Vitor Pereira tells 'king' of UEFA Europa League Unai Emery 'your trophy cabinet is full' before Nottingham Forest visit Aston Villa in semi-final

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Vitor Pereira has anointed Unai Emery as "the king'" of the UEFA Europa League and joked the Aston Villa head coach would struggle to store yet another trophy in his cabinet.

Pereira praises 'king of the competition' Emery ahead of crunch EL second leg

Video credit: TNT Sports

Nottingham Forest head coach Pereira is hoping to guide his side to their first major European final since 1980, while Emery could reach his sixth Europa League showpiece.

The Villa boss triumphed in four of his five previous finals, completing the three-peat with Sevilla between 2014 and 2016, losing to Chelsea as Arsenal manager in 2019, and beating Manchester United to claim the 2021 edition for Villarreal.

Yet more English opposition stands in the Basque-born head coach's way and two-time European Cup winners Forest hold a delicate advantage after winning 1-0 in the first leg.

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No coach has tasted glory more times than Emery in UEFA's second-tier competition, with outright closest challenger Giovanni Trapattoni securing three UEFA Cups in 1977, 1991 and 1993 for Juventus and Internazionale.

"He is the king of the competition," Pereira told TNT Sports. "But the last time that we had a minute to talk, I said to him: 'You don't have space in your room for one more trophy.'

"But the people that I started to compete with when I was a young boy, [who always] compete to win, compete to win. This kind of person, when they win something, one minute after, they start to think, 'What am I going to win again?'

No Filter: Advantage Forest as Wood penalty secures first-leg win over Villa

Video credit: TNT Sports

"Because this is the fire. This is what we need to be every time in the competition - to win, to win, to win, and after, we want to win again. And when we lose, we must lose proud of ourselves. This is what, for me, is important every time."

Chris Wood's penalty was the difference for Pereira's team at the City Ground last Thursday, while the scoreline was far more emphatic when a much-changed Forest visited Stamford Bridge to claim a stunning 3-1 win on Monday afternoon.

Beating Chelsea extended their winning run to five and their unbeaten streak to 10 in all competitions and, perhaps more importantly, lifted them six points clear of the Premier League relegation zone.

But league safety and a first major trophy since lifting the League Cup in 1990 will not come easily, and Pereira has been revising hard for his end-of-season examinations.

"The way to improve in football is to study every day," said Pereira. "We need to study. I used to say that I study more than my sons, even when they were in university.

"Now they've finished but I used to say to them, 'I study every day from when I wake up, until I go to sleep.' I study because we need to study. You need to reflect. You need to understand why things happen and what we can improve.

"For sure, Emery did the same. We take the game, which we watch again, both games, and we try to be better. We'll try to correct some things and be better [in the second leg]."

But Pereira could be without talisman Morgan Gibbs-White for the second leg after the England midfielder sustained a nasty head injury in Forest's win over Chelsea.

Asked if Gibbs-White would be available to feature at Villa Park, Pereira drew a question mark in the air with his finger, saying: "I don't know. We must wait until [Thursday] and after, we will decide together with the medical department."

Milenkovic feeling 'power' of Forest's European heritage

Strong memories of Forest's sensational back-to-back European Cup triumphs against Malmo and Hamburg live on in the minds of the fans.

And stories of the club's glory years in the late 1970s have been successfully transmitted to the current crop of players too, with defender Nikola Milenkovic desperate to drag Forest back to the top.

"We know [how big the game is] and we speak about it also with each other. We know this game is big for this club, for these fans, for everybody," said Milenkovic.

"I also need to mention this bond between the staff, between the coach, between players, between fans, is a really strong bond.

"And you can feel this power of the tradition of this club, and a huge desire to get back to old paths of European glory. Tomorrow is a really big game, and we must enjoy it."

Forest's seismic clash against Villa in the Europa League semi-finals will be broadcast live on TNT Sports and HBO Max, with coverage on TNT Sports 1 commencing at 19:00 UK time on Thursday, May 7.

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