Aston Villa boss Unai Emery has named his starting line-up vs Liverpool at Anfield on Sunday, and Emiliano Martinez returns from injury to replace Robin Olsen.
The 31-year-old suffered a calf injury in the first leg of our Europa Conference League play-off round tie with Hibernian, and having been replaced at half-time in that game, he went on to sit out our wins in the second leg and against Burnley last weekend.
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Having been named in Argentina’s squad for the upcoming international break, it had been expected that Martinez would be in contention feature on Merseyside, and fortunately, it has been confirmed that he is set to return to the starting XI.
Given his experience, leadership, goalkeeping ability and his distribution, it will be a vital boost to have him back despite Olsen doing a solid job in his absence, and we’ll hopefully have a strong foundation on which to go out and win the game this weekend.
Meanwhile, Clement Lenglet is named on the bench after his loan move from Barcelona this past week, and it’s a strong bench as a whole for Emery, with a number of quality options at his disposal to bring on and change the game if needed.
Leander Dendoncker returned in midweek and is included in the matchday squad to give us another boost in midfield, while the likes of Leon Bailey, Nicolo Zaniolo and Jhon Duran are in reserve ready to make an impact, or ideally are options to bring on and help us see out the game in the latter stages.
Villa have bounced back brilliantly from that opening weekend defeat at Newcastle Utd, and it’s hoped that we can sign off before the international break with another significant win to continue to build confidence and momentum.
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