A LOT TO PACK IN
Listening to John McGinn reflect on Aston Villa’s win over Young Boys after the final whistle on Tuesday night, it was clear how much playing in Bigger Cup meant to him. As a young player making his name with St Mirren and Hibs, occasionally playing on the plastic pitches at Hamilton, Falkirk and Kilmarnock, the midfielder hoped that one day he might move on to more prestigious, metaphorically greener astro. And while making his Bigger Cup debut in a stadium with a name ripe for schoolboy sniggering against a struggling side is hardly the stuff of young footballers’ dreams, you can only beat the team in front of you while burning the skin from your knees and elbows on the pitch underneath you and Villa accomplished that in fine style. Their win was due in no small part to another masterstroke from Unai Emery’s hirsute assistant coach Austin McSet-Piece, some schoolboy Young Boys defending and the latest strike from unlikely goal machine Amadou Onana.
