John McGinn has conceded that Aston Villa's 3-0 defeat to Barcelona on Tuesday night was a "huge learning curve".

With Unai Emery's new-look side having started to gel, there was optimism that the Premier League club could record a fourth successive Champions League win.

Despite matching the La Liga champions in the first half, Villa ultimately succumbed to defeat in the pouring rain at Camp Nou.

Speaking to TNT Sports after the game, McGinn admitted that Villa had been outclassed by the Catalan giants.

McGinn says Aston Villa "can be competitive" against big teams

The Scot said: "Barcelona made the right decisions at the right times and scored really good goals.

"The manager spoke about being clinical at important moments in the game. When you come here 50-50s sometimes don't go your way. They also leave players up the pitch so if you lose the ball they can be away.

"I think we are competitive against teams at this level, we have shown that whether it is Bayern Munich or PSG. Tonight was a huge learning curve for us and I am sure it will stand us in good stead for the future."

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Emery describes Aston Villa defeat to Barcelona as "important experience"

Although Emery acknowledged his disappointment at Villa failing to make the most of openings in the first half, the Spaniard was taking the positives from the night.

He said: "The result is not good, a lot of things positive but it was not enough to get a good result.

"How we are building the team is clear in 90 minutes but we have young players, talented players and experienced players. Today we conceded some mistakes. Over the process we've had here we have made those mistakes but then overcame them.

"Today more or less after the mistake we made we were creating chances, facing them with individual duels. If we could score one goal with the chances we had in the first half maybe it would have been different but we were not clinical.

"I can feel on one side we are comfortable doing our way because we have nine points because of the good work before. We should be realistic but at the same time feeling good how we are doing it.

"Of course I have my opinion how we can get better but the experience today was very important.

"This is the level we want to achieve again. Today was a good experience, bad result but good things as well. In this level you must be more ruthless."

While Villa have remained in third place in the League Phase table, that is likely to change after the remaining nine matchday four matches on Wednesday.