Olympiacos v Aston Villa LIVE: Europa Conference League team news, line-ups and build-up to semi-final tonight

Olympiacos midfielder Vicente Iborra knows exactly what lengths Aston Villa boss Unai Emery will be going to in his bid to achieve more European glory.

Villa travel to Athens on Thursday for their Europa Conference League semi-final second leg, looking to overturn last week’s 4-2 first-leg deficit.

Emery has won the Europa League four times, three times with Sevilla and once with Villarreal, and Iborra was in his team on every occasion.

The pair are on opposite sides this time, but Iborra, who had a two-year stint with Leicester between 2017 and 2019, will be driven by one of the messages his former boss instilled in him.

Unai Emery has described tonight as the “biggest challenge” of Aston Villa’s season.

The Spaniard overcame a 2-0 first-leg defeat with Sevilla 10 years ago, in a Europa League comeback against Real Betis.

“Experiences can always help, being successful or not,” Emery said. “But we have to create and build a new way and we lost the first leg clearly.

“Tomorrow will be difficult to come back but we must play thinking to extend after the first 90 minutes, the game plan we had that didn’t work well but expect tomorrow to do better.

“It’s going to be very difficult here with the atmosphere.

“This is the challenge tomorrow, the biggest challenge we are going to face this year, playing in this semi-final.”

The problem with assuming a Europa League winner with Sevilla is bound to conquer the continent is that there is more than one of them. Unai Emery can seem the king of Europe, but a defending champion has one foot in the Europa Conference League final. Rather than Emery’s fifth European trophy, it could be Jose Luis Mendilibar’s second in as many years after, courtesy of Ayoub El Kaabi’s hat-trick, Olympiacos stormed Villa Park.

Aston Villa may retain hope of two trips to Athens this month, for the final as well as the semi-final second leg, but they came Acropolis in Birmingham, reports Richard Jolly

Morgan Rogers, Youri Tielemans and Nicolo Zaniolo are also doubts for Aston Villa.

“We have some players close to coming back but I don’t know exactly if they can play tomorrow or not,” Unai Emery said.

Emiliano Martinez looks set to return to the Aston Villa side as they plot a dramatic European comeback against Olympiacos.

The Argentina goalkeeper has missed the last two games with a thigh injury suffered in the 2-2 Premier League draw with Chelsea 10 days ago.

But he has been training for the last couple of days and made the journey to Athens on Wednesday as Villa try to overcome a 4-2 first-leg deficit.

“He’s with us today,” Emery said. “I don’t want to keep information from you. He was injured last week after the match against Chelsea, 10 days.

“Tomorrow I will speak with him and the doctor to see if he is 100 per cent available.

“But if not I believe in Olsen. When we are building the team it is not only the players in the starting XI.”

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Aston Villa have a slim chance of keeping their European hopes alive as they seek to overturn a 4-2 deficit against Olympiacos.

At Villa Park, the hosts enjoyed most of the possession and created more chances, but it was Olympiacos who came away with a crucial advantage in the Europa Conference League quarter-finals.

John McGinn summed up the first leg afterwards, saying: “Everything that could have gone wrong did,” as Ayoub El Kaabi scored a hat-trick including two early goals.

Douglas Luiz then missed a late penalty and a chance to reduce the deficit, as Aston Villa will travel to Greece, trying to reach a first European final since 1982.

Hello and welcome to the The Independent’s live coverage of the Europa Conference League semi-final between Olympiacos and Aston Villa.

The Premier League side have plenty of work to do on away soil after they slipped to a 4-2 defeat in the first leg at Villa Park.

Stay tuned right here for all the build up, team news and live coverage.