Villa versus Forest: Premier League Preview
Opening Thoughts
Hello and welcome to this Premier League fixture between Villa and Nottingham Forest. Aston Villa are the strong favourites to win in this lunchtime start as they are soaring this season and are currently occupying third place, while Forest are 17th and just a handful of points outside of the relegation zone.
Both clubs are entering the game off of the back of a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest lost 2-0 to Everton.
This promises to be a challenging task for Forest to come away with all three points with Villa having one of the best home records in Europe at the moment and they also achieved a team record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But maybe it’s a new year and a new narrative? All will become clear very soon.
The starting lineups will be released shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Confirmed Lineups
The lineups have been confirmed. Unai Emery has made four changes to his starting XI who were defeated by 4-1 to Arsenal last time out.
Villa: Martinez, Cash, Konsa, Lindelof, Maatsen, Kamara, Tielemans, McGinn, Buendia, Rogers, Watkins.
Bench: Bizot, Digne, Sancho, Garcia, Carroll, Bogarde, Hemmings, Malen, Jimoh-Aloba.
Nottingham Forest have likewise made four changes to their matchday squad after a 2-0 defeat to Everton.
Nottingham Forest: Victor, Williams, Murillo, Anderson, Gibbs-White, Dominguez, I Jesus, Hutchinson, Bakwa, Milenkovic, Aina.
Substitutes: Sels, Morato, Awoniyi, Luiz, Kalimuendo, McAtee, Zinchenko, Savona, Abbott.
Manager Comments
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has remarked on his opponent today:
"Emery has delivered a excellent job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been good - spent a lot of money, to be fair, on some top players and they’ve moulded it into a cohesive team, so definitely a tough game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve taken on some of the top sides, or the ones that are fancied every year, and held our own against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as fancied, we struggled more against them. That’s probably the test of the group - rising to the expectation of each game rather than just the big games."
Player Situation
Harvey Elliott has will not be staying at Aston Villa, an update that was revealed by the manager Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss stated:
"We respect him as much as possible because he’s a top professional, very respectful. The issue we have with Harvey is this year he is a loan player and if he is playing matches, we must buy him. We decided two months ago we are not convinced to sign him, committing the money we would need to."
Season Snapshot
The tables have turned. This time last year Nottingham Forest were third in the table, where Villa are now. A lot of things have shifted, including the manager twice and Sean Dyche is tasked with keeping the club in the top-flight this season. Since being appointed on 21 October, Dyche has won 10 Premier League points and the side are just above the relegation zone with 19 games of the season to go.
