champions League.
"I think he's an experienced man who knows how to navigate it. He's a top drawer manager, very calm and he knows how to shuffle the pack. He rotates his squad perfectly and he’s been helped out with the finances they've recruited very well.
"I've got hopes for them. I don't think they can win it because I think there's possibly only two teams who can win it in Real Madrid and Man City, but Villa can be a danger. If you're any team, you don't want to play away at Aston Villa. On their day and with the experience of their manager, they can cause an upset against anyone."
Sherwood also believes his successor Unai Emery, who has led the club from the lower reaches of the Premier League and into the top four, a finish they're aiming to repeat again this season while juggling Champions League commitments, could make waves at an even bigger Premier League club, but he doesn't think the Spaniard - who signed a new long-term contract in the spring - would be in a rush to leave having been placed in control at various levels.
"Unai Emery certainly has the credentials to be a future Manchester United manager, but Aston Villa would do everything they can not to lose him and I don’t think he’d be interested in leaving to take that job," Sherwood commented.
"Aston Villa, they've given him everything. They've given him the sporting director he wants as well. He's pretty much running the club from top to bottom - and why wouldn't they? He has had a couple of fantastic seasons and he's turned their fortunes around, on top of that, every time he signs a player, it seems to be a success and he improves the ones they already have.
"He is a dream manager and Villa are right to trust him, it would be difficult to prise him away now, but certainly he looks like a man to me who's very level -headed and can handle the big pressure. Back to that old thing of experience in the Premier League, he knows all about it. They weren't bringing him in cold, he'd already dipped his toe in the water with Arsenal and that would have been a benefit to him in this job."
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