Villa v Nottingham Forest: Top-Flight Preview
Opening Thoughts
Hello and welcome to this Premier League clash between Villa and Forest. Villa will be the expected winners to win in this lunchtime start as they are excelling this season and are currently sitting third, while Forest are 17th and just four points outside of the drop zone.
The two teams are coming into the game on the back of a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest succumbed 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a difficult task for Forest to obtain all three points with Villa having one of the best home records in Europe at the moment and they also achieved a club record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But perhaps it’s a new year and a new narrative? We will find out very soon.
The confirmed XIs will be released shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The team news is in. The Villa boss has made four changes to his starting XI who were defeated by 4-1 to Arsenal last time around.
Villa: Martinez, Cash, Konsa, Lindelof, Maatsen, Kamara, Tielemans, McGinn, Buendia, Rogers, Watkins.
Substitutes: Bizot, Digne, Sancho, Garcia, Carroll, Bogarde, Hemmings, Malen, Jimoh-Aloba.
Nottingham Forest have likewise made four adjustments 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.
Dugout Insights
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has said on his counterpart today:
"He’s [Unai Emery] done a great job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been impressive - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some excellent players and they’ve moulded it into a good unit, so certainly a difficult game.
We’ve just shown 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 challenge of the group - meeting the challenge of each game rather than just the big games."
Transfer Update
The midfielder has no future at Aston Villa, news that was confirmed by the manager Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss said:
"I am respecting him all we can because he’s a excellent professional, very respectful. The situation we have with Harvey is this year he is a loan player and if he is playing matches, we are obligated to buy him. We decided two months ago we are not convinced to sign him, committing the money we need."
Season Snapshot
How times change. This time last year Forest were third in the table, where Villa are now. A lot of things have changed, including the manager on two occasions 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.
