Villa v Nottingham Forest: Top-Flight Preview
Preamble
Greetings and welcome to this Premier League encounter between Villa and Forest. The home side are the favourites to win in this lunchtime start as they are soaring this season and are currently in third, while Nottingham Forest are in 17th position and just four points outside of the relegation zone.
Both clubs are entering the game following a loss as Villa were defeated 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest lost 2-0 to Everton.
This shapes up as a challenging task for Forest to obtain all three points with Villa boasting one of the best home forms 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? All will become clear very soon.
The starting lineups will drop shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Confirmed Lineups
The lineups have been confirmed. Unai Emery has made four changes to his starting XI who lost 4-1 to Arsenal last time around.
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 starting squad after a 2-0 defeat to Everton.
Nott’m Forest: Victor, Williams, Murillo, Anderson, Gibbs-White, Dominguez, I Jesus, Hutchinson, Bakwa, Milenkovic, Aina.
Bench: Sels, Morato, Awoniyi, Luiz, Kalimuendo, McAtee, Zinchenko, Savona, Abbott.
Dugout Insights
Forest boss Sean Dyche has remarked on his counterpart today:
"He’s [Unai Emery] done a great job as a manager there. Their recruitment 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 definitely a tough game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve played against some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are favoured every year, and done very well against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as fancied, we haven’t done as well against them. That’s probably the challenge of the group - meeting the expectation of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Transfer Update
The midfielder has will not be staying at Aston Villa, news that was confirmed 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 very good professional, very respectful. The situation we have with Harvey is this year he is on loan and if he is featuring regularly, we must buy him. We decided two months ago we are not convinced to make the move permanent, spending the money we need."
Season Snapshot
The tables have turned. This time last year Forest were in third place in the table, where Villa are now. A lot of things have shifted, including the manager on two occasions and the current boss is tasked with keeping the club in the Premier League this season. Since being appointed on 21 October, Dyche has secured 10 Premier League points and the side are just outside the relegation zone with 19 games of the season to go.
