Aston Villa out to join small group of European away comebacks from two goals down

Aston Villa will have to achieve a rare feat in European football if they are to reach the Europa Conference League final.

Only four times in UEFA's current trio of competitions has a team lost a first leg at home by two or more goals and gone on to progress to the next round.

That is the task facing Unai Emery’s men after a 4-2 defeat to Olympiacos and here we look at the few precedents for success – and while Unai Emery himself has previous, the most recent example comes from Villa’s semi-final opponents…

Olympiacos v Maccabi Tel-Aviv, Europa Conference League, 2024

Olympiacos looked to be heading out of the competition in March after a 4-1 first-leg hammering by Maccabi Tel-Aviv in their own Stadio Georgios Karaiskakis. Even UEFA’s website summary stated "Maccabi take full control of tie," after Eran Zahavi’s brace and goals for Ido Shahar and Dor Peretz.

Ayoub El Khabi’s goal gave Olympiacos at least something to cling to and the switching of the return leg to Serbia, necessitated by the conflict on the Gaza Strip, negated Maccabi’s home advantage.

El Kaabi scored twice more, with Daniel Podence and Kostas Fortounis also on target as a reciprocal 4-1 win forced extra-time – where substitutes Stevan Jovetic and Youssef El-Arabi completed a 6-1 scoreline, a 7-5 aggregate and a stunning turnaround.

Manchester United v Paris St Germain, Champions League, 2019

Goals from Presnel Kimpembe and Kylian Mbappe at Old Trafford had PSG on course for the quarter-finals, especially after United’s France midfielder Paul Pogba was sent off in the closing stages and suspended for the trip to his homeland.

Romelu Lukaku had other ideas, scoring twice in the first half-hour to sandwich Juan Bernat’s goal for PSG and keep United in the tie.