John McGinn is confident Aston Villa will compete this year. Amphol Thongmueangluang/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images John McGinn is confident Aston Villa are going to continue challenging the elite in the Premier League and Europe despite their latest summer shake-up.
Villa have had to transfer three of their key players in Morgan Rogers, Youri Tielemans and Lucas Digne -- the latter to Wednesday's Super Cup final opponents Paris Saint-Germain.
But skipper McGinn said the "hunger and desire" which took them to Europa League glory last season is still burning at the club.
"A lot has changed, yeah, but a lot has changed in the eight years that I've been here," McGinn said.
"When we got promoted to the Premier League, there was a lot of change in the summer.
"When you're signing the best young English talent, there's only going to be interest in them. When your players are performing at the highest level, there's going to be interest.
"So we've got a structure in place, we've got standards and rules which have made us successful over the past few seasons, and our job is just to integrate the new players and try and make them believe the same way the players in the last few seasons have believed.
Alejandro Garnacho has joined Aston Villa on loan Neville Williams/Aston Villa FC via Getty Images "The expectations? Similar to where it's been in the past few seasons. I think we've consistently competed with the best in England, I think we've consistently competed with the best in Europe no matter what the competition is.
"We will have our challenges, there's a lot of change, but when you look at other clubs around England there's a lot of changes there as well.
"A lot of coaches are changing, a lot of players are changing, but what we have still is our main core; the same manager, the same methods, the same desire to achieve more.
"A lot of people thought we'd reached our ceiling a couple of seasons ago and we proved them wrong.
- Lucas Digne completes transfer to PSG from Aston Villa - Premier League, EFL summer transfer window 2026 dates: When is Deadline Day? - One U21 player to watch from each Premier League team
"We've still got the same hunger and desire to go and achieve more, and as long as we've got the hunger and desire to do that you can expect as much as possible."
Manager Unai Emery revealed Villa will be without Ollie Watkins, Ezri Konsa and Emiliano Martínez in Salzburg, the trio having been given extended breaks after going deep at the World Cup.