Aston Villa v Nottingham Forest: Top-Flight Build-Up
Opening Thoughts
Greetings and welcome to this Premier League fixture between Villa and Forest. The home side are the strong favourites to win in this lunchtime start as they are flying this season and are currently sitting third, while Forest are seventeenth and just a handful of points outside of the relegation zone.
The two teams are coming into the game following a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest succumbed 2-0 to Everton.
This shapes up as a challenging task for the visitors to secure all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home records in Europe at the moment and they also set 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 confirmed XIs will be released shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Confirmed Lineups
The starting XIs have been announced. Unai Emery has made a quartet of alterations to his starting XI who lost 4-1 to Arsenal last time out.
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 changes to their starting squad after a 2-0 loss 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.
Pre-Match Quotes
Forest boss Sean Dyche has remarked on his opponent today:
"He has done a excellent job as a manager there. Their recruitment has been strong - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some very good players and they’ve moulded it into a cohesive team, so definitely a challenging game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve faced some of the top sides, or the ones that are tipped every year, and held our own against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as highly-rated, we haven’t done as well against them. That’s likely the test of the group - rising to the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Transfer Update
Harvey Elliott has will not be staying at Aston Villa, an update that was revealed by the manager Unai Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss stated:
"I am respecting him as much as possible because he’s a excellent professional, very respectful. The problem we have with Harvey is this year he is a loan player and if he is featuring regularly, we must buy him. We made the decision two months ago we are not persuaded to make the move permanent, committing the money we need."
Form Guide
How times change. This time last year Forest were in third place in the table, where 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 named manager 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.
