Aston Villa boss Unai Emery has provided our latest team news ahead of our FA Cup tie with Cardiff City on Friday night.
After seeing off West Ham Utd and Tottenham in the previous two rounds, Villa will look to continue to advance in the competition as we hopefully keep our pursuit of silverware this season alive.
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Many will fancy us to get the job done at home given the disparity between the two sides, but we’ve been on the wrong end of cup upsets in recent years, and so we can’t afford to be at all complacent, particularly given our woeful defeat earlier in the week at Crystal Palace.
Emery’s task is set to be made even more difficult though as he could be missing up to eight players for this encounter, as he spoke to the media in his pre-match press conference and offered updates on a number of key individuals.
“Tyrone Mings, as well, doubt,” he said, as per VillaTV. “Emiliano Martinez, doubt. Barkley is not for tomorrow. Onana, doubt. Kamara, doubt. They are close to coming back, but we will see this afternoon.
“Malen, he is sick, but hopefully he can recover for tomorrow. Being sick is different, but it depends.
“More or less, this is the news about the players, how we will be tomorrow.”
“We will train this afternoon… to watch on the field how they are, the players. More or less, without the risk or without pain to be available for tomorrow, we will decide.
“But only the players, they are still being injured, like Pau Torres, like Matty Cash – close, but we will see this afternoon. Pau, not.”
It’s far from ideal to be potentially without eight players for this game, but such is Villa’s strength in depth, we’re still more than capable of putting out a strong side to try and get the win.
Naturally though, that will have a major impact on our bench and will leave us short, and so it’s asking a lot again of those who have featured heavily in recent weeks, as they’ll have to dig deep and put in a much better performance than we saw on Tuesday night.
Nevertheless, it sounds as though there are several players on the verge of returning at least, and so it’s hoped that we have more positive news ahead of our trip to face Club Brugge in the Champions League next week.
