Aston Villa travel to Portman Road on Sunday to take on newly-promoted Ipswich Town.
Roy Keane, Ian Wright and Jamie Carragher provided their thoughts and predictions for that game in what is a huge week for the club.
Unai Emery’s side face Bayern Munich next Wednesday in what is the club’s first home Champions League match in decades.
You can’t blame fans for having one eye on that game because of the magnitude of it, but Aston Villa go into next week in strong form.
Villa have won four out of their five Premier League games, including beating Wycombe in the League Cup on Tuesday night.
As you would expect, Emery made wholesale changes for that match, with Amadou Onana the only starter remaining from the win over Wolves.
You suspect, a strong XI as possible will be named for Ipswich and then the same for Bayern, with lots of youngsters used against Wycombe.
There could be the possibility that Leon Bailey, who came off the bench against Wolves, comes back into the XI, whilst John McGinn is out with an injury and he is expected to be replaced by Ross Barkley.
Either way, Roy Keane and Ian Wright agreed that Villa will pick up another three points on Sunday, but once again, they expect them to concede.
The legendary striker warned ‘that will be a tough game at Ipswich’, but they still expect a positive result, as they told Stick to Football.
Jamie Carragher agreed, but he backed the Midlands side to secure their first clean sheet of the Premier League campaign by claiming ‘nobody is beating (Emi) Martinez’.
Roy Keane, Ian Wright and Jamie Carragher back Aston Villa to beat Ipswich
“Villa I am going,” stated Wright and Keane agreed: “Villa all day.” Jill Scott then tells Keane “You are loving Villa, at the minute.” to which he responded: “Villa are (brilliant). They have got loads of goals Villa.”
Wright added: “He is always loving Villa – this seems a 3-2 game. We have done too many 3-1s. That will be a tough game at Ipswich.”
“3-0,” asked Carragher as he looked over to Gary Neville. “2-0. Nobody is beating Martinez.”
Aston Villa’s defence
It’s a bit of a worry that Villa have played several poor sides this season, yet they haven’t kept a clean sheet, nor have they threatened to do so.
Ipswich are an aggressive and front-foot team. Villa will have to be wary because they won’t sit back and they are looking for their first win of the season.
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Diego Carlos produced a mixed display against Wolves, but was then taken away from the subs bench after picking up an injury during the warm-up at Wycombe.
If Carlos is fit, then you expect him to start again, but Villa’s backline and midfield need to start keeping clean sheets sooner rather than later.
