Leicester City vs Aston Villa: Time To Make Hay

Villa looked good again in a disappointing home defeat to Arsenal, but looks don’t get you points. They do, however, give you a gauge, and what I saw is a Villa that really does belong in the conversation. Two solid outings in the first two weeks is the sort of signal we were looking for. And we could quite easily have taken all six points, but for some rust and luck. Or lack thereof.

So, the feel-good factor remains and now Villa have a stretch they need to take advantage of. I’m hoping they’re smarting enough over what got away from them last week to go on the road and take care of business against Leicester in Youri Tieleman’s homecoming.

Team news is that Philogene is out, and Bogarde is in. One assumes he’s playing right back and got the nod over Kosta. Here’s hoping it’s a good debut for him.

Elsewhere, no changes:

Martinez, Bogarde, Konsa, Pau, Digne, Onana, Tielemans, McGinn, Bailey, Rogers, Watkins

The usual suspects remain available on the bench.

So, Emery will keep doing what he’s been doing and easing in players other than Onana. It’s a strong XI, and the options are reasonable.

Anyway, not much else to say. Oh, well, there’s the Champions League draw, and a very interesting set of fixtures in the league phase:

Tuesday, September 17: Young Boys v Aston Villa
Wednesday, October 2: Aston Villa v Bayern Munich
Tuesday, October 22: Aston Villa v Bologna
Wednesday, November 6: Club Brugge v Aston Villa
Wednesday, November 27: Aston Villa v Juventus
Tuesday, December 10: RB Leipzig v Aston Villa
Tuesday, January 21: AS Monaco v Aston Villa
Wednesday, January 29: Aston Villa v Celtic

In other words, can’t wait to get back from the break.

Over to you.