Protests take shine off Villa's Maccabi Tel Aviv win

Aston Villa coasted to a 2-0 Europa League win over Maccabi Tel Aviv where all the attention was on what happened off the pitch.

The match became highly politicised after Maccabi's fans were banned from attending in a decision – made by Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group – which sparked debate on a parliamentary level, with British prime minister Kier Starmer calling it wrong.

While there were six arrests made before kick-off after a deployment of 700 police officers amid pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli protests, Villa’s focus was only ever on the football.

And a goal in either half from Dutch duo Ian Maatsen and Donyell Malen saw them earn victory which boosts their chances of qualifying for the knockout stages automatically.

At the halfway point in the league phase they sit sixth in the table, with games against Young Boys, Basel, Fenerbahce and Salzburg still to come.

They did not have it all their own way, though, and could easily have been behind when Osher Davida’s shot was deflected just wide.

After Morgan Rogers almost scored a wonder goal by dancing into the penalty area, Maccabi missed an even bigger chance to go ahead.

Skipper Dor Peretz will have nightmares about how he managed to shoot straight at Emiliano Martinez from inside the six-yard box when he had an empty net to aim from after Roy Revivo’s cutback.

That proved costly as Villa went ahead on the stroke of half-time when Maatsen scored from an impossibly acute angle, crashing in off the crossbar after good link-up play with Rogers and Jadon Sancho.

Another golden chance went begging in the 55th minute as Peretz was wasteful again after he shot straight at Martinez from Helio Varela’s pull-back.

And four minutes later it was 2-0 as Malen converted from the penalty spot after England international Ezri Konsa had been pulled back by Elad Madmon.

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