Leicester hope to halt Villa’s impressive start at the King Power

With Aston Villa and especially Jack Grealish in exceptional form coming into this midlands clash, the Villains will be looking to thrive on Leicester’s injury problems, which has caused them major defensive problems over the last couple of weeks.

Considering the Villa captain didn’t get on the pitch for both of England’s Nations League games (this to the disarray of most football fans in England), Grealish will be keen to kick on for Villa, and continue to put pressure on Gareth Southgate to start the 25-year-old.

Leicester come into this fixture missing lots of key players, including doubts for Jamie Vardy, Jonny Evans and Çağlar Söyüncü. This will be a problem for the Foxes as they lack squad depth, the prospect of competing in the Europa League also looming from next week.

James Maddison is also uncertain to feature for Brendan Rodgers’ men, and it is proven that Leicester miss him when they play without him, most recently shown against West Ham before the international break, where the inability to create stopped them from getting a result.

In the last matchday, a weekend which featured many surprising results, Villa’s new man Ollie Watkins scored a first half hat-trick and Jack Grealish had a hand in five of the goals as they ran out 7-2 victors over champions Liverpool. The 24-year-old striker signed for £32m in the summer after scoring 26 goals for Brentford in the Championship last season.  

Both Leicester and Aston Villa won their opening three games of the season and are scoring for fun, however City’s momentum was halted by West Ham United and Rodgers’ men will be eager to bounce back this weekend.

Photo – AVFC

“I simply cannot turn this offer down to play for Leicester City” was the quote from new boy Wesley Fofana  earlier this month, the 19-year-old will be making his debut for the Foxes against Villa. Costing around £30m from French side Saint-Étienne, Leicester fans will be hoping he can settle down in England quickly.

Keeping two clean sheets in his recent involvement for the France U21’s, Fofana and Leicester will be praying for a clean sheet and a win against a strong remastered Villa side who look 100 times the team they were last season.

This fixture is always an entertaining one, and is one the Foxes have done well with in recent years. A win for Villa would represent the first time since 1930 that they’ve won their first four matches in a league campaign.