🔗 Share this article Villa v Nottingham Forest: Top-Flight Build-Up Opening Thoughts Greetings and welcome to this English top-flight encounter between Villa and Nottingham Forest. The home side are the favourites to win in this early kick-off as they are excelling this season and are currently occupying third place, while Forest are seventeenth and just a handful of points outside of the drop zone. Both clubs are coming into the game off of the back of a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest fell 2-0 to Everton. This promises to be a tough task for the visitors to secure all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home forms in Europe at the moment and they also set 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 be released shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT. Starting Elevens The starting XIs have been announced. Unai Emery has made a quartet of alterations to his starting lineup 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. Forest have also made four changes to their starting 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. Dugout Insights Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has remarked on his opponent today: "Emery has delivered a great job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been impressive - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some very good players and they’ve forged it into a strong side, so certainly a tough game. We’ve just shown lately, we’ve played against some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are favoured every year, and performed admirably 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 - rising to the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures." Squad News Harvey Elliott has no future at Aston Villa, news that was revealed by the manager Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss said: "I am respecting him as much as possible because he’s a excellent professional, very respectful. The problem we have with Harvey is this year he is on loan and if he is playing matches, we must buy him. We made the decision two months ago we are not convinced to sign him, spending the money we would need to." League Context The tables have turned. This time last year Forest were third in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have altered, including the manager on two occasions and the current boss is charged with keeping the club in the Premier League this season. Since being named manager 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.
Opening Thoughts Greetings and welcome to this English top-flight encounter between Villa and Nottingham Forest. The home side are the favourites to win in this early kick-off as they are excelling this season and are currently occupying third place, while Forest are seventeenth and just a handful of points outside of the drop zone. Both clubs are coming into the game off of the back of a defeat as Villa were defeated 4-1 by top-of-the-table Arsenal and Forest fell 2-0 to Everton. This promises to be a tough task for the visitors to secure all three points with Villa possessing one of the best home forms in Europe at the moment and they also set 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 be released shortly before kick-off at 12.30pm GMT.
Starting Elevens The starting XIs have been announced. Unai Emery has made a quartet of alterations to his starting lineup 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. Forest have also made four changes to their starting 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.
Dugout Insights Nottingham Forest manager Sean Dyche has remarked on his opponent today: "Emery has delivered a great job as a manager there. Their transfer business has been impressive - invested a lot of money, to be fair, on some very good players and they’ve forged it into a strong side, so certainly a tough game. We’ve just shown lately, we’ve played against some of the bigger teams, or the ones that are favoured every year, and performed admirably 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 - rising to the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures."
Squad News Harvey Elliott has no future at Aston Villa, news that was revealed by the manager Emery in the lead-up to this match. The boss said: "I am respecting him as much as possible because he’s a excellent professional, very respectful. The problem we have with Harvey is this year he is on loan and if he is playing matches, we must buy him. We made the decision two months ago we are not convinced to sign him, spending the money we would need to."
League Context The tables have turned. This time last year Forest were third in the table, where Aston Villa are now. A lot of things have altered, including the manager on two occasions and the current boss is charged with keeping the club in the Premier League this season. Since being named manager 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.