‘You’ve seen the stats’ – Aston Villa star hits back at Gerrard after ‘not giving it’ slam with Emery comparison

Will Ford
Emery Gerrard Aston Villa
Unai Emery is on 'another level' to Steven Gerrard.

Aston Villa star Matty Cash insists there’s “no disrespect” of Steven Gerrard but Unai Emery is on “another level”.

Emery replaced Gerrard in October 2022 with Villa 17th on nine points from 11 games and guided them to seventh and European football, before leading them into the Champions League in his first full season in charge.

Meanwhile, Gerrard has taken charge of Al-Ettifaq in the Saudi Pro League and taken them from seventh to sixth in his first season, no thanks to Jordan Henderson.

‘You’ve seen the stats’

Villa announced earlier this week that Emery has signed a new five-year contract at the club and Cash has hailed the impact of the Spaniard, claiming he’s on “another level” compared to his predecessor.

The defender told talkSPORT Drive: “There’s a lot detail that goes into it [his work]. We have so many individual and collective meetings on how you can improve.

“Obviously no disrespect to Gerrard – I think he was obviously a good manager – and he did well at Rangers. I just think Unai is another level really. Since he’s come in we’ve been nothing but brilliant.

“You’ve seen the stats and the results that we’ve had in the last year-and-a-half and it’s been incredible really.

“The main thing is little details that he does and he knows, just the experience helps massively.”

READ MORE: Steven Gerrard ‘disappointed’ in Jordan Henderson? Unai Emery’s made him look a right mug

Villa players ‘weren’t giving it’ under Gerrard

Cash’s comments come on the back of Gerrard claiming the Villa players “weren’t giving it” in his time at the helm.

Gerrard said: “I think when top footballers are not performing at their level I am not going to pull any punches. We had players who weren’t giving what I felt they should have been giving at the time and that’s my responsibility.

“Villa is a fantastic club. It was an incredible opportunity at the time and I have nothing bad to say. The owners gave me a fantastic chance. The initial period, our form was top eight in the Premier League and obviously the opinion of me now from a lot of people will be that I failed, if you like, but I know there was a period there where we got an awful lot of things right. We had the team doing okay.”