Aston Villa midfielder Boubacar Kamara
Aston Villa midfielder Boubacar Kamara (Image: DeFodi Images via Getty Images)
Boubacar Kamara is expected to start for Aston Villa against Chelsea so long as he gets through Saturday's training session after playing nearly 80 minutes against Juventus on Wednesday night following a hamstring injury.
The midfielder didn't feature against Crystal Palace last weekend due to the injury which he suffered before the November international break in Villa's 2-0 defeat against Liverpool at Anfield. Amadou Onana is closing in on a return from injury himself after picking up a foot problem two weeks ago while playing for Belgium, leaving Emery with a selection headache in midfield given the strong form of Youri Tielemans and Ross Barkley too.
"Kamara is getting better, he had a small injury, he was not available one match before, but after he played on Wednesday - he played feeling comfortable - I decided to reduce the last 20 minutes," Emery said when asked about his options ahead of facing Chelsea.
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"He needs minutes, but he needs as well, care with the minutes he is playing. We played on Wednesday, we play on Sunday, four days’ difference between one match and another. If everything is going well, if he comes in tomorrow well, my idea is to try and use the better players on Sunday as well, and one of them is Kamara, of course.
“The midfield we have now, with Kamara, with Onana, with Barkley, with Tielemans, I am happy, really happy. Of course, I want the players competing as well [with] each other, to try and help us in every position we have, but in the middle, we are now, with the players we can have, happy.”
Villa have won their last two Premier League away games against Chelsea, as many as in their previous 21 visits to Stamford Bridge. They last won three consecutive away league games against the Blues between 1930 and 1933.
"We are Aston Villa and we are in a process," Emery responded when asked how confident he is of getting another result at Chelsea. "We are more or less getting our high demands. To be consistent is our next challenge. We won there two times and drew in the FA Cup last year, drawing there 0-0. Now it is a different match, some different players, they have a different coach.
"They feel comfortable and they are more or less feeling consistency, progressively getting better. The challenge is this Sunday. The thing we have in our mind is to face a team who are more contenders than us to get into the top seven.
"We want to face them and fight as well to compete with the teams who are top seven contenders. We were better one month ago, but we still have the possibilities to be there."
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