Aston Villa thrash Nottingham Forest to reach Europa League final
Baku, May 8, AZERTAC
Aston Villa demolished Nottingham Forest's hopes to charge into the Europa League final and edge closer to ending a 30-year major trophy drought, according to BBC.
John McGinn's late double added to Emi Buendia's penalty and Ollie Watkins' opener to complete Villa's comeback against Nottingham Forest after last week's 1-0 first-leg defeat.
The hosts booked a final against Bundesliga side Freiburg, who beat Braga 4-3 on aggregate, in Istanbul on 20 May.
Villa head coach Unai Emery is chasing his fifth Europa League title, having joined the club as a serial winner of this competition. His team will be looking to lift Villa's first major silverware since the 1996 League Cup, and with it book a Champions League spot.
They are still fifth in the Premier League and if they finish there and win the Europa League, the team in sixth - currently Bournemouth - will qualify for the Champions League.
This was a deserved victory for the hosts, in front of fan Prince William, with Forest rarely threatening without Morgan Gibbs-White.
The playmaker was only fit enough for the bench following a head injury, which required extensive stitches in Monday's win at Chelsea.
It took Villa until seven minutes before the break to level on aggregate when Watkins turned in Buendia's center from the left.
They went ahead overall 13 minutes after the break when referee Glenn Nyberg awarded a penalty after reviewing the monitor following a VAR check when Nikola Milenkovic tugged Pau Torres.
Watkins had a goal disallowed for offside, while Emi Martinez denied Chris Wood at the other end, before McGinn 's quickfire two goals wrapped up victory.
Meanwhile, Freiburg are through to their first European final after beating 10-man Braga in Thursday's Europa League semi-final second leg.
Leading 2-1 from the first leg, the visitors were reduced to 10 men when Mario Dorgeles – scorer of Braga's last-gasp winner in Portugal – was shown a straight red card for a professional foul on Jan-Niklas Beste.
Freiburg soon made their numerical advantage count, taking the lead on the night when Jean-Baptiste Gorby's attempted clearance rebounded off Lukas Kubler's knee before trickling over the line via the inside of the far post.
The opening goal may have been slightly fortuitous, but there was nothing lucky about Yohan Manzambi's stunning second four minutes before half-time.
Braga keeper Lukas Hornicek made a sensational double save to deny Igor Matanovic and Matthias Ginter with 20 minutes remaining, but the 23-year-old was powerless to prevent Kubler from extending Freiburg's lead with a towering header.
Pau Victor's close-range header gave the visitors hope seven minutes later, but there was to be no way back for Carlos Vicens' side.
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