Villa appoint Monchi as president of football operations

Aston Villa appointed highly-regarded Spaniard Monchi as their president of football operations on Friday.

Villa landed a major coup as they convinced Monchi to leave his role as Sevilla director of football to move to the Premier League.

The 54-year-old's time at Sevilla included seven Europa League titles, with the first coming in 2005-06 and the most recent this season.

Three of those Europa triumphs were achieved with Sevilla being managed by current Villa boss Unai Emery in 2014, 2015 and 2016.

"I am very excited to join Aston Villa, a great project which is striving for excellence from the Under-9s to the top level, and I completely share the vision of the owners," Monchi said.

"I am also delighted and can't wait to work with Unai Emery again, one of the best managers in football.

"After enjoying so many years with Sevilla and winning several European trophies with my life-long club, I look forward to building on the recent successes at Aston Villa and ensuring this colossal club continues to grow and improve."

Monchi left Sevilla in 2017 to become sporting director at Roma, but returned to the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan Stadium two years later.

His reputation for finding bargain buys in the transfer market made him a top target for Villa after Emery's appointment.

Emery arrived in October to replace the sacked Steven Gerrard and took Villa from just above the relegation zone to a seventh-placed finish.

Villa have qualified for next season's Europa Conference League, their first European berth since 2010.

Monchi will be reunited with Emery from July, subject to receiving his work permit.

Villa also said Damian Vidagany is to assume the role of director of football operations, while Johan Lange will be global director of football