New season, new kit, new hopes.While Villa's stars will no doubt look the part when they pull on the brand-new FxPro kit against Basingstoke and Peterborough, the early pre-season assignments are all about making sure they are well fashioned for the serious business of the Barclays Premier League.The hard work has begun on the training pitch but the trips to The Camrose and London Road, on Sunday and Monday, provide early opportunities to see how Martin O'Neill's men are shaping up, as they embark on a varied pre-season programme.Villa face a diverse mix of opponents over the next month, beginning with the Blue Square South outfit on Sunday [ko 2pm] and League One Posh the following evening [ko 7.45pm].The gulf in leagues does not matter at this stage. As goalkeeper Brad Friedel explains, it is all about getting mind and body prepared ahead of the big kick off on August 14."As you are going through pre-season you are obviously going to have varying degrees of opponents in front of you," he said."That doesn't matter where you are - whether you play your games here or whether you go abroad."The most important thing is that you get your fitness right, you get your timing right and that you start playing with each other again."After you get the first couple of weeks under your belt and your legs start coming back, then you can start progressing your fitness on to the next level and get ready for August 14."The Basingstoke clash brings Villa up against O'Neill's former Nottingham Forest team-mate Frank Gray - whom he lined up alongside in the 1980 European Cup final.Peterborough, under new boss Gary Johnson, have already produced one admirable pre-season performance against Premier League opposition, when they were edged out 2-1 by West Ham last week.Both games form an important part of Villa's plans, as they look to hit the ground running when the top-flight season begins."First of all, I think the most important thing is the kick-off itself," O'Neill said."It is how you are prepared. Last year, for instance, we thought we had prepared very well indeed."We won the Peace Cup, albeit with a group of young players in the side. Some players like Gabby Agbonlahor and James Milner hadn't participated in the pre-season, simply because of they had played in the England under-21 competition so they had time off."The long and the short of it - we lost 2-0 against Wigan. So you are never sure about whether you preparation is right."Here not only do we have the start of the season, we have these important qualification games in the Europa League and we want to try and be as fit as possible."Around 12 months ago, Villa kicked off an exciting pre-season campaign with a 3-0 victory at Peterborough.Andreas Weimann, the man who opened the scoring that day, will be unavailable to take on Posh this time around.The Austrian and fellow youngsters Nathan Delfouneso and Nathan Baker miss out on the trips to Hampshire and Cambridgeshire because of international commitments.The trio are set to kick off their Euro U19 Championship campaigns in France on Sunday, with Delfouneso and Baker named in the England squad to face Weimann's Austria.The early pre-season fixtures also come too soon for World Cup stars James Milner, Emile Heskey, Stephen Warnock and Brad Guzan, who were given extra time to recover after their involvement in the summer showpiece.
Team is....Parish, L Young, Shorey, Hogg, Cuellar, Davies, Albrighton, Osbourne, Forrester, Bannan, Herd
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Topic: Pre-season Friendlies Match Thread (Read 279510 times)
