Villa versus Forest: Premier League Preview
Opening Thoughts
Welcome everyone to this English top-flight encounter between Villa and Forest. Aston Villa are the expected winners to win in this early kick-off as they are excelling this season and are currently occupying third place, while Nottingham Forest are in 17th position and just a handful of points outside of the drop zone.
Each side are entering the game following a defeat as Villa were overcome 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest succumbed 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a difficult task for Forest to secure all three points with Villa boasting one of the best home records in Europe at the moment and they also recorded a team record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But maybe it’s new year, new story? The answer will be revealed very soon.
The starting lineups will drop shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The team news is in. Unai Emery has made four changes to his starting XI who lost 4-1 to Arsenal last time out.
Villa: Martinez, Cash, Konsa, Lindelof, Maatsen, Kamara, Tielemans, McGinn, Buendia, Rogers, Watkins.
Substitutes: Bizot, Digne, Sancho, Garcia, Carroll, Bogarde, Hemmings, Malen, Jimoh-Aloba.
Forest have likewise made four changes to their matchday squad after a 2-0 loss to Everton.
Nottingham Forest: Victor, Williams, Murillo, Anderson, Gibbs-White, Dominguez, I Jesus, Hutchinson, Bakwa, Milenkovic, Aina.
Bench: Sels, Morato, Awoniyi, Luiz, Kalimuendo, McAtee, Zinchenko, Savona, Abbott.
Dugout Insights
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has said on his opponent today:
"Emery has delivered a fantastic job as a manager there. Their signings has been strong - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some very good players and they’ve forged it into a cohesive team, so definitely a difficult game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve taken on some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are favoured every year, and done very well against them - and a couple of teams perhaps not as highly-rated, we haven't performed as strongly against them. That’s probably the test of the group - meeting the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Transfer Update
Harvey Elliott has no future at Aston Villa, news that was stated by the manager Unai Emery in the build-up to this match. The boss commented:
"We respect him all we can because he’s a very good professional, very dedicated. The issue we have with Harvey is this year he is a loan player and if he is featuring regularly, we must buy him. We decided two months ago we are not convinced to make the move permanent, spending the money we need."
Form Guide
How times change. This time last year Nottingham Forest were in third place in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have altered, including the manager twice and Sean Dyche is charged with keeping the club in the top-flight this season. Since being appointed on 21 October, Dyche has accumulated 10 Premier League points and the side are just outside the bottom three with 19 games of the season to go.
