Villa v Forest: Premier League Preview

The lineups have been confirmed. The Villa boss has made a quartet of alterations to his starting XI who lost 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.

Nottingham Forest have likewise made four changes 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.

Forest boss Sean Dyche has remarked on his counterpart today:

"Emery has delivered a great job as a manager there. Their signings has been impressive - spent a lot of money, to be fair, on some top players and they’ve forged it into a strong side, so definitely a tough game.

We’ve just shown lately, we’ve faced some of the top sides, or the ones that are tipped every year, and performed admirably against them - and a couple of teams maybe not as fancied, we haven't performed as strongly against them. That’s probably the test of the group - rising to the challenge of each game rather than just the major fixtures."

Harvey Elliott has no future at Aston Villa, an update that was stated by the manager Unai Emery in the build-up to this match. The boss said:

"We respect him as much as possible because he’s a very good professional, very dedicated. The issue 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 convinced to sign him, spending the money we would need to."

What a difference a year makes. 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 twice and the current boss is tasked 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 remaining.