Pau Torres Dismisses Favorites Talk Before Final
pau torres says Aston Villa will not lean on favorites talk before the Europa League final. He said the club reached this stage with the view that “el cartel de favoritos no sirve para nada,” and that the final will be approached with a winning mentality.
Pau Torres in Birmingham
Torres spoke in Birmingham before the final, after previously agreeing a month earlier to give the interview in Torrepacheco, Murcia, if Aston Villa got there. He said the team had earned its place by working through the season and eliminating powerful rivals, not by carrying a label into the match.
“Al final el cartel de favoritos no sirve para nada. Ya ves lo que hicimos con el Villarreal ante el United. Hay que trabajar mucho durante la temporada. Hemos eliminado a rivales muy potentes que habían jugado Champions League el año pasado, como el Lille o el Bolonia. Rivales muy fuertes, el Nottingham Forest, que al final siempre es difícil jugar contra otro equipo de tu país en Europa. Llegamos a la final al 50% de posibilidades para los dos equipos y vamos a ir con la mentalidad de ganarla y ojalá así pueda ser,” he said.
Aston Villa’s route to final
Those wins over Lille, Bolonia and Nottingham Forest formed the path to Birmingham’s final stage. Torres pointed to that run as the better guide than any pre-match status, saying Villa had already handled opponents with Champions League experience from the previous year.
He also said the club and staff had set a clear target of reaching a final and competing for a title. Villa have gone more than 40 years without playing a European final, a stretch he called part of what makes this moment so meaningful for the squad and its supporters.
Forty years without a final
Torres said he felt excited to help return the club to a European final after so many years, and he tied that feeling to the practical demands of the match itself. “Es difícil llegar a lo del míster. Ahora que tenemos el trabajo hecho en Liga, podemos centrarnos mucho más en esa final, disfrutar sobre todo de prepararla, disfrutar del momento que vamos a vivir esta semana y llegar a la final con la máxima ilusión, con ambición y con la misma mentalidad de todo el mundo,” he said.
He added that finals turn on small details and that every player must stay concentrated from the first minutes to the last. Torres has already won a Europa League, and his return after a lesion that kept him out for part of the season gives Villa another experienced defender as they try to turn a 50-50 final into a title.
