Aston Villa right-back Matty Cash has praised manager Unai Emery this week.

The Spanish head coach is the key reason for the club's improvement in form over the past 12 months.

Cash, whose side are in the Europa Conference League this season, admitted as much.

Obviously the manager has great experience in European football which helps massively," Cash stated.

"We have a few boys who haven't played in Europe before, like myself.

"Then we have other boys who have played in European competitions and have loads of experience. But most of all we have a lot of players who desperately want to do well in Europe."

He added: "I don't think it matters what cup competition we play in or the Premier League, every game we play we want to win. Not just in Europe this season but in the other cup competitions too.

"We want to go as far as we can and that's the chat we've had between ourselves and with the manager. Every game we go out there wanting to win, no matter who we are playing. Europe gives us a great opportunity to do that as well."

He added on his knowledge of upcoming opponents Legia Warsaw, given he is Polish: There are a few Polish boys who play there and I'm sure I'll get asked the same question by the manager during the week.

"I know a few things about Legia who are obviously one of the biggest teams in Poland. They are a good team who have a massive fanbase, which is really good.

"It will be a difficult game for sure and we'll have to prepare well, which I'm sure we will do this week. The manager will have people go over everything about them with us. It was good to go into Thursday's game on the back of an important victory."

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