Villa will hope to make a positive start to the new campaign, but it promises to be a difficult challenge against a direct rival in the Magpies, who will be aiming for a similar finish in the standings as us.
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After a productive pre-season in which we thankfully avoided any serious injuries, there were knocks along the way, particularly in the back-end of our schedule, and that has led to a couple of players being ruled out of this contest.
However, as per [BirminghamLive](https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/morgan-rogers-injury-update-aston-32283119), Emery has confirmed that Morgan Rogers is available for selection having recovered from the ankle knock he suffered against Roma last week, but both Andres Garcia and Ross Barkley are sidelined with their own injury setbacks.
Further, Emiliano Martinez will play no part as he’s suspended following the red card that he received on the final day of last season, and so that in turn means Marco Bizot will get his Villa debut, and the Dutch shot-stopper will hope to build on his positive pre-season appearances.
Although there has yet to be an official announcement on Jacob Ramsey, it’s believed that his move to Newcastle will not be registered in time for him to feature against us this weekend, while we’ll wait to see if a summer signing of our own in Evann Guessand gets his debut.
Emery will no doubt put a strong Villa starting line-up out and still has good options on the bench if needed, but with more business expected in the latter stages of the transfer window, it’s a settled Villa side that will hopefully be able to continue to build on the progress and development that we’ve seen over the past two seasons, with that consistency and familiarity potentially giving us the edge and an important boost ahead of what promises to be another challenging year.
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