Lille vs Aston Villa Prediction and Betting Tips: Back a draw in France

Holding a slender 2-1 advantage following last week's home tie, Aston Villa travel to France in their bid to complete a Europa Conference League quarter-final job over Lille and progress to the competition's final four.

High from Sunday's 2-0 win in Arsenal's own North London backyard, that victory and Spurs' heavy defeat to Newcastle now puts Villa in the driving seat of their own Champions League destiny.

Last Thursday's result was slightly tainted by Bafode Diakite's 84th-minute goal from a set piece at Villa Park, however, the English side would absolutely have taken any form of advantage heading into this second meeting before the first leg.

Lille will be well rested for this pivotal fixture, having not played since that narrow 2-1 defeat in B6. That loss was Lille's first in the UECL and having won four of their five home matches in this competition, Villa will certainly have their work cut out if they are to make it through.

Judging by the number of goals flying around in this campaign's European knockout matches, you might consider us brave or entirely stupid for tipping up this main bet on Thursday.

Don't get us wrong - these teams are perfectly capable of playing out a high stakes thriller, but with the nature of the tie being far from conclusive, there's good reason to believe we might see a more measured scoreline south of the channel.

AVFC kept a first clean sheet in four against The Gunners last weekend - only the second team to shut them out in a league game at the Emirates this term. Unai Emery has displayed excellent game management in his last two European trips, seeing out a 1-1 draw with Zrinjski to ensure his side topped their group before executing a 0-0 stalemate in Rotterdam in their last-16 first leg tie with Ajax.

They've kept 12 clean sheets on the road for the season, so for as leaky as people insist Villa are, they are clearly more than capable of quietening their opponents when absolutely necessary.

Meanwhile, half of the hosts' 14 Ligue 1 home matches have produced two or fewer goals. This extends to nine fixtures at the Decathlon Arena when factoring in UECL home ties, including their 1-1 draw with Strum Graz in the round of 16 most recently.

Luck was somewhat on Villa's side a week ago, as was the marvellous Emi Martinez, however, when you're as proficient at catching teams offside as Villa are, a certain amount of credit has to be thrown your way when it comes to defensive performance.

Emery is a master of navigating tricky European occasions and if red-hot centre back Diego Carlos is able to nullify Jonathan David for the second time in the space of a week to build on his exceptional performance at the Emirates, then Villa should be able to keep goals to a minimum in France.

Off the back of our main play, we fancy things to end all square in Lille between this well matched pair. Logically, it's the smartest outcome to bet on considering Villa's marginal advantage and their expected approach to play things safe to protect that lead.

It's also been the result in the visitors' last two games of their European adventure as mentioned previously. Now while those circumstances weren't identical, there were certainly a lot of similarities to go by, as well as basing this prediction on AVFC's general style of play on the road.

Rennes, Brest and Sturm Graz have all held Lille to score draws in the French side's last six outings - two of which were played on home soil. PSG and Toulouse also came and took away a point from this ground, leaving Paulo Fonseca's men with a tally of 13 draws across 42 fixtures in the 2023/24 season's calendar.