Aston Villa v Wigan Athletic Pre-Match Thread

[peckvillajunior]

Either a comfortable win or a frustrating 0-0 I reckon. Much of that depending on whether Al Habsi has one of his "ten world class saves" days, or one of his "chuck the ball into his own net three times" days.

[Sister of Top Cat]

We're doomed.  Lawro has us down to win 2-1.

[Rip Van We Go Again]

Heskey and Dunne back, Makoun still out

sportinglife.com

Aston Villa striker Emile Heskey has recovered from a knee problem and will be fit to face his former club Wigan at Villa Park on Saturday.

Heskey was ruled out of last weekend's 2-1 defeat at West Brom and was replaced by Gabriel Agbonlahor.

But he has returned to training and is in contention to face the Latics.

Caretaker manager Gary McAllister said: "Emile has come back in and trained the past couple of days.

"He had a bit of fluid on his knee which had caused a bit of swelling but that has settled down."

Midfielder Jean Makoun will again not be risked with the dead leg which prevented him from facing Albion.

McAllister said: "Jean has a dead leg and has been feeling it for a while now so we pulled him out of training.

"He has upped his training this week but he's only been with the physios and not joined in with the full group.

"We're just going to hold him back again so he won't be available."

Defender Richard Dunne has recovered from a similar knock which led to him being substituted early in the second period against the Baggies.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

I'd shake it up a bit.

                             Friedel

Walker        Collins          Dunne       Young

                   Reo Coker     Delph

Downing                                           Young

                     Bent        Gabby

Marshall, Clark, Cuellar, Makoun, Gardner, Albrighton, Heskey,

Almost there. Swap Carlos for Collins as Wigan have a bit of pace up front and you're there. Love the idea of seeing what Delph can do with NRC protecting the defence. Not sure about Gardner on the bench. Having only seen him once this season (against Chelsea), he did a wonderful impersonation of the Invisible Man. I'd be tempted to put Bannan or Bradley there instead. It really depends who's preforming well at Bodymoor Heath.

[levico]

Gary Mac in charge?  Doomed!!

[Rudy Can't Fail]

I'm going for a 4-0 home win.

[TheSandman]

If I was picking the team my main concern would be the defence. I'd drop at least one of the chuckle brothers.

I might bring Delph into midfield but nothing else major.

[taylorsworkrate]

Its obvious we have more talent in our team than they do.  However, they'll play more like a team and want it more.

1 - 3

[ez]

2 - 2 draw. Them, us, us, them.

[mozza]

1-1 with Darren getting the goal to ensure our safety ............

[Matt C]

They need to go for it, we're best on the break so I'll go 3-2 Villa.

[Brian Taylor]

Losing is not an alternative..losing is a hopeless cause.
Losing is giving it all away..

[pooligan]

Well this being the Villa and never doing anything easy,we will probably be awful and outplayed in the first half and be booed off at half time losing 1-0 . In the second half we will come out a changed side like we did at Everton ,draw level, get in front and then just when we think we,ve won give a stupid goal away or more likely have a bad decision go against us and end up drawing .

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

9-1 win.
Once again, no clean sheet.

[asgpaul]

Would love to see Carlos given a game in place of either Dunne or Collins and Pires not included in the squad. 

Think Wigan are there for the taking, with the right man in charge, the players would be in no doubt what they'd need to do, but with Gary Mac in charge, I fear another clueless performance but we'll scrape three points and in the process, hopefully help to send Wigan down.