Unai Emery Warns Aston Villa of Potential Losses: Watkins and Martinez at Risk

Unai Emery has jolted Aston Villa’s pre-season calm with a blunt admission: the club has received formal bids for Ollie Watkins, and his future is no longer guaranteed.

The England striker, the spearhead of Villa’s Europa League triumph with five goals and two assists, is now firmly in the sights of Saudi Pro League giants Al-Hilal. For a fanbase still basking in European glory, the timing could hardly feel more jarring.

“We have an issue with him, it's clear. He is our player. We have had offers for him, I don't want to sell him but it can change because if it's a good option for him and the club and I can replace him in the squad, this is the routine we have and we did before with the players who are leaving,” Emery told reporters when pressed on the 30-year-old’s situation.

That “routine” has already ripped through Villa’s core.

Ezri Konsa has gone to Arsenal for £51 million. Morgan Rogers has joined Chelsea for a British record £117 million. Youri Tielemans and Lucas Digne have also moved on in the same window. One by one, key pieces of Emery’s Europa League winners have walked out of Villa Park.

Losing Watkins on top of that would not just sting. It would reshape everything.

Since arriving from Brentford in 2020, Watkins has scored 108 goals and become the reference point for Emery’s entire attacking structure. The coach knows exactly what is at stake, yet refuses to sugar-coat the reality of a market that does not wait for anyone.

“With Ollie, he is here, for me he is a fantastic striker, we have always believed in him. Now he is our player, there are 10 days more or less to finish the transfer window, we will see what happens, I'm happy with him, if he is staying with us he will continue playing his level. If he leaving it's because it is good for three ways, one is him, another is the club and another is the team,” Emery said.

The message is clear: sentiment stops where the balance sheet and squad planning begin.

And it is not only the forward line that feels fragile.

Emi Martinez, the 2022 World Cup winner and emotional heartbeat of this Villa side, also stands on uncertain ground. A proposed move to Juventus has already collapsed over the fee, but the goalkeeper’s future still hangs in the air. Villa, wary of being caught cold, have acted first.

Japan international Zion Suzuki has arrived from Parma for £30 million, not as a project, but as a live contender.

“We have two excellent goalkeepers, of course we signed Suzuki not for the future but for now. He showed his capacity to get his performance to our level. He will need to adapt to us but he is playing at this level. Martinez transmitted to us the possibility to have another challenge in his career. Even last year, he was thinking in case he can have one possibility to change for his challenges,” Emery explained.

So while Villa fans debate potential line-ups, Emery is juggling something more delicate: ambition versus inevitability. Keep everyone and you might stall progress. Sell too many and the whole structure risks collapsing.

“He didn't do it last year and he performed fantastic with us. This year, again, he transmitted us the possibility to have another challenge and we decided to sign Suzuki because I think he's a fantastic goalkeeper,” the manager added, underlining that Martinez’s restlessness is not a new storyline, just one that now has a ready-made successor in place.

Strip away the emotion and the numbers are stark.

If Watkins and Martinez both leave, Villa will have cashed in on more than half of the starting XI that lifted the Europa League trophy just two months ago. That is not a tweak. It is a rebuild on the fly.

The recruitment team now walks a tightrope with the clock ticking towards deadline day. Every outgoing deal demands a smart, immediate answer. Every hesitation risks turning a triumphant European spring into a chaotic Premier League autumn.

And all the while, the season does not wait. Villa open their league campaign away to Brighton on Sunday, carrying a new weight: can a team torn apart by the market still look anything like the one that conquered Europe in May?