Aston Villa v Nottingham Forest: Premier League Preview
Introduction
Welcome everyone to this Premier League fixture between Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest. Aston Villa are the strong favourites to win in this early kick-off as they are flying this season and are currently sitting third, while Nottingham Forest are in 17th position and just a handful of points outside of the relegation zone.
The two teams are coming into the game off of the back of a loss as Villa were defeated 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest fell 2-0 to Everton.
This promises to be a challenging task for Forest to secure 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 confirmed XIs will drop shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Confirmed Lineups
The lineups have been confirmed. The Villa boss has made a quartet of alterations to his first eleven 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 adjustments to their matchday squad after a 2-0 loss 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.
Pre-Match Quotes
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has remarked on his counterpart today:
"Emery has delivered a great job as a manager there. Their recruitment has been impressive - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some excellent players and they’ve shaped it into a good unit, so definitely a difficult game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve taken on some of the larger clubs, or the ones that are favoured every year, and held our own against them - and a couple of teams perhaps not as fancied, we haven't performed as strongly against them. That’s likely the challenge of the group - meeting the challenge of each game rather than just the big games."
Player Situation
Harvey Elliott has will not be staying at Aston Villa, news that was revealed by the manager Emery in the build-up to this match. The boss stated:
"I am respecting him as much as possible because he’s a very good professional, very respectful. The issue 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 made the decision two months ago we are not persuaded 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 Villa are now. A lot of things have shifted, including the manager on two occasions and the current boss is charged with keeping the club in the Premier League 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.