Aston Villa host Bournemouth in the Premier League on Sunday, and Unai Emery has delivered our latest team news for the encounter.
The squad will return from France in buoyant mood after our triumphant penalty shootout against Lille, which in turn secured our place in the semi-finals of the Europa Conference League next month.
READ MORE: Blow for Villa as influential ace set for suspension, but Emery says talks ongoing
However, while fatigue is a concern given our efforts on Thursday night, it promises to be another difficult assignment against a talented side, while the pressure will be on us as we look to solidify our position in fourth place in the table, which is likely to now become the only option for Champions League qualification.
With Tottenham not playing this weekend, Villa can move six points clear of our rivals, albeit they will have two games in hand, but it’s important to have the points on the board and put the pressure on them to respond at this crunch stage of the campaign.
In order to have the best possible chance of securing the desired result this weekend, Emery would have been hoping for good news on the injury and fitness front, and it sounds as positive as it could have been.
“It’s difficult to know today how the players finished exactly, thinking how they are going to be for Sunday,” he told the media, as per VillaTV. “Not available for Sunday is Álex Moreno, and Tyrone Mings, Emi Buendía, Jacob Ramsey and Boubacar Kamara.
“I think no more, but after the match we played yesterday we have wait for the last training tomorrow and we’ll decide.”
While Nicolo Zaniolo was forced off in the first half at Lille, Leon Bailey’s knee was heavily strapped even though he was able to come off the bench and make an important impact in the second half.
After 120 minutes of football plus penalties, the physical and emotional drain on the players would have been significant, and so to come away with no obvious setbacks that have already ruled anyone out is a major boost for Emery, albeit it’s still subject to the last training session on Saturday.
Time will tell if they’ll all be ready for Sunday afternoon, but we’ll certainly need another big shift from those involved, as after looking so impressive against Arsenal last weekend, our performance level undoubtedly dipped in midweek and tiredness may well have been one of the main causes.
Villa will have just under a week between the Bournemouth game and the visit of Chelsea next Saturday night, and while it feels as though we’ve been saying this every week for the past couple of months, it’s another massive week in our season as we could take a fundamental step towards a top-four finish with back-to-back positive results.