Aston Villa face Chelsea in the Premier League on Saturday night, and Douglas Luiz will be available for selection again as he returns from suspension.
The Brazilian international missed our wins over Arsenal and Bournemouth as he served a two-match league ban, albeit he has stayed sharp and heavily involved having featured in our Europa Conference League quarter-final tie against Lille.
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Now though, Villa boss Unai Emery has a selection headache this weekend, one that he would prefer to have as opposed to not having quality options at his disposal, as given how impressive the midfield partnership of Youri Tielemans and John McGinn was in those two outings, how does the Basque coach tweak his set-up to bring Luiz back into the fold?
The easy answer is to shift either Tielemans or McGinn into a more advanced role and restore Luiz in his preferred central midfield position where he can dictate and control play for us.
However, who is better suited to moving into that attacking role, and off the back of scoring an all-important goal against Bournemouth, is it Moussa Diaby who misses out this weekend?
What has arguably become apparent in recent weeks is that Villa lose a crucial balance and solidity when we have Luiz and Tielemans paired together in the heart of the midfield. While they give us technical quality and possession paired with grit and determination, we can be picked off more easily and the midfield bypassed which in turn puts our backline in trouble.
In contrast, McGinn’s energy, tenacity and positional awareness in a deeper, central position gives us that protection and balance in the side, and in turn allows Tielemans or Luiz to play with more freedom.
With that in mind, it’s hoped that Emery goes with Tielemans in support of Ollie Watkins in the final third, with Leon Bailey, McGinn, Luiz and Morgan Rogers forming our midfield quartet. That said, the Villa boss will certainly know what the best strategy to exploit Chelsea’s weaknesses is and one that gives us the best possible opportunity to come away with all three points.
As noted above, having healthy competition for places is absolutely vital for Emery and so this is by no means a piece that bemoans having such a positive conundrum. Particularly with our Europa Conference League semi-final tie with Olympiacos to come as well as four fundamental league games to try and qualify for the Champions League, we’ll need all our options to contribute and make an impact when called upon.
It will be an intriguing wait to see which combination Emery goes with in midfield though and how that impacts the team in both phases, but off the back of some brilliant results in the past fortnight, Villa have momentum and confidence going into another crunch showdown this weekend.