Profiled deathball coach meets the old club:

It will be a very special match for Aston Villa's set-piece coach Pål Fjelde when the Premier League club meets Viking in the Superliga tonight. Follow the match on NRK Sport from 9 pm tonight. Fjelde, who is also the set-piece coach for the Norwegian national team, has a past as a player and assistant coach at Stavanger club. In addition, the set-piece expert was raised in Jørpeland, half an hour's drive from Stavanger. – It will be very special to meet Viking in Europe's biggest club competition at Villa Park. I have also played with several of them and had several as coaches. – I also know the coaching team well. But it will be nice, and I look forward to it, says Fjelde. Norway's best set-piece team He is fully aware that Viking is Norway's clear best team in set-pieces. They top the statistics for set-piece goals in the Eliteserien with 16. They are six more than Bodø/Glimt in second place. Viking also scored goals from corners just a few minutes into the eleven-minute 3-3 match against Bayern Munich in Stavanger. – We must be aware that they are good at set-pieces. We prepare ourselves as well as possible for all the matches, and there is no exception with Viking. – How will Villa stop Viking's set-piece strength? – No, I cannot say that, laughs Fjelde, before adding: – We will have to analyze and see what they are good at, and then we will make a plan after that. Important piece for the national team Set-piece coach Fjelde is an important piece for Aston Villa – and not least for Ståle Solbakken and the Norwegian national team. He received a lot of attention for the played move when Erling Braut Haaland scored the decisive 3-2 goal against Denmark in the Nations League in September. Fjelde was honored with a kiss from the Norwegian star after the goal. – Have you cooked up a new surprise against Viking, as you did when Haaland scored the winning goal against Denmark? – Yes, that could be. I cannot say much about it. But we are preparing well both offensively and defensively. It is an important match for us. Not surprised by Viking's success The set-piece expert and the rest of the Aston Villa camp have naturally noticed Viking's 3-3 achievement against the German giant Bayern Munich. But the former Viking player and assistant is not surprised by the strong result in Jåttåvågen. – Viking is good at home and has done very well in the last couple of years. They have many good players, conceded few goals and scored many. A good deal of work was done in Stavanger, so we hope they will ease up a little against us tonight. Praised by the manager Aston Villa manager Unai Emery praised Pål Fjelde on the press conference at Villa on Tuesday. – Pål is a fantastic guy. He came to us in the summer and has worked well to raise our performances in set-pieces. I am very satisfied with him, we share a lot and have many conversations about set-pieces. – He is young, but he also has a background as a player that helps him understand set-pieces. I hope we can achieve good things together, says Emery. Tripic: – Very cool Viking captain Zlatko Tripic probably has few plans to slow down in Birmingham tonight. He does not think Villa was scared by Viking's performance against Bayern, but thinks they are aware that the side can cause trouble for all teams. – It will be very cool to meet such a good football team as Aston Villa. It is also cool that an old acquaintance is working there. – Is it an advantage for Aston Villa to have a set-piece coach who knows Viking so well? – He probably has some information, but at the same time we are doing a lot of new things compared to when he was here. All teams also have access to videos of all our matches, but hopefully we will come up with surprises and cause trouble for them. The captain does not hide that set-pieces are an important part of Viking's game. – Set-pieces are important for all teams. When Arsenal won the Premier League last year, they were also the best team in set-pieces. It is a big part of football. Viking got 1850 away tickets for the match against Aston Villa. All the tickets were torn off in a short time.