Champions League-chasing Aston Villa will be looking to get back on track in the Premier League when they host Crystal Palace this weekend.
There are nine places between the two sides in the table, with Aston Villa in ninth and Palace in 18th, but both teams have suffered through a poor run of form.
Unai Emery’s men lost four on the bounce in all competitions before the break while the Eagles were held to a draw by Wolves and beaten by Fulham.
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Supporters will expect no less than three points from Villa this weekend, despite Emery’s injury troubles, and Chris Sutton has now offered his verdict on the clash.
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Chris Sutton predicts Aston Villa vs Crystal Palace
Emery wanted to use the international break to work hard on the training ground and have his squad refreshed and ready for the hectic Christmas schedule.
Sadly, the Spaniard revealed in his pre-match press conference that Amadou Onana and Ezri Konsa will miss the Palace clash through injury.
Onana and Konsa join two other players, Boubacar Kamara and Jacob Ramsey on the physio bench, though their absence isn’t expected to be long.
Despite missing four important players, former Premier League striker Sutton is backing Villa to return to winning ways while praising Emery in the process.
Predicting a 2-1 win for the hosts, Sutton told BBC Sport: “Aston Villa have lost four in a row in all competitions but Crystal Palace have even more cause for concern.
“Logic tells me that Villa will come good, because Unai Emery is a superb organiser of teams and we have already seen long spells of them at their best.
“Villa need to click again, but they are at home which will help. Palace’s form is getting pretty desperate under Oliver Glasner, and I don’t see that changing this week.”
Sutton isn’t alone in thinking the hosts will secure victory, as Paul Merson predicted Villa to beat Palace 2-0.
Aston Villa stars were on form during the international break
Emery will be cursing his luck during the break as both Onana and Konsa suffered injuries, dealing blows to the Villa starting XI.
It wasn’t all bad news for the former Arsenal manager, though, as some of his players were in red-hot form for their countries.
Jude Bellingham was impressed with Morgan Rogers on his England debut against Greece while striker Ollie Watkins scored in that match.
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Captain John McGinn was also in fine scoring form for Scotland, coming off the bench to score the winner against Croatia before netting after just three minutes in the victory over Poland.
Emery will now hope that McGinn, Watkins and his other first-team stars can produce similar heroics for Villa during the Christmas schedule.
