LEIPZIG, Germany :Aston Villa substitutes Jhon Duran and Ross Barkley bagged second-half goals to salvage a 3-2 victory over RB Leipzig on Tuesday in a Champions League match marked by a stunning error from keeper Emi Martinez that gifted Leipzig a goal.
With 13 points after six games, Unai Emery’s men are provisionally third in the table and just a win away from booking their berth in the Champions League last 16.
Leipzig have zero points and their loss means they cannot advance.
“I thought overall we were the better team and we could have scored more,” Villa captain John McGinn told Amazon Prime. “We dealt with their problems well and what we needed today was substitutes to come on and make a difference.
“It is exciting. It is great to be in the top three.”
McGinn put Villa on the scoresheet inside three minutes when he fired in Ollie Watkins’s header past Peter Gulacsi.
Lois Openda levelled against the run of play in the 27th minute when Martinez ventured well out of his net but misjudged the bounce of the ball, allowing Openda to nudge it past him and score.
“One mistake and they score but then we played very well,” Emery said. “Champions League is very difficult and we have to expect that every team playing at home are feeling strong. We played with consistency and domination.
“Today we were thinking if we won we could be a contender in the last two matches to be in the top eight. We achieved this.”
Super sub Duran, who has six goals off the bench this season – the most by any player in Europe’s big-five leagues in 2024-25 – was electric from the moment he entered the game after the break.
He put the visitors up in the 52nd minute when he latched on to a pass from Youri Tielemans before unleashing a blistering shot from nearly 30 metres out that sailed over Gulacsi’s head.
Duran had the ball in the back of the net again minutes later but it was chalked off for offside in the build-up.
The home side levelled 10 minutes later when a 40-metre pass from Benjamin Henrichs found Openda, who floated the ball to the back post for Christoph Baumgartner to steer in with a volley.
Two minutes after he entered the game, Barkley bagged a fluke winner in the 85th when he slipped while firing a shot from long range that took a big deflection off defender Lukas Klostermann and went in.
Leipzig manager Marco Rose said: “It seems it’s not our Champions League season, now we have no chance to go for the next stage.”
The new Champions League format sees the top eight teams in the league phase after eight rounds advance into the round of 16. The teams from ninth to 24th will go into two-legged play-offs, with the eight winners moving into the last 16.
Villa’s final two games of the first round are at Monaco on Jan. 21 and against Celtic at Villa Park on Jan. 29.
