Aston Villa return to Champions League matters this week in the hope that it changes their fortunes.
Unai Emery’s side are struggling in the Premier League, especially from a defensive aspect, but they have won three out of their four matches in Europe.
The only defeat came when Club Brugge beat Villa at the start of the month, including the awarding of that bizarre Tyrone Mings penalty.
The returning centre-back, who had been out of action for over a year, was making his Champions League debut when he handled the ball in the penalty area from a goal kick.
Mings, standing just a few yards away from Emi Martinez, thought his teammate had just flung him the ball without realising the game had restarted.
He proceeded to pass the ball back to Martinez with his hands and gave away a penalty after protests from the opposition team, as well as VAR having a look.
Weeks after the incident, John McGinn shared his thoughts on that quite crazy moment.
John McGinn says he ‘cracked joke’ in Aston Villa training recently with Tyrone Mings regarding handball
Villa were flying in the Champions League, at the time. Three wins from three and no goals conceded.
But that penalty against Club Brugge resulted in the Midlands side losing their first match of the campaign and McGinn shared ‘I only just cracked that joke with Ty yesterday’, as he told Premier Sports.
Both McGinn and Mings were subbed off by Emery in the match and the skipper admitted that he wasn’t happy about it.
“I only just cracked that joke with Tyrone yesterday,” smiled McGinn. “Aye, a bit (still raw). I ended up getting subbed a few minutes later after it, so I was fuming as well.
“We were actually under a wee bit of pressure in the game and I don’t think Tyrone has seen Emi pass it. So, he thought he flung him the ball and he picked it up. It was just a bizarre thing. It will never happen again.
“You see it happen quite often, football evolves. I still to this day can’t understand why a goalkeeper would pass to the centre-back a yard away or fling it. I still haven’t worked that one out yet, it might make sense to be in a while. It was one of these things and, thankfully, we had the back-up of three wins before that.”
Alan Hutton and McGinn agree that Mings is not affected by handball
Mings has done a lot for Aston Villa over the years, and just like McGinn, he was with the club when they were in the Championship and on their knees.
That’s why he will be fondly remembered by supporters and he will be hoping his next Champions League game fairs a lot better.
Alan Hutton was part of that Dean Smith promotion-winning team in 2019 and he shared a dressing room with Mings.
The former right-back explained how such a situation won’t affect the player in the slightest.
Alan Hutton shared: “But Ty, he could take it. He is the one guy in that dressing room that will be able to take that, what happened and just keep moving forward.”
McGinn agreed: “It didn’t affect him in the slightest. I kind of left him to it for a couple of days. He actually played really well in the game, so these things happen. I made a mistake at the weekend in that split moment (Palace’s second goal). Made the wrong decision, stepped one way, boom goal, so at this level, you get punished. Unfortunately, his was a bit high profile than mine.”
