Aston Villa host Manchester City at Villa Park in the Premier League on Sunday as both sides head into the game in impressive form.
The Villans endured a difficult start to the campaign with Unai Emery, but they've started to turn things around, and have won their previous five games in the Premier League. Pep Guardiola's side head into the weekend's fixtures in second place in the table, picking up 16 points from their opening eight matches.
GIVEMESPORT have taken a look at the team news and how both sides could line up at Villa Park.
Aston Villa Team News
Youri Tielemans in action for Aston Villa
Youri Tielemans should be the only major injury concern for Villa, and he's expected to be a few weeks away from returning to action. Andres Garcia also remains on the treatment table, while there appeared to be no fresh injury concerns for the game against Man City.
Unai Emery Shares Harvey Elliott Aston Villa Update
Speaking to the media ahead of their game against Man City, Emery shared his feelings on Liverpool loanee Elliott...
“I am being very, very demanding myself to choose in each match the player to start and the players in the bench and the subs players, and firstly is always trying to get the best performance collectively, through individual players.
“Harvey is a 10 number in our structure, in our shape, and he plays some matches and there is still adaptation to add himself individually in our structure, the task we have.
“Of course, he is training well, and his commitment is being very well as well, but his performance was not enough (up to this point).
“At the same time, we have other players who can play as 10 number and they are performing well, and I have different players.
“This is the main reason he is not playing the last matches minutes, but he has to continue working like he is doing in the training session and of course getting his confidence in the performance we need through him.”
Aston Villa Predicted XI
Ollie Watkins Aston Villa
Aston Villa Predicted XI: Martinez; Cash, Konsa, Torres, Digne; Onana, Kamara; Guessand, Rogers, McGinn; Watkins.
Aston Villa Substitutes: Bizot (GK), Maatsen (DEF), Lindelof (DEF), Bogarde (DEF), Barkley (MID), Buendia (MID), Malen (FWD), Elliott (FWD), Sancho (FWD).
Villa could make just one change from their previous Premier League game, when they secured a 2-1 win away at Tottenham Hotspur. Ollie Watkins was left out of the starting XI that day, but we could see him come back into the side.
Otherwise, it could be an unchanged XI from Emery.
Man City Team News
Manchester City's Nico Gonzalez
Rodri is the main talking point for Man City fans, considering his importance to the side, and he's missed their last few games, and is expected to remain out. Nico Gonzalez is also a doubt for the weekend's fixture, while Abdukodir Khusanov isn't going to make it.
Guardiola should have no other issues to contend with, but he's going to have a decision to make in the middle of the park if Gonzalez and Rodri are out.
Pep Guardiola Drops Man City Team News Update
Speaking to the media ahead of the game against Villa, Guardiola said...
"It's not long [Rodri], but it's muscular and you have to be careful. We've tried so many times, we've tried to not take a risk, but we have not been able to do that. So we will see. We will see today and tomorrow how he feels [Gonzalez]."
Man City Predicted XI
Manchester City midfielder Mateo Kovacic
Man City Predicted XI: Donnarumma; Nunes, Stones, Dias, Gvardiol; Kovacic, Reijnders; Savinho, Foden, Doku; Haaland
Man City Predicted Substitutes: Trafford (GK), Ake (DEF), Lewis (DEF), Ait-Nouri (DEF), O'Reilly (DEF), Silva (MID), Cherki (FWD), Marmoush (FWD), Bobb (FWD).
Mateo Kovacic could come into the midfield if Rodri and Gonzalez are both unavailable. We could see an attacking trio of Savinho, Phil Foden, and Jeremy Doku behind Erling Haaland.
That could leave £340,000-a-week duo, Rayan Cherki and Nathan Ake, among the substitutes.