Villa v Forest: Premier League Preview
Opening Thoughts
Greetings and welcome to this Premier League clash between Villa and Forest. Aston Villa are the expected winners to win in this lunchtime start as they are soaring this season and are currently occupying third place, while Nottingham Forest are seventeenth and just four points outside of the drop zone.
Both clubs are entering the game off of the back of a defeat as Villa were beaten 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest succumbed 2-0 to Everton.
This shapes up as a tough task for Sean Dyche’s side to secure all three points with Villa having one of the best home records in Europe at the moment and they also recorded a club record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But maybe it’s new year, new story? We will find out very soon.
The starting lineups will be announced shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Starting Elevens
The starting XIs have been announced. Unai Emery has made four changes to his starting XI who lost 4-1 to Arsenal in their previous match.
Villa: Martinez, Cash, Konsa, Lindelof, Maatsen, Kamara, Tielemans, McGinn, Buendia, Rogers, Watkins.
Bench: Bizot, Digne, Sancho, Garcia, Carroll, Bogarde, Hemmings, Malen, Jimoh-Aloba.
Forest have likewise made four changes to their matchday squad after a 2-0 defeat to Everton.
Nott’m 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
Forest boss Sean Dyche has commented on his opponent today:
"He’s [Unai Emery] done a excellent job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been good - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some top players and they’ve forged it into a strong side, so certainly a challenging game.
We’ve just shown lately, we’ve played against some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are favoured every year, and performed admirably against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as highly-rated, we haven’t done as well against them. That’s probably the challenge of the group - rising to the expectation of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Transfer Update
Harvey Elliott has will not be staying at Aston Villa, news that was stated by the manager Unai Emery in the build-up to this match. The boss commented:
"I am respecting him all we can because he’s a top professional, very dedicated. The situation we have with Harvey is this year he is a loan player and if he is playing matches, we must buy him. We made the decision two months ago we are not convinced to sign him, committing the money we would need to."
Season Snapshot
How times change. This time last year Nottingham Forest were third in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have altered, including the manager twice and the current boss is tasked 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 relegation zone with 19 games of the season remaining.
