Aston Villa v Nottingham Forest: Top-Flight Preview
Preamble
Hello and welcome to this Premier League clash between Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest. Aston Villa are the favourites to win in this lunchtime start as they are flying this season and are currently in third, while Nottingham Forest are 17th and just a handful of points outside of the drop zone.
Each side are entering the game following a setback as Villa were beaten 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest lost 2-0 to Everton.
This promises to be a difficult task for the visitors to come away with all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home forms in Europe at the moment and they also set a club record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But perhaps it’s new year, new story? The answer will be revealed very soon.
The team news will be released shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The starting XIs have been announced. Unai Emery has made four changes 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.
Nottingham Forest have likewise made four changes 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 commented on his counterpart today:
"Emery has delivered a great job as a manager there. Their signings has been impressive - spent a lot of money, to be fair, on some excellent players and they’ve forged it into a good unit, so certainly a difficult game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve faced 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 haven't performed as strongly against them. That’s probably the challenge of the group - meeting the challenge of each game rather than just the big games."
Player Situation
The midfielder has will not be staying at Aston Villa, news that was stated by the manager Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss said:
"I am respecting him as much as possible because he’s a top professional, very dedicated. The issue we have with Harvey is this year he is on loan 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, committing the money we need."
League Context
The tables have turned. This time last year Forest were third in the table, where Villa are now. A lot of things have changed, including the manager twice and Sean Dyche is tasked with keeping the club in the top-flight this season. Since being named manager on 21 October, Dyche has secured 10 Premier League points and the side are just above the bottom three with 19 games of the season remaining.
