Aston Villa boss Unai Emery has provided fitness updates on our injured players ahead of facing Everton on Sunday.
Following our defeat to Newcastle Utd last weekend in our Premier League season opener, the focus this week is bouncing back to pick up our first three points of the campaign.
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It won’t be easy against an Everton side desperate for points themselves after they also endured a losing start, and so Villa will need to produce a much-improved performance compared to last time out, if we hope to immediately get back on track.
Having lost both Emiliano Buendía and Tyrone Mings to significant knee injuries last week, we’ll be without the influential duo for most, if not all, of this season, and so others will now have to step up and fill those voids as best as possible so that the blow of their respective absences is softened.
However, they’re not the only ones who have been sidelined, and the Villa boss provided an update on our other injured players, with the expectation being that they will all still be missing this weekend.
“We have two long-term injuries with Emi Buendía and Tyrone Mings,” he told the media, as per VillaTV. “They had surgery this week and now is the moment to be with their families, and start slowly working a little bit. But, of course, it’s a long time to come back with us. And then we have to continue, we are trying to carry on in our way.
“We are recovering some players – Bertrand Traoré and Jhon Durán started training with us this week.
“Álex Moreno is close to being back with us. Jacob Ramsey is still some weeks from coming back to us.
“But we are ready to play on Sunday and trying to have a good impact at home in the first match (of the season) with our supporters.”
While that rules out both Moreno and Ramsey, it doesn’t sound as though Traore or Duran will be fit enough to feature this weekend despite resuming training as they look to now build up their match fitness and sharpness, although it remains to be seen if they can make the bench.
With our Europa Conference League play-off round against Hibernian to consider too, with the first leg taking place on Wednesday evening, Emery will have to get the balance right in the coming weeks in terms of rotation.
In the more immediate future though, it’s imperative that we secure a win on Sunday to regain confidence and put that Newcastle defeat firmly behind us, and so we can undoubtedly expect as strong a starting XI as possible to be put out on the pitch.
With 8 first team players out are we going to have a strong starting 11 a couple more injuries and we will be well and truly stuffed and it only the second game of the season