Villa against Forest: Top-Flight Build-Up
Opening Thoughts
Greetings and welcome to this Premier League clash between Villa and Forest. The home side are the strong favourites to win in this early kick-off as they are excelling this season and are currently in third, while Nottingham Forest are 17th and just four points outside of the drop zone.
Both clubs are coming into the game on the back of a loss as Villa were overcome 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest lost 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a difficult task for the visitors to come away with all three points with Villa possessing 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? The answer will be revealed very soon.
The team news will be announced shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The starting XIs have been announced. Unai Emery has made four changes to his first eleven who were defeated by 4-1 to Arsenal in their previous match.
Aston 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 also 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
Forest boss Sean Dyche has said on his counterpart today:
"He has done a excellent job as a manager there. Their recruitment has been good - spent a lot of money, to be fair, on some top players and they’ve forged it into a cohesive team, so certainly a tough game.
We’ve just shown lately, we’ve faced some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are fancied every year, and held our own against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as highly-rated, we struggled more against them. That’s likely the test of the group - rising to the expectation of each game rather than just the big games."
Squad News
The midfielder has no future at Aston Villa, news that was revealed by the manager Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss commented:
"I am respecting him all we can because he’s a top professional, very dedicated. The issue we have with Harvey is this year he is a loan player and if he is featuring regularly, we are obligated to buy him. We decided two months ago we are not persuaded to make the move permanent, committing the money we need."
Season Snapshot
What a difference a year makes. 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 on two occasions 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 above the relegation zone with 19 games of the season remaining.
