Three brilliant goals from Paris Saint-Germain handed Aston Villa a 3-1 defeat in the first leg of the UEFA Champions League quarter-finals on Wednesday night. However, goalscorer Morgan Rogers believes his side has the quality to turn the tie around next week at Villa Park.
“We’ve got quality in our dressing room and we know that as well. We’re here for a reason. We’re not just here, as I said, just to compete,” he explained after the match.
“We want to fight, we want to try and win and we’re trying to score goals and normally we’ve got enough quality in the room to cause any team in the world problems. I think we did at times tonight, [we’d] probably like to a bit more, but now we’re going back at home. That’s where we know our best form and kind of the way we play is better probably at home this season, and we’ll be looking forward to it and hopefully we can win.”
PSG demonstrated why they are one of the favourites for the Champions League title this year, but Rogers believes his side performed well in what was a challenging game.
“It’s difficult of course. We knew it was going to be difficult coming into it. We’ve watched their last few games and how deadly and how sharp they’ve been.”
The goalscorer added: “I think they’ve put the world on notice to how good they are but we didn’t want to come here and just be spectators; we wanted to take part and try and compete and I thought we did that for large parts, I think. The scoreline is not great and not in our favour but listen, we’ve got another game we’re going to try and turn it around and try and win the game.”
The travelling fans showed their unwavering support for the Villa team tonight, and Rogers is determined to repay them next week at Villa Park.
“We’ve got nothing to lose, no one had us to win the tie in the first place so why not just go for it that’s the mentality I have, that’s the mentality everyone has and the manager as well.”
“We’ve just got to keep going for it and keep believing that we can do it and see where it takes us but we’ve got the quality to turn this around so it’s not done yet.”
