Aston Villa 2-0 Lille (agg 3-0): McGinn & Bailey help hosts secure last-8 spot

Aston Villa reached the quarter-finals of the Europa League as goals from John McGinn and Leon Bailey earned a 2-0 win over Lille, which sealed a 3-0 aggregate triumph. 

Match Report

Having already led from the first leg at Stade Pierre-Mauroy, Unai Emery's side cruised to their seventh consecutive win in the competition to book their spot in the last eight. 

Both sides struggled to create any clear-cut chances in a low-key first half, with Amadou Onana's header from McGinn's corner saved by Berke Ozer just before the break.

However, the second half burst into life nine minutes after the restart when Nabil Bentaleb's curling free-kick from the edge of the box sailed into Emiliano Martinez's gloves. 

And just 15 seconds later, the ball was in the net at the other end. Martinez launched a huge punt forward that sent Jadon Sancho on his way, with the Villa forward cutting inside before setting up McGinn, who picked out the bottom-right corner.

Olivier Giroud provided an almost instant response, but his fierce finish was ruled out for offside, with substitute Ollie Watkins then firing narrowly wide of the left post soon after. 

Villa could have put the tie to bed in the 65th minute when Douglas Luiz put Sancho in behind, but as he steadied himself to shoot, his shot cannoned against the woodwork. 

But for all of Lille's late pressure, which saw Martinez parry Noah Edjouma's curling effort, Villa sealed their progression five minutes from time through Bailey, who tucked into an empty net after Watkins unselfishly squared the ball to him just 99 seconds after coming on. 

Data Debrief: Magic McGinn helps Emery mastermind another European tour

Emery is considered the master of the Europa League, and he has now reached the quarter-finals of the competition for the eighth time. No other manager has done so more than five times. 

And the Spaniard has also now helped Villa reach the quarter-finals in major European competition in three consecutive seasons, as many times as the club had reached at least this round in their previous 11 such campaigns combined.

But they were helped by the brilliance of McGinn, who scored his ninth goal for Villa in major European competitions, the joint-most for the club alongside Peter Withe.

Though Villa were made to wait for their breakthrough, they were worthy winners here. They finished with an expected goals (xG) total of 1.8 from their eight attempts to Lille's 0.34 from the same number of shots as their opponents. 

Match Events

54' GOAL! Aston Villa 1-0 Lille (John McGinn)

84' GOAL! Aston Villa 2-0 Lille

Line-ups

Aston Villa XI: E. Martinez, Lindelof, McGinn, Abraham, P. Torres, Douglas Luiz, Sancho, Morgan Rogers, Amadou Onana, Maatsen, Lamare Bogarde

Subs: Marco Bizot, Digne, Mings, Ollie Watkins, Buendia, Bailey, Ngoyo, Matty Cash, Elliott, James Wright, Andrés García

Lille XI: Giroud, Meunier, Mbemba, Bentaleb, Perraud, Berke Özer, Alexsandro, Félix Correia, Nathan Ngoy, Ngal'ayel Mukau, Ayyoub Bouaddi

Subs: Mandi, Calvin Verdonk, Arnaud Bodart, Hákon Arnar Haraldsson, Matías Fernández-Pardo, Tiago Santos, Noah Edjouma, Lilian Baret, Soriba Diaoune, Saad Boussadia, Zadig Lanssade