The Aston Villa headache Matteo Ruggeri can now give Unai Emery

Matteo Ruggeri has a huge chance to stake his claim in Aston Villa's Champions League showdown against Club Brugge.

The summer signing has so far made two appearances for Villa, but both came from off the bench.

Roberto Olabe identified him as a key target for the Villans this summer, bringing him to B6 on a permanent deal from Atletico Madrid.

Ruggeri will provide Ian Maatsen with much-needed competition at left-back, especially after Luca Digne's departure.

However, Maatsen suffered a knock in the 0-0 draw with Hull City, and therefore could be rested against Brugge on Tuesday.

If Ruggeri gets the nod from Unai Emery, the full-back could make a claim to be starting week in, week out for Aston Villa.

How Matteo Ruggeri can go full steam ahead at Aston Villa

Aston Villa are yet to score after their first three games of the season, let alone win a game.

Maatsen has been a starter in all three of those games, but continues to have some doubters at Villa Park.

He has an average FotMob rating of 6.12 from his first games in the Premier League this campaign, and is partly to blame for the B6 side having the joint-worst xG difference in the division at 2.80.

Though Maatsen played well against Hull, Ruggeri replaced him after he picked up a knock.

In the 15 minutes that the Italian played, he completed 100 per cent of his 20 passes, with nine of them being line-breaking through-balls.

He covered 1.4 miles in the period he was on the field, and put two crosses into the box.

Ruggeri grabbed seven assists in all competitions for Atletico Madrid last term, and could be useful as an extra outlet in the final third against Club Brugge.

A strong performance may help the 24-year-old nail his spot in the side for the long term.

How Ruggeri has blueprint to unlock Club Brugge defence

Villa last paid Club Brugge a visit at the Jan Breydel Stadion only in March of last year, and came back to England with a 3-1 lead heading into the second leg of the last-16 tie.

Digne had a good game that night and was afforded plenty of space down the Belgian outfit's right-hand side, whipping in a total of four crosses and making nine passes into the final third

Though the players and manager have changed since, Club Brugge still deploy the same 4-2-3-1 formation, and Ruggeri can take information from Digne's performance.

The hosts in this one have already kept clean sheets in each of their home games in the league this season, scoring a combined total of four goals.

A win and a good performance would certainly help Ruggeri's case going forward, if he were to feature from the off.