Villa against Forest: Top-Flight Match Preview
Opening Thoughts
Hello and welcome to this English top-flight fixture between Aston Villa and Forest. The home side are the expected winners to win in this early kick-off as they are soaring this season and are currently occupying third place, while Nottingham Forest are in 17th position and just four points outside of the drop zone.
The two teams are entering the game off of the back of a setback as Villa were beaten 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest lost 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a difficult task for Forest to obtain 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 perhaps it’s a new year and a new narrative? The answer will be revealed very soon.
The starting lineups will be released shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Starting Elevens
The lineups have been confirmed. Unai Emery has made four changes to his starting lineup who lost 4-1 to Arsenal last time out.
Aston 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 also made four changes 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.
Dugout Insights
Forest boss Sean Dyche has remarked on his counterpart today:
"He has done a great 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 shaped it into a good unit, so definitely a tough game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve faced some of the top sides, or the ones that are favoured every year, and performed admirably against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as highly-rated, we struggled more against them. That’s probably the challenge of the group - rising to the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Squad News
The midfielder 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 commented:
"I am respecting him as much as possible because he’s a top professional, very respectful. The problem 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 sign him, committing the money we would need to."
Form Guide
How times change. 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 charged with keeping the club in the Premier League this season. Since being named manager on 21 October, Dyche has secured 10 Premier League points and the side are just outside the bottom three with 19 games of the season remaining.
