Unai Emery's Villa hit the top of the Champions League table on the same night Manchester United and Tielemans were humiliated

Youri Tielemans might be feeling sorry about something else now.

The former Aston Villa man was all apologetic back in August when he offended Villa Park supporters with a comment about Manchester United being “above Villa”.

Tielemans had just moved to Old Trafford for £35m, the release clause in his Villa contract triggered, when he said: "We (Villa) achieved the Europa League win, which is great for the club but, yeah, there is still clubs above Villa, and Manchester United is one of them. Especially at this moment, there is a very positive vibe, a very positive mood in and around the club.”

An apology swiftly followed: "Never meant for my words in the press yesterday to offend anyone or undermine the institution of Aston Villa Football Club which I massively respect and I'm grateful to for the past three years,” he said.

“I must however admit my mistake and apologise for my choice of words, will be more careful in the future. wishing the club the best in the future. Youri."

Having admitted to his mistake then, you have to wonder now if Tielemans is already thinking he’s made another one, in leaving Villa for United.

Gone is the positive vibe he spoke of at Old Trafford only two months ago. The vibe is now distinctly vicious after United hit a new low in the Champions League on Wednesday night, Tielemans playing the full 90 minutes as Michael Carrick’s side were embarrassed 4-1 by Como.

"It was a very bad match from us. The fans come out here and we put out a non-performance like this, it's not good enough from us,” Tielemans apologised, afterwards.

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It wasn’t the first time Tielemans has been forced to face tough questions on a Champions League night too, it happened only a week ago in Madrid after a 2-0 defeat against Atletico when one of his new teammates, Lisandro Martinez, publicly questioned United’s summer transfer business, which included Tielemans himself, of course.

Asked what he thought of Martinez’s explosive remarks, Tielemans said: “I have no comment on that.” You can imagine what he was thinking, though.

“It’s very hard to say after a defeat there is positivity, we have spells in games where we play well but we can’t capitalise on our chances and it’s very hard to get back into the game, we just have to work hard to keep working to keep trusting our structure and from there we can move on,” he added.

United have clearly not moved on. Villa have, however, from losing Tielemans. On the same night as another United post-mortem, Villa were vanquishing Viking at Villa Park in the Champions League, Unai Emery’s side winning 3-1.

With United down in 21st place in the league phase table, Villa were briefly top of it, above Paris Saint-Germain on goal difference, before Viking scored a late goal. Talk about mind the gap.

Even after only two months, it’s fair to say Tielemans’ comments haven’t aged well. United are not above Villa in the only place it truly matters.