So near and yet so far from Hamburg

Here I am in Hamburg... or as close as I am going to get tonight.

The Ryanair plane from Stansted couldn't have been quicker... well not without some sort of manipulation of modern-day physics. The hour and a half whizzed by.

We... and this includes a sizeable smattering of Villa fans.... touched down in what we thought was Hamburg only to find it was 54 kilometres to the North-East.

Lubeck Airport. Sort of the Stansted equivalent of London back home. These airport folk could start marketing Stoke and Oxford as Birmingham North and Birmingham South.

Anyway, it was nothing that a shuttle bus wouldn't put right in an hour.

First impressions: dark, very dark for 4pm. Cold and misty too.

Lubeck- a big, silver aircraft hangar. Not exactly welcoming.

It had been a long day to begin with. There had been some hasty re-writes at 9am when Martin O'Neill told us that all of his five big -hitters: Barry, Laursen, Young, Milner and Agbonlahor were staying at home.

Now there's confidence.

No more complaining about a weak squad. Still, qualification is assured.

It's just the 2,800 supporters (or thereabouts) didn't exactly pay to come over to watch the reserves. Then there is the truly blessed few who paid £800-odd to fly with the team.

What must they be thinking?

My M6 and A14 dash was often fraught but surely nothing else could go wrong?

Well, the hotel district around the central bus station in Hamburg looked impressive enough.

Huge buildings, bright lights... this was more like it.

But it was safer to get into a taxi so as not to get lost.

This sleek silver beast, without a scratch on the outside and smelling of soap on the inside, was driven by an elderly blonde lady, long silver hair, not much English language skills and a red baseball cap perched on her head.

My aim: to go straight to my stay for the next two nights.

"The Hotel Ramada please", I said. And showed her the address.

I only started to get a little worried with the meter at 30 euros (now about £25) and we were still driving.

Through my head, momentarily, at the time.....could this woman be related to Josef Fritzl? Was that a man under that red cap?

We ended up some 25 miles away. In the town of Bergedorf.

It appears my newspaper had booked me there with the thought that it was in Hamburg itself, and not on the outskirts.

Well, it was a pity as I missed the press conference where Martin O'Neill was set to entertain and perhaps tease the German media as he often likes to do.

Still, to be fair to the Villa manager he knew I was flying budget airways and he had tried three times to call in his mobile through the day- the last of which was just as the plane was beggining to hurtle down the runway towards take-off.

Ooops! Forget to turn that one off. "Can we speak later Martin!".

The look on the air steward's face would have frozen the fires of hell. I could have ruined his chance to shine as he demonstarted how to tug the chord in event of a crash. "Pull once and blow hard...."- I thought to myself he's said that before (Les Dennis gag circa 1990).

Anyway, here in Bergedorf, feeling a little bit disappointed at missing a few hours out with the many thousands of Villa fans who have travelled.

But tomorrow always brings another day. And despite the weakened team it is still such a magnificent occasion on which Villa can send a real message of intent to the rest of the UEFA Cup competitors.

If they top the group... with a terrific win they'll perchance face the likes of Stuttgart (Thomas Hitzlsperger), Schalke, Sporting Braga, Brugge, Olympiacos, NEC Breda or Deportivo La Coruna on February 18th.

Draw or lose and finish second in the group and it'll mean Bordeaux, Shakhtar Donetsk, Aalborg, Dynamo Kiev, Werder Bremen, Marseille, Fiorentina or holders Zenit St Petersburg.

Lose, or draw and finish third and it could mean a trip to: Standard Liege, Wolfsburg, St Etienne, Galatasaray, Udinese or CSKA Moscow.

All exciting stuff next year but clearly there are so many imponderables.

Clearly there is not much to be won or lost apart from pride in winning tomorrow night as all these teams, apart from one or two exceptions, seem much of a muchness.

The fear is that when managers chop a change to such a degree they are invariably seen to make a rod for their own backs.

And West Ham, who haven't won at home since September I believe, will certainly be looking to exploit that on Saturday night - whether Villa have five, fresh and raring to go match-winners or not.