Aston Villa versus Forest: Premier League Build-Up
Introduction
Welcome everyone to this Premier League encounter between Aston Villa and Forest. Villa will be the expected winners to win in this lunchtime start as they are flying this season and are currently in third, while Nottingham Forest are seventeenth and just a handful of points outside of the drop zone.
The two teams are entering the game on the back of a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest succumbed 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a tough task for Forest to obtain all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home forms 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? We will find out very soon.
The confirmed XIs will be announced shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The lineups have been confirmed. The Villa boss has made four changes to his starting XI 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.
Forest have likewise made four adjustments 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.
Bench: Sels, Morato, Awoniyi, Luiz, Kalimuendo, McAtee, Zinchenko, Savona, Abbott.
Manager Comments
Forest boss Sean Dyche has commented on his opponent today:
"Emery has delivered a fantastic job as a manager there. Their recruitment has been good - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some top players and they’ve moulded it into a strong side, so certainly a challenging game.
We’ve just shown lately, we’ve taken on some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are fancied every year, and done very well against them - and a couple of teams perhaps not as fancied, we haven't performed as strongly against them. That’s probably the challenge of the group - rising to the expectation of each game rather than just the big games."
Transfer Update
Harvey Elliott has no future at Aston Villa, an update that was confirmed by the manager Emery in the build-up to this match. The boss stated:
"We respect him all we can because he’s a very good professional, very dedicated. The situation we have with Harvey is this year he is on loan and if he is featuring regularly, we are obligated to buy him. We decided two months ago we are not convinced to sign him, spending the money we need."
Season Snapshot
The tables have turned. This time last year Forest were third in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have changed, including the manager twice and Sean Dyche is charged 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 to go.