Aston Villa against Nottingham Forest: Premier League Build-Up
Introduction
Hello and welcome to this Premier League fixture between Villa and Forest. Aston Villa 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 four points outside of the drop zone.
The two teams are coming into the game on the back of a setback as Villa were beaten 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest lost 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a difficult task for the visitors to come away with all three points with Villa boasting 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? The answer will be revealed very soon.
The confirmed XIs will be released shortly before the start at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The starting XIs have been announced. The Villa boss has made a quartet of alterations to his first eleven who lost 4-1 to Arsenal last time around.
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 also made four adjustments to their matchday 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.
Manager Comments
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has said on his counterpart today:
"He has done a fantastic job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been good - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some top players and they’ve forged it into a good unit, so definitely a difficult game.
We’ve just demonstrated lately, we’ve faced some of the larger clubs, or the ones that are tipped every year, and performed admirably against them - and a couple of teams perhaps not as highly-rated, we haven't performed as strongly against them. That’s likely the challenge of the group - rising to the expectation of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Squad News
The midfielder has will not be staying at Aston Villa, an update that was stated by the manager Unai 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 problem 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, committing the money we would need to."
League Context
The tables have turned. This time last year Nottingham Forest were in third place in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have changed, including the manager twice and Sean Dyche is tasked with keeping the club in the Premier League this season. Since being appointed on 21 October, Dyche has accumulated 10 Premier League points and the side are just above the bottom three with 19 games of the season remaining.
