The winning feeling is back and Unai Emery will have a little smile on his face.
The Aston Villa boss won’t go too overboard, just like he didn’t during the eight-game winless run, but those back-to-back wins have changed morale.
It started with Villa’s win over Brentford in midweek – Emery made two changes for that match from the Chelsea defeat – bringing Leon Bailey back into the starting XI and the long-awaited Premier League start for Tyrone Mings.
Even though Mings impressed against Brentford, he was never going to start again in the space of a few days, simply because his body isn’t ready for it.
That’s why, for Villa’s 1-0 win over Southampton on Saturday afternoon, further changes were made to the XI, with Pau Torres coming in for Mings, alongside Diego Carlos, with Matty Cash making way and Ezri Konsa going to right-back.
Added to that, Ollie Watkins dropped to the bench and Jhon Duran earned his first Premier League start of the campaign, as well as Ian Maatsen starting instead of Lucas Digne, but Tim Sherwood feels the message from the manager was pretty clear.
Unai Emery showed Southampton ‘no respect’ by starting Aston Villa trio Ian Maatsen, Diego Carlos and Jhon Duran
Even though Carlos has started a fair few games this season, he is still seen as a back-up player when everyone is fit, whilst Maatsen and Duran are certainly bench players.
So, this was a clear sign from Emery, ahead of the midweek trip to Leipzig, that he needed to rest some of his big boys and he did just that.
But Sherwood thinks the Villa boss was showing Russell Martin’s side ‘no respect’ because that’s what other teams across the Premier League have also been doing, as he told Sky Sports News (07/12/24 at 2:45 pm).
Chelsea put five goals past the bottom-of-the-table Premier League side in midweek and they also rested some of their big-name players ahead of their London showdown against Tottenham on Sunday.
“It’s a game where he (Emery) wants to rest players,” said Sherwood.
“But everyone seems to be doing it against Southampton. They are showing them absolutely no respect whatsoever. Whenever they need to play players who haven’t got any minutes, they are doing it.
“I mean Maatsen is playing instead of Digne. We looked at Ollie, he is going to sit on the bench and have a rest. Now they are going to play Duran. Mings, who played in midweek and he did well. It was good to see Tyrone Mings back. He was left out again and Carlos comes in. Matty Cash, who scored a goal, they are all using their reserve players against Southampton. It’s the correct thing to do if you win the game.”
Leon Bailey injury update
One of the reasons Emery is making such changes is to keep his players refreshed and for them to avoid injuries given the high calibre of games they are playing.
But Villa were unfortunate that Leon Bailey went off injured in the second half against Southampton.
It depends on how you look at it, on the one hand, he is set to be sidelined, but not as long as it would have been first feared, as Emery shared via John Townley’s Twitter account.
“He didn’t feel it a lot but I think [he will miss] minimum, one, two or three weeks,” said Emery.
