John McGinn: Aston Villa are not giving up on Europe

The 1-0 defeat at Molineux was the second in succession for Unai Emery’s men and left them eighth in the Premier League table but while McGinn admitted they have made things tough for themselves, he believes the opportunity to reach Europe is still there.

Villa host Tottenham, who sit three points ahead of them, next Saturday before finishing off the season against two other teams in the European hunt, Liverpool and Brighton.

McGinn said: “As much as when we were winning we weren’t getting carried away, it’s important we don’t let two defeats hamper what could be an exciting end to the season.

“We’ve made it extremely difficult for ourselves now but the challenge is still there for us. We’ll be aiming for three wins in the last three games.”

McGinn felt Villa paid the price for poor decision-making in the final third at Molineux after dominating much of the game following Toti Gomes’ ninth-minute goal.

Ollie Watkins and Tyrone Mings missed golden chances to level, while Villa also failed to make the most of several good positions through the 90 minutes.

McGinn said: “We lost a goal from a set piece, which is never nice, and you give yourselves a tougher task. We created a lot of chances today to go and equalise and get more from the game.

“It’s definitely frustrating. There are a lot of things we could have done better, but overall, we controlled a lot of it.

“We’ve got to be a lot smarter in the final areas with our decision-making like we have been over the last few months.”

Meanwhile, Wolves captain Ruben Neves admits only a catastrophe can send them down now.

They are 13th, 10 points clear of the Premier League’s bottom three, and depending on other results could be mathematically safe by Monday night.

It comes after Wolves were bottom at Christmas and Neves knows their job is virtually done.

He said: “It’s not a secret for anyone, with 40 points we are pretty much there. A catastrophe needs to happen. It was really important for us and we can breathe a bit better now.

“It’s a big relief to come out of this fight and to enjoy the three games left in the league. We knew if we won this game, we’d be really close to our goal. It’s really hard to go down on 40 points.

“We had a bad start and changed coach, then the World Cup and we changed coach again.

“A lot of injuries, a lot of players out, but we wanted to achieve our main goal.”