- Aston Villa have taken 16 points from the last 18 available in the Premier League 
- Nottingham Forest head to Villa Park harbouring top flight's worst away record
- Recommended bet: Aston Villa to win and over 2.5 goals

Aston Villa’s improvement under Unai Emery has gone slightly under the radar, with the Villans winning 10 of 16 Premier League matches to rise from a relegation scrap to within touching distance of Europe.

A midweek victory over Leicester took Emery’s men up into seventh and, if they can maintain their impressive results, then Villa supporters will be aiming to pip the likes of Chelsea, Liverpool and Brighton to a Europa League spot.

There is a tough run-in left for them to navigate, but Saturday’s arrival of Nottingham Forest looks by far the easiest of Villa’s remaining fixtures.

The visitors will be in no mood to play willing victims given they are fighting tooth and nail to battle their way out of relegation danger, but Steve Cooper’s team arrive in terrible form and with a woeful away record.

Team news

Aston Villa will be without both full-back Matty Cash and attacking midfielder Philippe Coutinho until late April, while midfielder Boubacar Kamara is a doubt this weekend due to an ankle injury.

Nottingham Forest centre-forward Chris Wood and defender Giulian Biancone are out for the season and centre-back Wily Boly will also miss the bulk of the campaign.

Goalkeeper Dean Henderson, full-back Omar Richards and defender Scott McKenna are expected to return later this month, while midfielder Ryan Yates is unlikely to feature and right-back Serge Aurier is a major doubt.

The stats

Nottingham Forest’s midweek defeat at fellow strugglers Leeds made it 10 losses and just one win from 14 away games this season, handing them the joint-worst away record in the Premier League.

That record looks even worse when you remove their games against others in the bottom five, with Forest taking just one point from 10 trips to teams placed 15th and higher, scoring just two goals across those matches.

Aston Villa claimed just 0.82 points-per-game under Steven Gerrard in their first 11 league matches of 2022-23 but that average has more than doubled to exactly two points per game in the 16 matches under Emery.

The Villans have won five and drawn one of their last six league outings, despite four of those coming away from home and that run includes a 2-0 victory at Chelsea.

Forest, by contrast, are winless in their last eight league games and have lost each of their last four away trips, conceding 11 goals.

Prediction

Nottingham Forest are starting to look in serious danger of relegation, with their away form having been dreadful all season, while the points they were picking up on home soil at the City Ground have dried up.

A run of four successive matches without a home win has dropped Cooper’s men level on points with the bottom three and their desperate lack of goals on the road makes ‘under 0.5 Forest goals’ an appealing Bet Builder option.

Villa, on the other hand, have been a revelation under Emery.

Their current seventh-placed standing might be hard to build on given their tough run-in, but Emery’s side will rightly regard the arrival of a poor-travelling Forest team as a chance to cut loose and build momentum ahead of sterner challenges.

Villa’s last home game, a stylish 3-0 rout of Bournemouth, suggests they can dispatch an even weaker visitor to Villa Park by a similar scoreline this weekend.

Back Aston Villa to win and over 2.5 goals, available at 31/20 with LiveScore Bet.

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