Aston Villa v Forest: Top-Flight Match Preview
Opening Thoughts
Hello and welcome to this Premier League clash between Aston Villa and Forest. Villa will be the strong favourites to win in this lunchtime start as they are excelling this season and are currently sitting third, while Nottingham Forest are seventeenth and just four points outside of the drop zone.
Both clubs are coming into the game off of the back of a setback as Villa were overcome 4-1 by league-leading Arsenal and Forest succumbed 2-0 to Everton.
It will be a challenging task for the visitors to secure all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home records in Europe at the moment and they also set a club record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But maybe it’s a new year and a new narrative? All will become clear very soon.
The starting lineups will be announced shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The team news is in. Unai Emery has made a quartet of alterations to his first eleven who were defeated by 4-1 to Arsenal last time around.
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 adjustments to their starting squad after a 2-0 loss 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.
Pre-Match Quotes
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has commented on his opponent today:
"He’s [Unai Emery] done a excellent job as a manager there. Their recruitment has been strong - spent a lot of money, to be fair, on some very good players and they’ve shaped it into a cohesive team, so definitely a difficult game.
We’ve just shown lately, we’ve played against some of the larger clubs, or the ones that are favoured every year, and performed admirably against them - and a couple of teams perhaps not as highly-rated, 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 no future at Aston Villa, an update 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 top professional, very dedicated. The situation we have with Harvey is this year he is on loan and if he is playing matches, we are obligated to buy him. We decided two months ago we are not persuaded to sign him, spending the money we need."
League Context
The tables have turned. This time last year Forest were in third place in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have altered, including the manager on two occasions and Sean Dyche is charged with keeping the club in the Premier League this season. Since being named manager 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.