Aston Villa FC

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• Manager:Gerard Houllier

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Slow start concerns O'Neill

19 Sep 2008 - 07:15:00

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Aston Villa manager Martin O'Neill admitted his side needed to learn in European football despite securing a 3-1 UEFA Cup first round first leg advantage over Litex Lovech.

Villa came from behind to beat the Bulgarian side with goals from Nigel Reo-Coker and Stiliyan Petrov plus a Gareth Barry penalty.

But despite the scoreline, O'Neill was unhappy after his side conceded an early goal to give Litex hope of taking a major European scalp.

"It was a very sluggish start," he admitted. "We did the one thing we really didn't want to do and gave away an early goal and it took a long time for us to get into our stride.

"The key moment was probably before half-time when they had a chance to score and a very good chance, and within a minute we had got an equaliser. That was also a priceless away goal.

"It was frustrating because we played really well against Tottenham (on Monday) and we had hoped with that momentum to have started more brightly.

"But the equalising goal gave us such an advantage. That basically changed the whole impetus of the game.

"If you said before the game we would win and score three goals we would have been very pleased.

"We didn't play as well as we did at Tottenham on Monday, but we won and we have to learn in European football."