Aston Villa are preparing for their Premier League showdown against Brentford on Wednesday night.
The mood in the Aston Villa camp isn’t great after failing to win any of their previous eight matches in all competitions, most recently losing 2-0 to Chelsea.
Unai Emery now has a job to turn a side lacking confidence into one firing from all cylinders once more.
Ollie Watkins lacked an edge against Chelsea, missing two gilt-edged chances, while Emi Martinez was uncharacteristically poor in the first half of that defeat.
Villa simply need a victory to get them back on track, and perhaps Brentford presents a decent chance, with Paul Merson now sharing his prediction.
Sky Sports pundit Paul Merson during the Premier League match between Tottenham Hotspur FC and Arsenal FC at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on September...
Photo by James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images
Paul Merson predicts Aston Villa vs Brentford
The idea of looking into a team’s form often doesn’t alter the outcome of a match.
In the case of Brentford, they’re winless on their travels all this term, collecting just a single point from a possible 18 available.
According to Merson, this could hand Villa the advantage in this clash as he predicts the hosts to register an invaluable 2-1 win at Villa Park.
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“Aston Villa are in a sticky patch at the moment, but I have a feeling they will still get the win here,” Merson wrote in his column for Sportskeeda.
“Brentford are like chalk and cheese when they play at home compared to away games. They are unbeaten at home with six wins and a draw, while they are winless on the road with five losses and a draw so far this season! That horrendous away record is why I’m backing Villa in this game.
“If I was Brentford, I would leave an extra forward in the line-up and have a real swing at this game. Thomas Frank should approach this game like his team has nothing to lose and take the game to Villa. It’s a free swing for Brentford if you ask me, but I don’t think they will win.”
Unai Emery’s big Ollie Watkins call vs Brentford
As Villa go in pursuit of their first victory in nine matches, Emery could make some changes to the side that were comfortably beaten at the Bridge.
One of those could be enforced as Emery confirmed Emi Martinez had a hand injury at full-time, with the Argentine perhaps not ready to start against Brentford.
Meanwhile, there is one bold alteration he could make to the starting XI, and that is dropping Ollie Watkins for Jhon Duran.
Micah Richards was critical of Watkins against Chelsea as he didn’t bring his shooting boots to West London, as was Daniel Sturridge, who claimed Watkins was ‘doubting’ himself.
The Englishman is experiencing a poor run of form, scoring just once in his last five Premier League matches.
In normal circumstances, that would see a player get dropped by the manager however, we’ve seen how much Emery prefers Watkins over Duran – even when the 20-year-old was scoring for fun.
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