'Bizarre' - Ex-England boss delivers verdict on Tyrone Mings Aston Villa mistake as Champions League format criticised

Tyrone Mings’ handball cost Aston Villa ‘dearly’ believes former England manager Sam Allardyce.

Mings was making his Champions League debut having recovered from an ACL injury he sustained last season. He came in the place of Pau Torres who dropped to the bench.

He was penalised for picking the ball-up after Emi Martinez had kicked the ball to him. Unai Emery branded it the 'biggest mistake' he had witnessed in his career.

“Sometimes you get a bit of a bizarre reaction from players,” he said whilst appearing as a pundit on talkSPORT.

“There will have been something going on in his brain that wasn’t quite functioning properly by the looks of it.

“Strange things happen in games and in life. People do things you wouldn’t expect them to do and that was certainly one of those in my opinion. It’s cost Villa dearly.”

He then went on to discuss the new format of the Champions League. In previous years there would be several groups of four teams who would play each other home and away. Clubs now play eight matches once with artificial intelligence helping who they play home and away, and whoever finishes in the top eight, and top 24 progress to the knockout rounds of the competition.

Those who finish third would drop in to the UEFA Europa League, but that is not the case these days. Those in the top eight are guaranteed a place in the Round of 16, whilst those ranked from ninth to 24th will battle it out to join them.

Allardyce added: “Look at the Champions League. They’ve changed that format again. Putting more games in, that’s another difficulty for every club that is in there. 

“I’m probably old-fashioned. I was always down to the fact it was always exciting when it was the knockout rounds and not the league rounds. I found watching some of the league games in the early stages unfortunately pretty boring.

“I think they were cagey and not a lot of entertainment. When we got to the two-legged knock-out rounds, that is when it became tasty and became a good watch. There are far too many games that are not really that interesting.”