Villa versus Nottingham Forest: Premier League Build-Up
Preamble
Greetings 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 Forest are seventeenth and just four points outside of the drop zone.
Each side are coming into the game on the back of a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest fell 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a difficult task for Sean Dyche’s side to obtain all three points with Villa boasting one of the best home forms in Europe at the moment and they also achieved a club record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But perhaps it’s new year, new story? We will find out very soon.
The starting lineups will drop shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Confirmed Lineups
The lineups have been confirmed. Unai Emery has made a quartet of alterations to his starting lineup who were defeated by 4-1 to Arsenal last time out.
Aston Villa: Martinez, Cash, Konsa, Lindelof, Maatsen, Kamara, Tielemans, McGinn, Buendia, Rogers, Watkins.
Substitutes: Bizot, Digne, Sancho, Garcia, Carroll, Bogarde, Hemmings, Malen, Jimoh-Aloba.
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.
Bench: Sels, Morato, Awoniyi, Luiz, Kalimuendo, McAtee, Zinchenko, Savona, Abbott.
Manager Comments
Forest boss Sean Dyche has said on his counterpart today:
"He’s [Unai Emery] done a great job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been impressive - spent a lot of money, to be fair, on some excellent players and they’ve moulded it into a strong side, so definitely a tough game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve taken on some of the top sides, or the ones that are tipped every year, and done very well against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as highly-rated, we haven’t done as well against them. That’s probably the challenge of the group - rising to the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Player Situation
Harvey Elliott has will not be staying at Aston Villa, an update that was confirmed by the manager Emery in the build-up to this match. The boss commented:
"We respect 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 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."
Season Snapshot
The tables have turned. This time last year Nottingham Forest were in third place in the table, where Villa are now. A lot of things have changed, including the manager on two occasions and the current boss is tasked with keeping the club in the top-flight this season. Since being appointed on 21 October, Dyche has won 10 Premier League points and the side are just outside the bottom three with 19 games of the season remaining.
