Villa versus Nottingham Forest: Premier League Build-Up
Preamble
Welcome everyone to this English top-flight fixture between Villa and Forest. Aston Villa are the strong favourites to win in this lunchtime start as they are excelling this season and are currently in third, while Nottingham Forest are 17th and just a handful of points outside of the relegation zone.
Both clubs are entering the game following a setback as Villa were beaten 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest fell 2-0 to Everton.
This shapes up as a challenging task for Sean Dyche’s side to secure all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home forms in Europe at the moment and they also recorded a club record of 36 wins across all competitions this season. But perhaps it’s new year, new story? All will become clear very soon.
The starting lineups will drop shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Team News
The lineups have been confirmed. Unai Emery has made four changes to his starting XI who were defeated by 4-1 to Arsenal in their previous match.
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 also 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.
Substitutes: Sels, Morato, Awoniyi, Luiz, Kalimuendo, McAtee, Zinchenko, Savona, Abbott.
Pre-Match Quotes
Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has remarked on his opponent today:
"He has done a excellent 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 moulded it into a good unit, so definitely a tough game.
We’ve just demonstrated 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 performed as strongly against them. That’s likely the challenge of the group - meeting the challenge of each game rather than just the big games."
Squad News
Harvey Elliott has will not be staying at Aston Villa, an update that was stated by the manager Unai 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 persuaded 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 third in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have shifted, including the manager on two occasions and Sean Dyche is tasked with keeping the club in the top-flight this season. Since being named manager on 21 October, Dyche has accumulated 10 Premier League points and the side are just outside the bottom three with 19 games of the season remaining.
