Aston Villa have virtually secured safe passage to the second round of the UEFA cup with a 3:1 away victory at Litex Lovech in Bulgaria. With the heavy, wet pitch and the run of away fixtures facing Martin O'Neill's men, this game had "banana skin" written all other it and the traveling faithful's fears soon materialized when the hosts took the lead by their captain Popov in the 10th minute. Villa were lucky to equalize in first-half added time by Reo-Coker. The Bulgarians totally lost their control in the second half and finished the game with nine men and a mountain to climb in the return leg, with a Gareth Barry penalty and a late goal by local boy Stillian Petrov sealing their fate. Carlos Cuellar debuted for Villa  at the heart of the Villa defense in place of Curtis Davis. With Ashley Young suffering from a knee injury, James Milner got a first start in left midfield. Marlon Harewood started on the bench, in spite of the absence of the injured John Carew.

There had been doubt as to whether the game would be held at all after torrential rain over Northern Bulgaria in the previous 48 hours. The hosts were the quickest off the blocks on the heavy pitch. Brazilians Tom and Sandrinho were dictating the pace in midfield from the opening minutes and Villa looked very uncomfortable on the ball. They were clearly missing the towering presence of Carew in the box and could not muster much of a threat on Golubovic's goal throughout the first half hour. Instead, it was the hosts who got the breakthrough as early as the tenth minutes from a well-dispatched free kick from their captain Popov, after Reo-Coker has felled the lively Sandrinho on the edge of the box. Stillian Petrov was Villa's most active player in midfield. The Midlanders thought they had equalized  after Villa's Bulgarian combined with Agbonlahor on the right to set up Barry in the box but the captain's headed goal was canceled out for offside. Litex nearly doubled their lead in the 40th minute when Laursen stumbled in the box and let Niflore in but the striker could only find the side-netting after rounding off Friedel. Martin O'Neill was contemplating a tough half time speech when his side were gifted an equalizer in first half added time by a misunderstanding between Cambon and Golubovic, which allowed Reo-Coker to side-foot the ball in an empty net .

Litex seemed to have put the disappointment of letting their grip on the game slip when they came back from the interval. They had a decent shout for a penalty within moments of the restart when Niflore went down in the box under Laursen's challenge. The game was turned on its head in the space of five minutes around the hour mark, the time it took for Cedric Cambon to get booked twice. The second booking could have been a straight red, such was the cynicism of the rugby tackle he made on the speedy Agbonlahor. Litex then proceeded to press the self-destruct button a few minutes later when Venkov handled the ball on the goal line under pressure from Harewood, who had just come on. The defender was sent off there and then and Barry, on his 400th appearance for Villa, converted the penalty with his usual composure. At nine against eleven, the encounter descended into a game of cat and mouse and Villa were odds on to score another. To Litex's credit, they managed to delay the inevitable until the dying seconds when Petrov got his reward for a competent shift.

Villa will play better and lose this season. They were very poor in the first half and could have been overrun on the difficult pitch. Milner and Agbonlahor upfront, for all their pace, lacked strength and height to unsettle the Bulgarian defense. With a tough run of fixtures ahead, starting with West Brom at the Hawthorns on Sunday, this is an unexpected let off for Martin O'Neill's side. Given the scoreline, Litex will harbour little hope for the return leg, even though they showed promise in the first half.